{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_51652/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_51652","id":"gutenberg_51652","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/51652","summary":null,"tags":["Category: British Literature","Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches","Category: Poetry","Category: Religion/Spirituality","English literature"],"text":"THE\n\n    WORKS\n\n    OF\n\n    JOHN DRYDEN,\n\n    NOW FIRST COLLECTED\n\n    _IN EIGHTEEN VOLUMES_.\n\n           *       *       *       *       *\n\n    ILLUSTRATED\n\n    WITH NOTES,\n\n    HISTORICAL, CRITICAL, AND EXPLANATORY,\n\n    AND\n\n    A LIFE OF THE AUTHOR,\n\n    BY\n\n    WALTER SCOTT, ESQ.\n\n           *       *       *       *       *\n\n    VOL. X.\n\n    LONDON:\n    PRINTED FOR WILLIAM MILLER, ALBEMARLE STREET,\n    BY JAMES BALLANTYNE AND CO. EDINBURGH.\n\n    1808.\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\nOF\n\nVOLUME TENTH.\n\n\n                                                                   PAGE.\n\n    Religio Laici, or a Layman's Faith, an Epistle,                    1\n    Preface,                                                          11\n\n    Threnodia Augustalis, a Funeral Pindaric Poem, sacred\n    to the happy Memory of King Charles II.                           53\n    Notes,                                                            79\n\n    The Hind and the Panther, a Poem, in Three Parts,                 85\n    Preface,                                                         109\n    Notes on Part I.                                                 139\n    Part II.                                                         159\n    Notes on Part II.                                                185\n    Part III.                                                        195\n    Notes on Part III.                                               240\n\n    Britannia Rediviva, a Poem on the Birth of the\n    Prince,                                                          283\n    Notes,                                                           302\n\n    Prologues and Epilogues,                                         309\n\n    Mack-Flecknoe, a Satire against Thomas Shadwell,                 425\n    Notes,                                                           441\n\n\n\n\nRELIGIO LAICI:\n\nOR,\n\nA LAYMAN'S FAITH.\n\nAN EPISTLE.\n\n_Ornari res ipsa negat; contenta doceri._\n\n\n\n\nARGUMENT.\n\nTAKEN FROM THE AUTHOR'S MARGINAL NOTES.\n\n\n    Opinions of the several Sects of Philosophers concerning the\n    _Summum bonum_.--System of Deism.--Of Revealed Religion.--Objection\n    of the Deist.--Objection answered.--Digression to the Translator\n    of Father Simon's Critical Edition of the Old Testament.--Of the\n    Infallibility of Tradition in general.--Objection in behalf of\n    Tradition, urged by Father Simon.--The Second Objection.--Answered.\n\n\n\n\nRELIGIO LAICI.\n\n\nThe _Religio Laici_, according to Johnson, is almost the only work of\nDryden which can be considered as a voluntary effusion. I do not see\nmuch ground for this assertion. Dryden was indeed obliged to write by\nthe necessity of his circumstances; but the choice of the mode in which\nhe was to labour was his own, as well in his Fables and other poems,\nas in that which follows. Nay, upon examination, the _Religio Laici_\nappears, in a great measure, a controversial, and almost a political\npoem; and, being such, cannot be termed, with propriety, a voluntary\neffusion, any more than \"The Medal,\" or \"Absalom and Achitophel.\"\nIt is evident, Dryden had his own times in consideration, and the\neffect which the poem was likely to produce upon them. Religious\ncontroversy had mingled deeply with the party politics of the reign\nof Charles II. Divided, as the nation was, into the three great sects\nof Churchmen, Papists, and Dissenters, their several creeds were\nexamined by their antagonists with scrupulous malignity, and every\nhint extracted from them which could be turned to the disadvantage of\nthose who professed them. To the Catholics, the dissenters objected\ntheir cruel intolerance and jesuitical practices; to the church of\nEngland, their servile dependence on the crown, and slavish doctrine\nof non-resistance. The Catholics, on the other hand, charged the\nreformed church of England with desertion from the original doctrines\nof Christianity, with denying the infallibility of general councils,\nand destroying the unity of the church; and against the fanatics,\nthey objected their anti-monarchical tenets, the wild visions of\ntheir independent preachers, and their seditious cabals against the\nchurch and state. While the church of England was thus assailed by\ntwo foes, who did not at the same time spare each other, it probably\noccurred to Dryden, that he, who could explain her tenets by a plain\nand philosophical commentary, had a chance, not only of contributing\nto fix and regulate the faith of her professors, but of reconciling to\nher, as the middle course, the Catholics and the fanatics. The Duke\nof York and the Papists, on the one hand, were urging the king to the\nmost desperate measures; on the other, the popular faction were just\nnot in arms. The king, with the assistance and advice of Halifax, was\ntrimming his course betwixt these outrageous and furious torrents.\nWhatever, therefore, at this important crisis, might act as a sedative\non the inflamed spirits of all parties, and encourage them to abide\nwith patience the events of futurity, was a main point in favour of\nthe crown. A rational and philosophical view of the tenets of the\nnational church, liberally expressed, and decorated with the ornaments\nof poetry, seemed calculated to produce this effect; and as I have\nno doubt, as well from the preface, as from passages in the poem,\nthat Dryden had such a purpose in view, I have ventured to place the\n_Religio Laici_ among his historical and political poems.[1]\n\nI would not, from what is above stated, be understood to mean, that\nDryden wrote this poem merely with a view to politics, and that he\nwas himself sceptical in the matters of which it treats.--On the\ncontrary, I have no doubt, that it expresses, without disguise or\nreservation, what was then the author's serious and firm, though, as\nit unfortunately proved, not his unalterable religious opinion. The\nremarkable line in the \"Hind and Panther,\" seems to refer to the state\nof his mind at this period; and this system of divinity was among the\n\"new sparkles which his pride had struck forth,\" after he had abandoned\nthe fanatical doctrines in which he was doubtless educated.[2] It is\ntherefore probable, that, having formed for himself, on grounds which\nseemed to warrant it, a rational exposition of the national creed,\nhe was willing to communicate it to the public at a period, when\nmoderation of religious zeal was so essentially necessary to the repose\nof the nation.\n\nConsidered in this point of view, the _Religio Laici_ is one of the\nmost admirable poems in the language. The argumentative part is\nconducted with singular skill, upon those topics which occasioned the\nprincipal animosity between the religious sects; and the deductions\nare drawn in favour of the church of England with so much apparent\nimpartiality, that those who could not assent, had at least no title\nto be angry. The opinions of the various classes of free-thinkers\nare combated by an appeal to those feelings of the human mind, which\nalways acknowledge an offended Deity, and to the various modes in\nwhich all ages and nations have shewn their sense of the necessity\nof an atonement by sacrifice and penance. Dryden, however, differs\nfrom most philosophers, who suppose this consciousness of guilt to be\noriginally implanted in our bosoms: he, somewhat fantastically, argues,\nas if it were some remnants of the original faith revealed to Noah,\nand preserved by the posterity of Shem. The inadequacy of sacrifices\nand oblations, when compared with the crimes of those by whom they are\nmade, and with the grandeur of the omnipotent Being, to whom they are\noffered, paves the way for the imputed righteousness of Jesus Christ,\nthe fundamental doctrine of the Christian religion. The fitness of\nthis vicarious sacrifice to accomplish the redemption of man, and\nvindicate the justice and mercy of God; the obvious impossibility that\nthe writings, or authors, by which it has been conveyed to us, should\nbe less than inspired; the progress of the Christian faith itself,\nthough militating against the corrupt dispositions of humanity, and\ngraced with none of those attractions by which Mahomet, and other\nfalse prophets, bribed their followers, are then successively urged\nas evidences of the Christian religion. The poet then recurs to an\nobjection, at which he had hinted in his preface. If the Christian\nreligion is necessary to salvation, why is it not extended to all\nnations of the earth? And suppose we grant that the circumstance of\nthe revealed religion having been formerly preached and embraced in\ngreat part of the world where it is now unknown, shall be sufficient\nto subject those regions to be judged by its laws, what is to become\nof the generations who have lived before the coming of the Messiah?\nwhat of the inhabitants of those countries on which the beams of the\ngospel have never shone? To these doubts, I hope most Christians will\nthink our author returns a liberal, and not a presumptuous answer,\nin supposing that the heathen will be judged according to the light\nwhich it has pleased God to afford them; and that, infinitely less\nfortunate than us in the extent of their spiritual knowledge, they will\nonly be called upon to answer for their conformity with the dictates\nof their own conscience. The authority of St Athanasius our author\nhere sets aside, either because in the ardour of his dispute with\nArius he carried his doctrine too far, or because his creed only has\nreference to the decision of a doctrinal question in the Christian\nchurch; and the anathema annexed applies not to the heathen world,\nbut to those, who, having heard the orthodox faith preached, have\nwilfully chosen the heresy. Dryden next takes under review the work\nof Father Simon; and, after an eulogy on the author and translator,\npronounces, that the former was not a bigotted Catholic, since he\ndid not hesitate to challenge some of the traditions of the church\nof Rome. To these traditions, these \"brushwood helps,\" with which\nthe Catholics endeavoured to fence the doctrines of their church,\nour author proceeds, and throws them aside as liable to error and\ncorruption. The pretensions of the church of Rome, by her pope and\ngeneral councils, infallibly to determine the authenticity of church\ntradition, is the next proposition. To this the poet answers, that\nif they possess infallibility at all, it ought to go the length of\nrestoring the canon, or correcting the corrupt copies of scripture; a\nreply which seems to concede to the Romans; as, without denying the\ngrounds of their claim, it only asserts, that it is not sufficiently\nextended. Upon, the ground, however, that the plea of infallibility, by\nwhich the poet is obviously somewhat embarrassed, must be dismissed,\nas proving too much, the holy scriptures are referred to as the sole\nrule of faith; admitting such explanations as the church of England\nhas given to the contested doctrines of Christianity. The unlettered\nChristian, we are told, does well to pursue, in simplicity, his path to\nheaven; the learned divine is to study well the sacred scriptures, with\nsuch assistance as the most early traditions of the church, especially\nthose which are written, may, in doubtful points, afford him. It is in\nthis argument chiefly, that there may be traced a sort of vacillation\nand uncertainty in our author's opinion, boding what afterwards took\nplace--his acquiescence in the church authority of Rome. Nevertheless,\nhaving vaguely pronounced, that some traditions are to be received,\nand others rejected, he gives his opinion against the Roman see, which\ndictated to the laity the explications of doctrine as adopted by the\nchurch, and prohibited them to form their own opinion upon the text,\nor even to peruse the sacred volume which contains it. This Dryden\ncontrasts with the opposite evil, of vulgar enthusiasts debasing\nscripture by their own absurd commentaries, and dividing into as many\nsects, as there are wayward opinions formed upon speculative doctrine.\nHe concludes, that both extremes are to be avoided; that saving faith\ndoes not depend on nice disquisitions; yet, if inquisitive minds are\nhurried into such, the scripture, and the commentary of the fathers,\nare their only safe guides:\n\n    And after hearing what our church can say,\n    If still our reason runs another way,\n    That private reason 'tis more just to curb,\n    Than by disputes the public peace disturb;\n    For points obscure are of small use to learn,\n    But common quiet is mankind's concern.\n\nIn considering Dryden's creed thus analyzed, I think it will appear,\nthat the author, though still holding the doctrines of the church\nof England, had been biassed, in the course of his enquiry, by those\nof Rome. His wish for the possibility of an infallible guide,[3]\nexpressed with almost indecent ardour, the difficulty, nay, it would\nseem, in his estimation, almost the impossibility, of discriminating\nbetween corrupted and authentic traditions, while the necessity of the\nlatter to the interpretation of scripture is plainly admitted, appear,\nupon the whole, to have left the poet's mind in an unpleasing state\nof doubt, from which he rather escapes than is relieved. He who only\nacquiesces in the doctrines of his church, because the exercise of his\nprivate judgement may disturb the tranquillity of the state, can hardly\nbe said to be in a state to give a reason for the faith that is in him.\n\nThe doctrine of the _Religio Laici_ is admirably adapted to\nthe subject: though treating of the most abstruse doctrines of\nChristianity, it is as clear and perspicuous as the most humble prose,\nwhile it has all the elegance and effect which argument is capable\nof receiving from poetry. Johnson, usually sufficiently niggard of\npraise, has allowed, that this \"is a composition of great excellence\nin its kind, in which the familiar is very properly diversified with\nthe solemn, and the grave with the humorous; in which metre has\nneither weakened the force, nor clouded the perspicuity of argument;\nnor will it be easy to find another example, equally happy, of this\nmiddle kind of writing, which, though prosaic in some parts, rises to\nhigh poetry in others, and neither towers to the skies, nor creeps\nalong the ground.\"[4] I cannot help remarking, that the style of the\n_Religio Laici_ has been imitated successfully by the late Mr Cowper\nin some of his pieces. Yet he has not been always able to maintain\nthe resemblance, but often crawls where Dryden would have walked. The\nnatural dignity of our author may be discovered in the lamest lines of\nthe poem, whereas his imitator is often harsh and embarrassed. Both are\noccasionally prosaic; but in such passages Dryden's verse resembles\ngood prose, and Cowper's that which is feeble and involved.\n\nThe name which Dryden has thought proper to affix to this declaration\nof his faith, seems to have been rather fashionable about that time.\nThere is a treatise _de Religione Laici_, attached to the work of\nLord Herbert of Cherburg, _De Veritate_, first published in 1633. But\nthe most famous work, with a similar title, was the _Religio Medici_\nof Thomas Browne, which was translated into Latin by Meryweather,\nand afterwards into French, Italian, Dutch, German, and most of the\nlanguages of Europe. In 1683, Charles Blount, of Staffordshire, son\nto Sir Henry Blount, published a short treatise, entitled, _Religio\nLaici_, which he inscribed to his \"much honoured friend, John Dryden,\nEsq.;\" whom he informed, in the epistle-dedicatory, \"I have endeavoured\nthat my discourse should only be a continuance of yours; and that, as\nyou taught men how to believe, so I might instruct them how to live.\"[5]\n\nIt has been suggested, that the purpose of the _Religio Laici_ of\nDryden was to bring the contending factions to sober and philosophical\nreflection on their differences in points of faith, and to abate, if\npossible, the acrimony with which they contended upon the most obscure\nsubjects of polemical divinity. But to attempt, by an abstracted\ndisquisition on the original cause of quarrel, to stop a controversy,\nin which all the angry passions had been roused, and which indeed was\nfast verging towards blows, is as vain an attempt, as it would be to\nturn the course of a river, swoln with a thousand tributary streams,\nby draining the original spring-head. From the cold reception of\nthis poem, compared to those political and personal satires which\npreceded it, Dryden might learn the difference of interest, excited by\nproductions which tended to fan party rage, and one which was designed\nto mitigate its ferocity. The _Religio Laici_, which first appeared\nin November 1682, neither attracted admiration nor censure; it was\nneither hailed by the acclamations of the one party, nor attacked\nby the indignant answers of the other. The public were, however,\nsufficiently interested in it to call for a renewal of the impression\nin the following year. This second edition, which had escaped even the\nresearches of Mr Malone, is in the collection of my friend Mr Heber.\nIt might probably have been again reprinted with advantage, but our\nauthor's change of faith must necessarily have rendered him unwilling\nto give a third edition. The same circumstance called the attention of\nhis enemies towards this neglected poem, who, in many libels, upbraided\nhim with the versatility of his religious opinions. The author of a\npamphlet, called \"The Revolter,\" was at the pains to print the tenets\nof the _Religio Laici_ concerning the Catholic controversy, in contrast\nwith those which our author had adopted and expressed in the \"Hind and\nPanther.\"[6] Another turned our author's own title against him, and\npublished \"_Religio Laici_, or a Layman's Faith touching the Supream\nand Infallible Guide of the Church, by J. R. a Convert of Mr Bayes.\nIn Two Letters to a Friend in the Country. Licenced June the 1st,\n1688.\" In both these pamphlets our author is treated with the grossest\ninsolence and brutality.[7] Excepting these malignant criticisms, the\n_Religio Laici_ slept in obscurity after the second edition, and was\nnot again published till after the author's death. Neither has it been\nsince popular, although its pure spirit of Christianity should be\nacceptable to the religious, its moderation to the philosopher, and the\nexcellence of the composition to all admirers of argumentative poetry.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 1: It was intimated by Dryden's enemies, that he chose this\nreligious and grave subject with a view to smooth the way to his taking\norders, and obtaining church preferment--See a quotation from the\n_Religio Laici_, by J. R. subjoined to these introductory remarks. But\nour author, in the preface to the \"Fables,\" declares, that going into\nthe church was never in his thoughts.]\n\n[Footnote 2: The reader will find this opinion more fully expressed in\nthe observations on Dryden's conversion to the Roman Catholic faith,\ngiven in the Life.]\n\n[Footnote 3:\n\n    Such an omniscient church we wish indeed;\n    'Twere worth both Testaments, cast in the creed.\n]\n\n[Footnote 4: Johnson's Life of Dryden.]\n\n[Footnote 5: Malone, Vol. III. p. 310.]\n\n[Footnote 6: \"The Revolter, a Tragi-Comedy, acted between the Hind and\nPanther and _Religio Laici_. London. 1687.\"]\n\n[Footnote 7: As will appear from the following extracts:--\"While he\nsat thus in his poetical throne, or rather acting upon the stage of\nfable and pagan mythology, and transfiguring into beasts almost all\nmankind, but Turks and infidels, that were out of his road, he never\nconsidered what a monster he was himself; a second Gorgon with three\nheads, for each of which he had a particular employment; with the one,\nto fawn upon the most infamous usurpers; with the other, at one time\nto lick the beneficent hands of his Protestant mother, and, bye and\nbye, to court the charity of his Catholic mamma; while, with the third,\nhe barked and snarled, not only at his first deserted female parent,\nbut also at all other differing sentiments and opinions, which his\nsovereign had so graciously and generously indulged.\"\n\n    But 'twas his wrath, because his native church\n    Left his high expectations in the lurch.\n\n           *       *       *       *       *\n\n    He saw the play-wright laureate debauched\n    By the times, vices which he himself reproached;\n    And, by his grand reform stage-pit fools;,\n    Judged his ability to manage souls.\n    The comedy, to see him preach for aught,\n    She knew might tragic prove to those he taught;\n    By ill instructions to their loss beguiled,\n    Or scorning precepts from a tongue defiled\n    With stage obscenity----\n    For who could have refrained from sportive mirth,\n    To hear the nation's poet, Bayes, hold forth?\n    Or who would ever practice by the rule\n    Of one they could not chuse but ridicule?\n    The scandal was the greater, the more rare,\n    An ordained play-wright in the house of prayer.\n    While people only flock to hear him chime\n    A rampant sermon forth in brilly rhime;\n    Or else his gaping auditors he feasts\n    With bold Isaiah's raptures, and Ezekiel's beasts.\n    All this the church foresaw, nor could endure\n    Polluted lips should handle things most pure.\n\n    _The Revolter_, p. 2.\n\nBut, to give the devil his due, I must needs own Mr Bayes has a\nmost powerful and luxurious hand at satire, and may challenge all\nChristendom to match him; for indeed I never, in my slender province,\nmet any that was worthy to compare to him, unless that unknown, but\nsupposed worthy author, that writ to him upon his at last turning Roman\nCatholic; for Bayes, like the Vicar of Bray, in Henry VIII. Edward\nVI. Queen Mary, and Queen Elizabeth's times, was resolved to keep his\nplace; (and the quoting an author to the purpose, is the same thing,\nthe learned say, as if it was his own), and that will, I hope, excuse\nmy putting them down here:--\n\n    \"Thou mercenary renegade, thou slave,\n    Thou ever changing still to be a knave;\n    What sect, what error, wilt thou next disgrace?\n    Thou art so _lude_, so scandalously base,\n    That antichristian popery may be\n    Ashamed of such a proselyte as thee;\n    Not all thy rancour, or felonious spite,\n    Which animates thy lumpish soul to write,\n    Could ha' contrived a satire more severe,\n    Or more _disgrace_ the cause thou wouldst prefer.\n    Yet in thy favour, this must be confest,\n    It suits with thy poetic genius best;\n    There thou----\n    To truths disused, mayst entertain\n    Thyself with stories, more fanciful and vain\n    Than _e'er_ thy poetry could _ever_ fain;\n    Or sing the lives of thy own fellow saints,\n    'Tis a large field, and thy assistance wants;\n    Thence copy out new operas for the stage,\n    And with their miracles direct the age.\n    Such is thy faith, if faith thou hast indeed,\n    For well we may suspect the poet's creed,\n    Rebel to God, blasphemer o' the king,\n    Oh tell whence could this strange compliance spring?\n    So mayest thou prove to thy new gods as true,\n    As thy old friend, the devil, has been to you.\n    Yet conscience and religion's your pretence,\n    But bread and drink the _methologick_ sense.\n    Ah! how persuasive is the want of bread,\n    Not reasons from strong box more strongly plead.\n    A convert, thou! 'tis past all believing;\n    'Tis a damned scandal, of thy foes contriving;\n    A jest of that malicious monstrous fame--\n    The honest layman's faith is still the same.\"\n\n    _Religio Laici, by J. R. a Convert of Mr Bayes._\n\nIn such coarse invective were Dryden's theological poems censured by\npersons, who, far from writing decent poetry, or even common sense,\ncould neither spell, nor write tolerable grammar.]\n\n\n\n\nTHE\n\nPREFACE.\n\n\nA Poem, with so bold a title, and a name prefixed from which the\nhandling of so serious a subject would not be expected, may reasonably\noblige the author to say somewhat in defence, both of himself and of\nhis undertaking. In the first place, if it be objected to me, that,\nbeing a layman, I ought not to have concerned myself with speculations,\nwhich belong to the profession of divinity; I could answer, that\nperhaps laymen, with equal advantages of parts and knowledge, are not\nthe most incompetent judges of sacred things; but, in the due sense\nof my own weakness, and want of learning, I plead not this; I pretend\nnot to make myself a judge of faith in others, but only to make a\nconfession of my own. I lay no unhallowed hand upon the ark, but wait\non it, with the reverence that becomes me, at a distance. In the next\nplace, I will ingenuously confess, that the helps I have used in\nthis small treatise, were many of them taken from the works of our\nown reverend divines of the church of England; so that the weapons\nwith which I combat irreligion, are already consecrated; though I\nsuppose they may be taken down as lawfully as the sword of Goliah was\nby David, when they are to be employed for the common cause against\nthe enemies of piety. I intend not by this to entitle them to any of\nmy errors, which yet I hope are only those of charity to mankind;\nand such as my own charity has caused me to commit, that of others\nmay more easily excuse. Being naturally inclined to scepticism in\nphilosophy, I have no reason to impose my opinions in a subject which\nis above it; but whatever they are, I submit them with all reverence\nto my mother church, accounting them no further mine, than as they are\nauthorised, or at least uncondemned, by her. And, indeed, to secure\nmyself on this side, I have used the necessary precaution of shewing\nthis paper before it was published to a judicious and learned friend;\na man indefatigably zealous in the service of the church and state,\nand whose writings have highly deserved of both. He was pleased to\napprove the body of the discourse, and I hope he is more my friend\nthan to do it out of complaisance: It is true, he had too good a\ntaste to like it all; and, amongst some other faults, recommended\nto my second view, what I have written, perhaps too boldly, on St\nAthanasius, which he advised me wholly to omit. I am sensible enough,\nthat I had done more prudently to have followed his opinion; but then\nI could not have satisfied myself, that I had done honestly not to\nhave written what was my own. It has always been my thought, that\nheathens, who never did, nor without miracle could, hear of the name\nof Christ, were yet in a possibility of salvation. Neither will it\nenter easily into my belief, that before the coming of our Saviour,\nthe whole world, excepting only the Jewish nation, should lie under\nthe inevitable necessity of everlasting punishment, for want of that\nrevelation, which was confined to so small a spot of ground as that\nof Palestine. Among the sons of Noah, we read of one only who was\naccursed; and, if a blessing, in the ripeness of time, was reserved\nfor Japhet, of whose progeny we are, it seems unaccountable to me, why\nso many generations of the same offspring, as preceded our Saviour in\nthe flesh, should be all involved in one common condemnation, and yet\nthat their posterity should be entitled to the hopes of salvation; as\nif a bill of exclusion had passed only on the fathers, which debarred\nnot the sons from their succession: or, that so many ages had been\ndelivered over to hell, and so many reserved for heaven, and that the\ndevil had the first choice, and God the next. Truly I am apt to think,\nthat the revealed religion, which was taught by Noah to all his sons,\nmight continue for some ages in the whole posterity. That afterwards it\nwas included wholly in the family of Shem, is manifest; but when the\nprogenies of Cham and Japhet swarmed into colonies, and those colonies\nwere subdivided into many others, in process of time their descendants\nlost, by little and little, the primitive and purer rites of divine\nworship, retaining only the notion of one deity; to which succeeding\ngenerations added others; for men took their degrees in those ages\nfrom conquerors to gods. Revelation being thus eclipsed to almost all\nmankind, the light of nature, as the next in dignity, was substituted;\nand that is it which St Paul concludes to be the rule of the heathens,\nand by which they are hereafter to be judged. If my supposition be\ntrue, then the consequence, which I have assumed in my poem, may be\nalso true; namely, that Deism, or the principles of natural worship,\nare only faint remnants, or dying flames, of revealed religion, in the\nposterity of Noah; and that our modern philosophers, nay, and some of\nour philosophising divines, have too much exalted the faculties of our\nsouls, when they have maintained, that, by their force, mankind has\nbeen able to find out, that there is one supreme agent, or intellectual\nbeing, which we call God; that praise and prayer are his due worship;\nand the rest of those deducements, which I am confident are the remote\neffects of revelation, and unattainable by our discourse, I mean as\nsimply considered, and without the benefit of divine illumination. So\nthat we have not lifted up ourselves to God, by the weak pinions of our\nreason, but he has been pleased to descend to us; and what Socrates\nsaid of him, what Plato writ, and the rest of the heathen philosophers\nof several nations, is all no more than the twilight of revelation,\nafter the sun of it was set in the race of Noah. That there is\nsomething above us, some principle of motion, our reason can apprehend,\nthough it cannot discover what it is by its own virtue: and, indeed,\nit is very improbable that we, who, by the strength of our faculties,\ncannot enter into the knowledge of any being, not so much as of our\nown, should be able to find out, by them, that supreme nature, which we\ncannot otherwise define, than by saying it is infinite; as if infinite\nwere definable, or infinity a subject for our narrow understanding.\nThey, who would prove religion by reason, do but weaken the cause\nwhich they endeavour to support: it is to take away the pillars from\nour faith, and to prop it only with a twig; it is to design a tower,\nlike that of Babel, which, if it were possible, as it is not, to reach\nheaven, would come to nothing by the confusion of the workmen. For\nevery man is building a several way; impotently conceited of his own\nmodel and his own materials, reason is always striving, and always at a\nloss; and of necessity it must so come to pass, while it is exercised\nabout that which is not its proper object. Let us be content, at last,\nto know God by his own methods; at least, so much of him as he is\npleased to reveal to us in the sacred Scriptures. To apprehend them to\nbe the word of God is all our reason has to do; for all beyond it is\nthe work of faith, which is the seal of heaven impressed upon our human\nunderstanding.\n\nAnd now for what concerns the holy Bishop Athanasius, the preface\nof whose creed seems inconsistent with my opinion, which is, that\nheathens may possibly be saved. In the first place, I desire it may\nbe considered, that it is the preface only, not the creed itself,\nwhich, till I am better informed, is of too hard a digestion for my\ncharity.[8] It is not that I am ignorant, how many several texts of\nScripture seemingly support that cause; but neither am I ignorant,\nhow all those texts may receive a kinder, and more mollified\ninterpretation. Every man, who is read in church history, knows that\nbelief was drawn up after a long contestation with Arius, concerning\nthe divinity of our blessed Saviour, and his being one substance\nwith the Father; and that thus compiled, it was sent abroad among\nthe Christian churches, as a kind of test, which, whosoever took,\nwas looked on as an orthodox believer.[9] It is manifest from hence,\nthat the heathen part of the empire was not concerned in it; for its\nbusiness was not to distinguish betwixt Pagans and Christians, but\nbetwixt heretics and true believers. This, well considered, takes off\nthe heavy weight of censure, which I would willingly avoid from so\nvenerable a man; for if this proportion, \"whosoever will be saved,\"\nbe restrained only to those to whom it was intended, and for whom it\nwas composed, I mean the Christians; then the anathema reaches not the\nheathens, who had never heard of Christ, and were nothing interested\nin that dispute. After all, I am far from blaming even that prefatory\naddition to the creed, and as far from cavilling at the continuation\nof it in the liturgy of the church, where, on the days appointed, it\nis publicly read: for I suppose there is the same reason for it now,\nin opposition to the Socinians, as there was then against the Arians;\nthe one being a heresy, which seems to have been refined out of the\nother; and with how much more plausibility of reason it combats our\nreligion, with so much more caution it ought to be avoided: therefore,\nthe prudence of our church is to be commended, which has interposed\nher authority for the recommendation of this creed. Yet to such as are\ngrounded in the true belief, those explanatory creeds, the Nicene and\nthis of Athanasius, might perhaps be spared; for what is supernatural\nwill always be a mystery in spite of exposition; and, for my own part,\nthe plain Apostles creed is most suitable to my weak understanding, as\nthe simplest diet is the most easy of digestion.\n\nI have dwelt longer on this subject than I intended, and longer than\nperhaps I ought; for, having laid down, as my foundation, that the\nScripture is a rule; that in all things needful to salvation it is\nclear, sufficient, and ordained by God Almighty for that purpose; I\nhave left myself no right to interpret obscure places, such as concern\nthe possibility of eternal happiness to heathens; because whatsoever is\nobscure is concluded not necessary to be known.\n\nBut, by asserting the Scripture to be the canon of our faith,\nI have unavoidably created to myself two sorts of enemies; the\npapists, indeed, more directly, because they have kept the Scripture\nfrom us what they could, and have reserved to themselves a right\nof interpreting what they have delivered under the pretence of\ninfallibility; and the fanatics, more collaterally, because they\nhave assumed what amounts to an infallibility in the private spirit,\nand have distorted those texts of Scripture which are not necessary\nto salvation, to the damnable uses of sedition, disturbance, and\ndestruction of the civil government. To begin with the papists, and to\nspeak freely, I think them the less dangerous (at least in appearance)\nto our present state; for not only the penal laws are in force against\nthem, and their number is contemptible, but also their peerage and\ncommons are excluded from parliaments, and consequently those laws in\nno probability of being repealed. A general and uninterrupted plot of\ntheir clergy, ever since the Reformation, I suppose all protestants\nbelieve; for it is not reasonable to think, but that so many of their\norders, as were outed from their fat possessions, would endeavour a\nre-entrance against those whom they account heretics.[10] As for the\nlate design, Mr Coleman's letters, for aught I know, are the best\nevidence; and what they discover, without wire-drawing their sense, or\nmalicious glosses, all men of reason conclude credible.[11] If there be\nany thing more than this required of me, I must believe it as well as\nI am able, in spite of the witnesses, and out of a decent conformity to\nthe votes of parliament; for I suppose the fanatics will not allow the\nprivate spirit in this case. Here the infallibility is at least in one\npart of the government; and our understandings, as well as our wills,\nare represented. But, to return to the Roman Catholics, how can we be\nsecure from the practice of jesuited papists in that religion? For not\ntwo or three of that order, as some of them would impose upon us, but\nalmost the whole body of them, are of opinion, that their infallible\nmaster has a right over kings, not only in spirituals, but temporals.\nNot to name Mariana, Bellarmine, Emanuel Sa, Molina, Santarel,\nSimancha,[12] and at least twenty others of foreign countries, we\ncan produce of our own nation, Campian, and Doleman or Parsons,[13]\n(besides many [who] are named whom I have not read,) who all of them\nattest this doctrine, that the pope can depose and give away the right\nof any sovereign prince, _si vel paulum deflexerit_, if he shall never\nso little warp; but if he once comes to be excommunicated, then the\nbond of obedience is taken off from subjects; and they may and ought\nto drive him, like another Nebuchadnezzar, _ex hominum Christianorum\ndominatu_, from exercising dominion over Christians; and to this\nthey are bound by virtue of divine precept, and by all the ties of\nconscience, under no less penalty than damnation. If they answer me,\n(as a learned priest has lately written,) that this doctrine of the\nJesuits is not _de fide_, and that consequently they are not obliged\nby it, they must pardon me, if I think they have said nothing to the\npurpose; for it is a maxim in their church, where points of faith are\nnot decided, and that doctors are of contrary opinions, they may follow\nwhich part they please, but more safely the most received and most\nauthorized. And their champion, Bellarmine, has told the world, in his\nApology, that the king of England is a vassal to the pope, _ratione,\ndirecti dominii_,[14] and that he holds in villanage of his Roman\nlandlord; which is no new claim put in for England: our chronicles are\nhis authentic witnesses, that King John was deposed by the same plea,\nand Philip Augustus admitted tenant; and, which makes the more for\nBellarmine, the French king was again ejected when our king submitted\nto the church, and the crown received under the sordid condition of a\nvassalage.\n\nIt is not sufficient for the more moderate and well-meaning papists,\nof which I doubt not there are many, to produce the evidences of their\nloyalty to the late king, and to declare their innocency in this plot.\nI will grant their behaviour in the first to have been as loyal and as\nbrave as they desire; and will be willing to hold them excused as to\nthe second, (I mean when it comes to my turn, and after my betters;\nfor it is a madness to be sober alone, while the nation continues\ndrunk:) but that saying of their father Cres.[15] is still running in\nmy head,--that they may be dispensed with in their obedience to an\nheretic prince, while the necessity of the times shall oblige them\nto it; (for that, as another of them tells us, is only the effect of\nChristian prudence;) but when once they shall get power to shake him\noff, an heretic is no lawful king, and consequently to rise against him\nis no rebellion. I should be glad, therefore, that they would follow\nthe advice which was charitably given them by a reverend prelate of our\nchurch, namely, that they would join in a public act of disowning and\ndetesting those jesuitic principles, and subscribe to all doctrines\nwhich deny the pope's authority of deposing kings, and releasing\nsubjects from their oath of allegiance; to which, I should think,\nthey might easily be induced, if it be true, that this present pope\nhas condemned the doctrine of king-killing; a thesis of the Jesuits,\nmaintained, amongst others, _ex cathedra_, as they call it, or in open\nconsistory.\n\nLeaving them, therefore, in so fair a way, (if they please themselves,)\nof satisfying all reasonable men of their sincerity and good meaning\nto the government, I shall make bold to consider that other extreme\nof our religion, I mean the fanatics, or schismatics, of the English\nchurch. Since the Bible has been translated into our tongue, they have\nused it so, as if their business was not to be saved, but to be damned\nby its contents. If we consider only them, better had it been for the\nEnglish nation, that it had still remained in the original Greek and\nHebrew, or at least in the honest Latin of St Jerome, than that several\ntexts in it should have been prevaricated to the destruction of that\ngovernment, which put it into so ungrateful hands.\n\nHow many heresies the first translation of Tyndal[16] produced in few\nyears, let my Lord Herbert's History of Henry the Eighth inform you;\ninsomuch that, for the gross errors in it, and the great mischiefs\nit occasioned, a sentence passed on the first edition of the Bible,\ntoo shameful almost to be repeated.[17] After the short reign of\nEdward the Sixth, (who had continued to carry on the Reformation on\nother principles than it was begun,) every one knows, that not only\nthe chief promoters of that work, but many others, whose consciences\nwould not dispense with popery, were forced, for fear of persecution,\nto change climates; from whence returning at the beginning of Queen\nElizabeth's reign, many of them, who had been in France, and at Geneva,\nbrought back the rigid opinions and imperious discipline of Calvin,\nto graft upon our Reformation;[18] which, though they cunningly\nconcealed at first, (as well knowing how nauseously that drug would\ngo down in a lawful monarchy, which was prescribed for a rebellious\ncommonwealth,) yet they always kept it in reserve; and were never\nwanting to themselves, either in court or parliament, when either they\nhad any prospect of a numerous party of fanatic members in the one,\nor the encouragement of any favourite in the other, whose covetousness\nwas gaping at the patrimony of the church. They who will consult\nthe works of our venerable Hooker,[19] or the account of his life,\nor more particularly the letter written to him on this subject, by\nGeorge Cranmer,[20] may see by what gradations they proceeded; from\nthe dislike of cap and surplice, the very next step was admonitions\nto the parliament against the whole government ecclesiastical; then\ncame out volumes in English and Latin in defence of their tenets; and\nimmediately practices were set on foot to erect their discipline\nwithout authority. Those not succeeding, satire and railing was the\nnext; and Martin Mar-prelate,[21] (the Marvel of those times,) was the\nfirst presbyterian scribbler, who sanctified libels and scurrility\nto the use of the good old cause: which was done, (says my author,)\nupon this account, that their serious treatises having been fully\nanswered and refuted, they might compass by railing what they had lost\nby reasoning; and, when their cause was sunk in court and parliament,\nthey might at least hedge in a stake amongst the rabble, for to their\nignorance all things are wit which are abusive; but if church and\nstate were made the theme, then the doctoral degree of wit was to be\ntaken at Billingsgate; even the most saintlike of the party, though\nthey durst not excuse this contempt and vilifying of the government,\nyet were pleased, and grinned at it with a pious smile, and called it\na judgment of God against the hierarchy. Thus sectaries, we may see,\nwere born with teeth, foul-mouthed, and scurrilous from their infancy;\nand if spiritual pride, venom, violence, contempt of superiors, and\nslander, had been the marks of orthodox belief, the presbytery, and the\nrest of our schismatics, which are their spawn, were always the most\nvisible church in the Christian world.[22]\n\nIt is true, the government was too strong at that time for a rebellion;\nbut, to shew what proficiency they had made in Calvin's school, even\nthen their mouths watered at it; for two of their gifted brotherhood,\nHacket and Coppinger, as the story tells us, got up in a pease-cart\nand harangued the people, to dispose them to an insurrection, and to\nestablish their discipline by force;[23] so that, however it comes\nabout, that now they celebrate Queen Elizabeth's birth-night, as that\nof their saint and patroness; yet then they were for doing the work of\nthe Lord by arms against her;[24] and in all probability they wanted\nbut a fanatic lord-mayor, and two sheriffs of their party, to have\ncompassed it.[25]\n\nOur venerable Hooker, after many admonitions which he had given them,\ntowards the end of his preface, breaks out into this prophetic speech:\n\"There is in every one of these considerations most just cause to fear,\nlest our hastiness to embrace a thing of so perilous consequence,\n(meaning the presbyterian discipline,) should cause posterity to feel\nthose evils, which as yet are more easy for us to prevent, than they\nwould be for them to remedy.\"\n\nHow fatally this Cassandra has foretold, we know too well by sad\nexperience. The seeds were sown in the time of Queen Elizabeth; the\nbloody harvest ripened in the reign of King Charles the Martyr; and,\nbecause all the sheaves could not be carried off without shedding some\nof the loose grains, another crop is too like to follow; nay, I fear\nit is unavoidable, if the conventiclers be permitted still to scatter.\n\nA man may be suffered to quote an adversary to our religion, when\nhe speaks truth; and it is the observation of Maimbourg,[26] in his\n\"History of Calvinism,\" that wherever that discipline was planted\nand embraced, rebellion, civil war, and misery, attended it. And how\nindeed should it happen otherwise? Reformation of church and state\nhas always been the ground of our divisions in England. While we\nwere papists, our Holy Father rid us, by pretending authority out of\nthe Scriptures to depose princes; when we shook off his authority,\nthe sectaries furnished themselves with the same weapons, and out of\nthe same magazine, the Bible; so that the Scriptures, which are in\nthemselves the greatest security of governors, as commanding express\nobedience to them, are now turned to their destruction; and never\nsince the Reformation has there wanted a text of their interpreting to\nauthorize a rebel. And it is to be noted by the way, that the doctrines\nof king-killing and deposing, which have been taken up only by the\nworst party of the Papists, the most frontless flatterers of the pope's\nauthority, have been espoused, defended, and are still maintained, by\nthe whole body of nonconformists and republicans. It is but dubbing\nthemselves the people of God, which it is the interest of their\npreachers to tell them they are, and their own interest to believe,\nand after that, they cannot dip into the Bible, but one text or another\nwill turn up for their purpose: if they are under persecution, as they\ncall it, then that is a mark of their election; if they flourish, then\nGod works miracles for their deliverance, and the saints are to possess\nthe earth.\n\nThey may think themselves to be too roughly handled in this paper;\nbut I, who know best how far I could have gone on this subject, must\nbe bold to tell them, they are spared; though, at the same time, I am\nnot ignorant, that they interpret the mildness of a writer to them, as\nthey do the mercy of the government; in the one they think it fear, and\nconclude it weakness in the other. The best way for them to confute\nme is, as I before advised the Papists, to disclaim their principles,\nand renounce their practices. We shall all be glad to think them true\nEnglishmen, when they obey the king; and true Protestants, when they\nconform to the church-discipline.\n\nIt remains that I acquaint the reader, that the verses were written\nfor an ingenious young gentleman, my friend, upon his translation\nof \"The Critical History of the Old Testament,\" composed by the\nlearned father Simon:[27] the verses, therefore, are addressed to the\ntranslator of that work, and the style of them is, what it ought to be,\nepistolary.[28]\n\nIf any one be so lamentable a critic as to require the smoothness,\nthe numbers, and the turn of heroic poetry in this poem, I must tell\nhim, that if he has not read Horace, I have studied him, and hope\nthe style of his epistles is not ill imitated here. The expressions\nof a poem, designed purely for instruction, ought to be plain and\nnatural, and yet majestic; for here the poet is presumed to be a kind\nof lawgiver, and those three qualities, which I have named, are proper\nto the legislative style. The florid, elevated, and figurative way, is\nfor the passions; for love and hatred, fear and anger, are begotten\nin the soul, by shewing their objects out of their true proportion,\neither greater than the life, or less; but instruction is to be given\nby shewing them what they naturally are. A man is to be cheated into\npassion, but to be reasoned into truth.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 8: \"Whosoever will be saved, before all things it is\nnecessary that he hold the Catholic faith.\n\n\"Which faith, except every one do keep whole and undefiled, without\ndoubt he shall perish everlastingly.]\n\n[Footnote 9: The controversy between Athanasius and Arius long divided\nthe Christian church. The former was patriarch of Alexandria, and\nthe latter bishop of Nicomedia, in Asia. The dispute regarded the\ngodhead of the Trinity. The doctrine of Arius, that God the Son was\nnot co-existent, consequently, not equal in dignity with God the\nFather, was condemned by the grand general council of Nice, and he\nwas banished. But he was afterwards recalled by the emperor; and his\nheresy spread so widely, that almost all the Christian world were at\none time Arians. As a test of the true orthodox doctrine, Athanasius\ncomposed the creed which goes by his name. Being written expressly for\nthis purpose, and for the exclusive use of the Christian world, Dryden\nargues, with great apparent justice, that the anathema with which it\nis fenced, has no relation to the heathens, and that we cannot, with\ncharity, or even logically, argue from thence concerning their state in\nthe next world.]\n\n[Footnote 10: \"It is certain, that the restless and enterprising spirit\nof the Catholic church, particularly of the Jesuits, merits attention,\nand is, in some degree, dangerous to every other communion. Such\nzeal of proselytism actuates that sect, that its missionaries have\npenetrated into every nation of the globe, and, in one sense, there is\na Popish-plot perpetually carrying on against all states, Protestant,\nPagan, and Mahometan.\"--HUME, Vol. VII. p. 72.]\n\n[Footnote 11: The unfortunate Edward Coleman was secretary to the\nDuke of York, and in high favour with his master. With the intriguing\nspirit of a courtier, and the zeal of a Catholic, he had long carried\non a correspondence with Father La Chaise, confessor to the king of\nFrance, with the Pope's nuncio, and with other Catholics abroad, for\nthe purpose, as he himself states it, of \"the conversion of three\nkingdoms, and by that, perhaps, the utter subduing of a pestilent\nheresy, which has a long time domineered over a great part of the\nnorthern world.\" It would seem, from these letters, that it was\nthe purpose of the Catholics, to begin by obtaining, if possible,\na toleration, or exemption from the penal laws; and then, while\nstrengthening themselves by new converts, to await the succession of\nJames, or the open declaration of Charles in favour of their religion.\nFrom various points it appears, that Coleman was a better Catholic\nthan an Englishman; and would not have hesitated to sacrifice the\ninterests of his country to France, if, by so doing, he could have\nbrought her faith nearer to Rome. There were also indications of both\nthe king's and duke's accessibility to foreign influence, which were\nfraught with consequences highly dangerous to the country. But, while\nthe Catholics were availing themselves of these unworthy dispositions\nin the royal brothers, it was quite absurd to suppose, that they should\nhave forfeited every prospect of success, by assassinating these very\npersons, upon whose lives their whole plan depended, to place upon the\nthrone the Prince of Orange, the head of the Protestant League. Yet,\nalthough not the least trace is to be found in Coleman's letters of\nthe murders, invasions, fires, and massacres, which Oates and Bedloe\nbore witness to, the real and imaginary conspiracy were identified by\nthe general prepossession of the nation; and Coleman, who undoubtedly\ndeserved death for his unlawful and treasonable trafficking with\nforeign interests against the religion and liberty of his country,\nactually suffered for a plot which was totally chimerical.]\n\n[Footnote 12: These are all Jesuits and controversial writers.\n\nMariana maintains, that it is well for princes to believe, that if\nthey become oppressive to their people, they may be killed, not\nonly lawfully, but most commendably.--_Institut._ pp. 61, 64. In\nthe 6th chapter of the same work, he calls the murder of Henry III.\nof France by Jaques Clement, \"_insignem animi confidentiam--facinus\nmemorabile--c\u00e6so rege, ingens sibi nomen fecit_.\"\n\nBellarmine declares roundly, that all heretics are to be cut off,\nunless they are the stronger party, and then the Catholics must remain\nquiet, and wait a fitter time.--_De Laicis_, Liber III. cap. 22.\n\nSimancha affirms, \"_propter H\u00e6resin Regis, non solum Rex regno\nprivatur, et a communione fidelium diris proscriptionibus separatur;\nsed et ejus filii a regni successione pelluntur_.\" Suarez expressly\nsays, \"_Regem excommunicatum impune deponi vel occidi quibuscunque\nposse_.\"--Suarez in Reg. Mag. Brit. Lib. 6. cap 6. \u00a7 24.\n\nThese are sufficient examples of the doctrine laid down in the text,\nwhich, I believe, is now as much detested by Roman Catholics as by\nthose of other religions.]\n\n[Footnote 13: Edmund Campian, and Robert Parsons, English Jesuits,\nin the year 1580, obtained a bull from the Pope, declaring, that the\nprevious bull of Pius V., deposing and excommunicating Queen Elizabeth,\ndid forever bind the heretics, but not the Catholics, till a favourable\nopportunity should occur of putting it into execution. Thus armed,\nthey came into England, their native country, for the express purpose\nof proclaiming the pope's right to dethrone monarchs, and that Queen\nElizabeth's subjects were freed from their allegiance. Campian was\nhanged for preaching this doctrine, A. D. 1581. Parsons, finding\nEngland too hot for him, fled beyond seas, and settled at Rome. He\npublished many works, both in English and Latin, against the church\nand state of England; one of which is, \"A Conference about the next\nSuccession of the Crown of England.\" printed in 1593, under the name of\nN. Doleman. The first part contains the doctrine concerning the right\nof the church to chastise kings, and proceed against them. This book\nthe fanatics found so much to their purpose, that they reprinted it,\nto justify the murder of Charles I.--_Athen\u00e6 Oxon._ Vol. I. p. 358.\nDoleman, under whose name it was originally published, was a quiet\nsecular priest, who abhorred such doctrines. Parsons, the real author,\ndied at Rome in 1610.]\n\n[Footnote 14: The _Dominium directum_ is the right of seignory\ncompetent to a feudal superior, in opposition to the _Dominium utile_,\nor actual possession of the lands which is held by the vassal.]\n\n[Footnote 15: Hugh Paulin Cressy, better known by the name of Serenus\nCressy, which he adopted upon entering into a religious state, was\noriginally chaplain to the unfortunate Strafford, and afterwards to\nthe gallant Falkland; but, having gone abroad after the civil wars,\nhe became a convert to the Catholic faith, and a benedictine monk\nin the English college of Douay. After the Restoration, he returned\nto England, and was appointed chaplain to Queen Catherine. He was\nremarkable for regularity of life, unaffected piety, modest and mild\nbehaviour. But in mystical doctrines, he was an enthusiast; and in\nreligion, a zealot. He was the principal conductor of controversy\non the part of the papists; and published many treatises against\nStillingfleet, Pierce, Bagshaw, and other champions of the protestant\nfaith. His chief work was the Church History of Brittany, from the\nbeginning of Christianity to the Norman Conquest.--See _Athen\u00e6; Oxon._\nII. p. 528.]\n\n[Footnote 16: The passage in Lord Herbert's history, referred to by\nDryden, seems to be that which follows:\n\n\"For as the scriptures began then commonly to be read, so out of the\nliteral sense thereof, the manner of those times was, promiscuously\nto draw arguments, for whatsoever in matter of state or otherwise was\nto be done. Insomuch, that the text which came nearest the point in\nquestion, was taken as a decision of the business; to the no little\ndetriment of their affairs: The scriptures not pretending yet to give\nregular instructions in those points. But this is so much less strange,\nthat the year preceding, the Scriptures (heretofore not permitted\nto the view of the people) were now translated in divers languages,\nand into English, by Tindal, Joy, and others, though, as not being\nwarranted by the king's authority, they were publickly burnt, and a new\nand better translation promised to be set forth, and allowed to the\npeople. It being not thought fit by our king, that under what pretence\nor difficulty soever, his subjects should be defrauded of that, wherein\nwas to be found the word of God, and means of their salvation. Howbeit\nnot a few inconveniences were observed to follow. For as the people did\nnot sufficiently separate the more clear and necessary parts thereof,\nfrom the obscure and accessory; and as again taking the several authors\nto be equally inspired, they did equally apply themselves to all; they\nfell into many dangerous opinions: Little caring how they lived, so\nthey understood well, bringing religion thus into much irresolution\nand controversie, while few men agreeing on the same interpretation\nof the harder places, vexed each others conscience, appropriating to\nthemselves the gift of the spirit. Whereof the Roman church, (much\nperplext at first with these defections) did at last avail itself; as\nassuming alone the power of that decision, which yet was used more\nin favour of themselves, than such an analogy, as ought to be found\nin so perfect a book. So that few were satisfied therewith, but such\nas, renouncing their own judgment, and submitting to theirs, yielded\nthemselves wholly to an implicit faith; in which, though they found\nan apparent ease, yet as, for justifying of themselves, the authority\nof their belief was derived more immediately from the church, than\nthe scripture, not a few difficulties were introduced, concerning\nboth: While the more speculative sort could not imagine, how to hold\nthat as an infallible rule, which needed humane help to vindicate and\nsupport it; nevertheless, as by frequent reading of the scripture at\nthis time, it generally appeared what the Roman church had added or\naltered in religion, so many recovered a just liberty, endeavouring\ntogether a reformation of the doctrine and manners of the clergy, which\nyet, through the obstinacy of some, succeeded worse, than so pious\nintentions deserved.\"]\n\n[Footnote 17: William Tyndal, otherwise called Hitchens, was born\non the borders of Wales, and educated at Oxford. He was one of the\nearliest Protestants, and so boldly maintained the doctrines of the\nReformation, that he was obliged to leave England. He employed himself,\nwhile abroad, in executing a translation, first of the New Testament,\nand afterwards of the Pentateuch, with prologues to the different\nbooks. But as he was a zealous Lutheran, and as it had not pleased King\nHenry VIII. that his subjects should become Protestants, though they\nhad ceased to be Papists, Tyndal's version of the New Testament was\npublickly burned, and prohibited by royal proclamation, as tending to\ndisturb the brains of weak persons. This grossly indecorous expression\nwas not altogether without foundation. A rule of faith, containing the\nmost sublime doctrines both of faith and moral practice, and which had\nlong been acknowledged the only guide to heaven, could not be exposed\nat once to the vulgar, who had been bred up in the grossest ignorance\nof its nature and contents, without dazzling and confounding them, as\nthe beams of the sun suddenly let in upon the inmates of an obscure\ndungeon. It was not till the sacred Scriptures, with the expositions\nof judicious pastors, became a part of the regular education of the\npeople, that their minds were duly prepared to make the proper use of\nthat inestimable gift.\n\nThe fate of Tyndal was melancholy enough. By the influence of Henry, he\nwas seized at Brussels; and, under pretence of his being a pragmatical\nincendiary, one of the first translators of the New Testament was\nstrangled and burned, at Filford castle, about twenty miles from\nAntwerp, in 1536. His last words were, \"Lord, open the king of\nEngland's eyes.\"]\n\n[Footnote 18: Heylin says, the reformation would have rested with the\nfirst public liturgy, confirmed by act of parliament in the second and\nthird years of Edward VI., \"if Calvin's pragmatical spirit had not\ninterposed. He first began to quarrel at some passages in this sacred\nliturgy, and afterwards never left soliciting the lord protector,\nand practising, by his agents, on the court, the country, and the\nuniversities, till he had laid the first foundation of the Zuinglian\nfaction, who laboured nothing more than innovation both in doctrine and\ndiscipline.\"--_Ecclesia Restaurata._ Address to the Reader.]\n\n[Footnote 19: The learned and judicious Richard Hooker, one of the\nmost eminent divines of the church of England, wrote a treatise upon\nEcclesiastical Policy, in which he vindicates that communion, both\nagainst the Puritans and Papists. It is in eight books; five were\npublished during Hooker's lifetime, and the other three after his\ndeath. The last are supposed to be interpolated, as they bear some\npassages tending to impugn the doctrine of non-resistance, which at\nthat time was a shibboleth of orthodoxy. Hooker died in 1600. His Life,\nto which Dryden refers, was written by the worthy Isaac Walton, better\nknown as the author of the \"Complete Angler;\" a delightful work, where\nthe innocent simplicity, unclouded cheerfulness, and real worth of the\nauthor, beam through every page. His Life of Hooker was published about\n1662. See HAWKIN'S edition of the _Complete Angler_, Introduction, p.\n19. _Athen\u00e6 Oxon._ Vol. I. p. 302.]\n\n[Footnote 20: George Cranmer, whom Wood calls a gentleman of singular\nhopes, was grandson to Edmund Cranmer, arch-deacon of Canterbury,\nbrother to Thomas the primate, who suffered martyrdom in the reign\nof Queen Mary. He was bred to state affairs under Secretary Davison;\nand after serving in various diplomatic capacities, became secretary\nto Lord Mountjoy, Lieutenant of Ireland. On the 13th November, 1600,\nCranmer was slain in a skirmish at Carlingford between the English and\nthe forces of Tyrone. Camden thus records his death: \"_Cecidit tamen\nex Anglis, pr\u00e6ter alios, Cranmerus, Proregi ab epistolis, et ipsi eo\nnomine longe charissimus_.\" He wrote to Hooker, under whom he had\nstudied, the letter mentioned in the text concerning the new church\ndiscipline, which is dated February 1598. It is inserted by Walton in\nhis Life of Hooker. _Athen\u00e6 Oxon._ Vol. I. p. 306.]\n\n[Footnote 21: John Penry, or Ap Henry, better known by the name\nof Martin Mar-prelate, or Mar-priest, as having been a plague to\nthe bishops and clergy of his time. He was a native of Wales, and\noriginally a sub-sizer of Peter-house, in Cambridge. Afterwards he\nobtained the degree of Master of Arts in Oxford, and, having taken\norders, was for some time a regular clergyman. But being a person \"full\nof Welch blood, of a hot and restless head,\" Anthony Wood tells us, he\nbecame a furious Anabaptist, and the most bitter enemy to the church of\nEngland that appeared in the long reign of Queen Elizabeth. He wrote\na great number of _pestilent_ pamphlets, with burlesque titles; such\nas, \"Oh, read over John Bridges, for it is a worthy work. Printed over\nsea, in Europe, within two furlongs of a bouncing Priest, at the cost\nof Martin Mar-prelate, gent.\" All his writings were filled with the\nmost virulent invectives against the Episcopal church. At length, being\napprehended, and tried for writing and publishing infamous books and\nlibels against the established religion, he was condemned and executed\nat St Thomas a Watering, 29th May, 1593. Dryden compares him to Andrew\nMarvel, the well known opposer of the court, during the reign of\nCharles II.]\n\n[Footnote 22: The court writers at this period were anxious to fix\nupon the presbyterians and the non-conformists in general, the\nanti-monarchical principles of the fanatics, who brought Charles I. to\nthe scaffold. Their arguments may be seen at length in a book entitled,\n\"Seditious Teachers, ungodly Preachers exemplified.\" These charges are\ncarried too far; yet as the Episcopalians made church and king their\nwatchword, the fanatics, on the contrary, in England, and the Huguenots\nin France, had a certain tendency to oppose monarchical government. One\nof their authors, as early as the reign of Queen Elizabeth, maintains,\nthat if kings and princes refused to reform religion, the inferior\nmagistrates or people, by direction of the ministry, might lawfully,\nand ought, if need required, even by force of arms, to reform it\nthemselves.--_Whittingham's Preface to Goodman on Obedience to Superior\nPowers._]\n\n[Footnote 23: The freaks of these unhappy enthusiasts may be seen in\nthe histories of the time. Hacket, a man of some learning, had his\nbrain turned by enthusiasm, and seduced Coppinger and Arthington, two\nfanatic preachers, by his example and exhortation, to sally forth into\nthe streets of London, where he proclaimed himself to be the Messiah,\nand Coppinger and Arthington, his prophet of mercy, and his prophet of\njudgment. As they continued to utter the most horrible blasphemies,\nand to exhort the citizens to take arms, to further the reign of\nHacket, who, they said, was come with his fan in his hand to purify\nthe discipline of the church of England, they were seized and lodged\nin prison. Hacket was executed, though fitter for Bedlam, persisting\nto the last in the most insane blasphemy. The discipline of the prison\nrestored Arthington to his senses, and he published a recantation,\nexpressing great remorse for his errors. Coppinger starved himself to\ndeath in jail. This explosion of madness took place in 1591. Hacket is\nstated by Camden to have been a determined enemy to Queen Elizabeth,\nand to have stabbed her picture with his dagger.]\n\n[Footnote 24: The birth-night of Queen Elizabeth was that which the\nWhigs chose to solemnize, by their grand pope-burnings and processions;\nconsidering her as the patron of the Protestant religion. Yet Queen\nElizabeth was very severe against the Puritans, and passed several\nstatutes against them.]\n\n[Footnote 25: See the notes on \"Absalom and Achitophel,\" Vol. IX.\npages, 280, 404.]\n\n[Footnote 26: Lewis Maimbourg, a secularized Jesuit, wrote a History of\nCalvinism, in which he charges upon the Huguenots the principal share\nof the guilt of the civil wars of France. He charges them particularly\nwith the conspiracies of Amboise and Meaux against the crown; and\nalleges, it was their intention, by the assistance of England, and the\nProtestant states of Germany, with whom they corresponded, to establish\na republic in France. His arguments are controverted in an \"Apology for\nthe Protestants of France, in six letters.\" London, 1683.]\n\n[Footnote 27: Pere Richard Simon was an excellent Orientalist. He was\nan oratorian priest, and published, besides the work here mentioned,\n\"A critical History of the New Testament,\" and a new Version of it,\nwhich was censured by Cardinal de Noailles, Archbishop of Paris, and\nopposed by Bossuet, the learned Bishop of Meaux. Pere Simon was an able\nbiblical critic, an excellent scholar, and one of the most learned\ndivines of his age.]\n\n[Footnote 28: Derrick erroneously states this young gentleman to\nhave been Hampden, son of the famous parliamentary leader, who was\ndeeply engaged in the Rye-house Plot, and some years afterwards killed\nhimself. Dryden was not likely, in the very hottest of his political\ncontroversy, to be on very intimate habits with a leader of the\nWhigs, much less to inscribe to him a poem, the preface of which, at\nleast, is levelled against the most zealous of that party. Besides,\nthe translation of Pere Simon's Critical History, which was published\nin 1682, bears to have been made by H. D. which initials can hardly\nstand for John Hampden. Mr Malone conjectures he may have been of the\nDigby family, or perhaps Mr Dodswell, who translated one of Plutarch's\nLives, But it appears, from a poem addressed to the Translator by\nDuke, that his name was Henry Dickinson, probably a son of Edmund\nDickinson, a physician, and author of the _Delphi Phenecizantes_, and\nother learned pieces. _Athen\u00e6 Oxon._ Vol. II. p. 946. There is another\ncopy of verses, addressed to the Translator of the \"Critical History\"\nin Dryden's \"Miscellanies.\" So that Dickinson's work seems to have\nattracted much notice at the time of its publication.]\n\n\n\n\nRECOMMENDATORY VERSES.\n\nON\n\nMR DRYDEN'S\n\nRELIGIO LAICI.\n\n\n    Begone, you slaves, you idle vermin, go,\n    Fly from the scourges, and your master know;\n    Let free, impartial men from Dryden learn\n    Mysterious secrets of high concern,\n    And weighty truths, solid convincing sense,\n    Explained by unaffected eloquence.\n      What can you, Reverend Levi, here take ill?\n    Men still had faults, and men will have them still;\n    He that hath none, and lives as angels do,\n    Must be an angel;--but what's that to you?\n      While mighty Lewis finds the Pope too great,\n    And dreads the yoke of his imposing seat,\n    Our sects a more tyrannic power assume,\n    And would for scorpions change the rods of Rome.\n    That church detained the legacy divine;\n    Fanatics cast the pearls of heaven to swine:\n    What, then, have honest thinking men to do,\n    But chuse a mean between the usurping two?\n      Nor can the Egyptian patriarch blame a muse,\n    Which for his firmness does his heat excuse;\n    Whatever counsels have approved his creed,\n    The preface, sure, was his own act and deed.\n    Our church will have the preface read, you'll say:}\n    'Tis true, but so she will the Apocrypha;         }\n    And such as can believe them freely may.          }\n      But did that God, so little understood,\n    Whose darling attribute is being good,\n    From the dark womb of the rude chaos bring\n    Such various creatures, and make man their king,\n    Yet leave his favourite, man, his chiefest care,\n    More wretched than the vilest insects are?\n      O! how much happier and more safe are they,\n    If helpless millions must be doom'd a prey\n    To yelling furies, and for ever burn\n    In that sad place, from whence is no return,\n    For unbelief in one they never knew,\n    Or for not doing what they could not do!\n      The very fiends know for what crime they fell,\n    And so do all their followers that rebell;\n    If then a blind, well-meaning Indian stray,\n    Shall the great gulph be shewed him for the way?\n      For better ends our kind Redeemer died,\n    Or the fallen angels' rooms will be but ill supplied.\n      That Christ, who at the great deciding day,\n    (For he declares what he resolves to say,)\n    Will damn the goats for their ill-natured faults,\n    And save the sheep for actions, not for thoughts,\n    Hath too much mercy to send them to hell,\n    For humble charity, and hoping well.\n      To what stupidity are zealots grown,         }\n    Whose inhumanity, profusely shewn              }\n    In damning crowds of souls, may damn their own!}\n      I'll err, at least, on the securer side,\n    A convert free from malice and from pride.\n\n    ROSCOMMON.\n\n\nTO\n\nMR DRYDEN,\n\nON HIS POEM CALLED\n\nRELIGIO LAICI.\n\n    Great is the task, and worthy such a muse,\n    To do faith right, yet reason disabuse.\n    How cheerfully the soul does take its flight\n    On faith's strong wings, guided by reason's light?\n    But reason does in vain her beams display,           }\n    Shewing to th' place, whence first she came, the way,}\n    If Peter's heirs must still hold fast the key.       }\n    The house, which many mansions should contain,\n    Formed by the great wise Architect in vain,\n    Of disproportion justly we accuse,\n    If the strait gate still entrance must refuse,\n    The only free enriching port God made,   }\n    What shameful monopoly did invade?       }\n    One factious company engrossed the trade.}\n    Thou to the distant shore hast safely sailed,\n    Where the best pilots have so often failed.\n    Freely we now may buy the pearl of price;  }\n    The happy land abounds with fragrant spice,}\n    And nothing is forbidden there but vice.   }\n    Thou best Columbus to the unknown world!\n    Mountains of doubt, that in thy way were hurled,\n    Thy generous faith has bravely overcome,\n    And made heaven truly our familiar home.\n    Let crowds impossibilities receive;\n    Who cannot think, ought not to disbelieve.\n    Let them pay tithes, and hood-winked go to heaven;\n    But sure the quaker could not be forgiven,\n    Had not the clerk, who hates lay-policy,     }\n    Found out, to countervail the injury,        }\n    Swearing, a trade of which they are not free.}\n    Too long has captive reason been enslaved,\n    By visions scared, and airy phantasms braved,\n    List'ning to each proud enthusiastic fool,\n    Pretending conscience, but designing rule;\n    Whilst law, form, interest, ignorance, design,\n    Did in the holy cheat together join.\n    Like vain astrologers, gazing on the skies,\n    We fall, and did not dare to trust our eyes.\n    'Tis time at last to fix the trembling soul,\n    And by thy compass to point out the pole;\n    All men agree in what is to be done,\n    And each man's heart his table is of stone,\n    Where he the god-writ character may view;\n    Were it as needful, faith had been so too.\n    Oh, that our greatest fault were humble doubt,\n    And that we were more just, though less devout!\n    What reverence should we pay thy sacred rhymes,\n    Who, in those factious too-believing times,\n    Has taught us to obey, and to distrust;\n    Yet, to ourselves, our king, and God, prove just.\n    Thou want'st not praise from an insuring friend;\n    The poor to thee on double interest lend.\n    So strong thy reasons, and so clear thy sense,\n    They bring, like day, their own bright evidence;\n    Yet, whilst mysterious truths to light you bring,}\n    And heavenly things in heavenly numbers sing,    }\n    The joyful younger choir may clap the wing.      }\n\n\nTO\n\nMR DRYDEN,\n\nON\n\nRELIGIO LAICI.\n\n    'Tis nobly done, a layman's creed profest,\n    When all our faith of late hung on a priest;\n    His doubtful words, like oracles received,\n    And, when we could not understand, believed.\n    Triumphant faith now takes a nobler course,\n    Tis gentle, but resists intruding force.\n    Weak reason may pretend an awful sway,\n    And consistories charge her to obey;\n    (Strange nonsense, to confine the sacred Dove,}\n    And narrow rules prescribe how he shall love, }\n    And how upon the barren waters move.)         }\n    But she rejects and scorns their proud pretence,\n    And, whilst those grovling things depend on sense,\n    She mounts on certain wings, and flies on high,}\n    And looks upon a dazzling mystery,             }\n    With fixed, and steady, and an eagle's eye.    }\n    Great king of verse, that dost instruct and please,\n    As Orpheus softened the rude savages;\n    And gently freest us from a double care,\n    The bold Socinian, and the papal chair:\n    Thy judgment is correct, thy fancy young,\n    Thy numbers, as thy generous faith, are strong:\n    Whilst through dark prejudice they force their way,\n    Our souls shake off the night, and view the day.\n    We live secure from mad enthusiasts' rage,\n    And fond tradition, now grown blind with age.\n    Let factious and ambitious souls repine,     }\n    Thy reason's strong, and generous thy design;}\n    And always to do well is only thine.         }\n\n    THO. CREECH.\n\n\nRELIGIO LAICI.\n\n    Dim as the borrowed beams of moon and stars\n    To lonely, weary, wandering travellers,\n    Is reason to the soul: and as, on high,\n    Those rolling fires discover but the sky,\n    Not light us here; so reason's glimmering ray}\n    Was lent, not to assure our doubtful way,    }\n    But guide us upward to a better day.         }\n    And as those nightly tapers disappear,\n    When day's bright lord ascends our hemisphere;\n    So pale grows reason at religion's sight,\n    So dies, and so dissolves in supernatural light.\n    Some few, whose lamp shone brighter, have been led\n    From cause to cause, to nature's sacred head,\n    And found that one First Principle must be:\n    But what, or who, that universal He;\n    Whether some soul encompassing this ball,\n    Unmade, unmoved; yet making, moving all;\n    Or various atoms' interfering dance\n    Leaped into form, the noble work of chance;\n    Or this great All was from eternity,--   }\n    Not even the Stagyrite himself could see,}\n    And Epicurus guessed as well as he.      }\n    As blindly groped they for a future state,\n    As rashly judged of providence and fate;\n    But least of all could their endeavours find\n    What most concerned the good of human kind;\n    For happiness was never to be found,\n    But vanished from them like enchanted ground.[29]\n    One thought content the good to be enjoyed;\n    This every little accident destroyed:\n    The wiser madmen did for virtue toil,\n    A thorny, or, at best, a barren soil:\n    In pleasure some their glutton souls would steep; }\n    But found their line too short, the well too deep,}\n    And leaky vessels which no bliss could keep.      }\n    Thus anxious thoughts in endless circles roll,\n    Without a centre where to fix the soul:\n    In this wild maze their vain endeavours end:--\n    How can the less the greater comprehend?\n    Or finite reason reach infinity?\n    For what could fathom God were more than he.\n      The Deist thinks he stands on firmer ground;\n    Cries [Greek: eureka]! the mighty secret's found:\n    God is that spring of good, supreme and best,\n    We made to serve, and in that service blest;\n    If so, some rules of worship must be given,\n    Distributed alike to all by heaven;\n    Else God were partial, and to some denied\n    The means his justice should for all provide.\n    This general worship is to praise and pray;\n    One part to borrow blessings, one to pay;\n    And when frail nature slides into offence,\n    The sacrifice for crimes is penitence.\n    Yet since the effects of providence, we find,\n    Are variously dispensed to human kind;\n    That vice triumphs, and virtue suffers here,\n    A brand that sovereign justice cannot bear;\n    Our reason prompts us to a future state,\n    The last appeal from fortune and from fate,\n    Where God's all righteous ways will be declared;\n    The bad meet punishment, the good reward.\n      Thus man by his own strength to heaven would soar,\n    And would not be obliged to God for more.\n    Vain wretched creature, how art thou misled,\n    To think thy wit these god-like notions bred!\n    These truths are not the product of thy mind,\n    But dropt from heaven, and of a nobler kind.\n    Revealed religion first informed thy sight,\n    And reason saw not till faith sprung the light.\n    Hence all thy natural worship takes the source;\n    'Tis revelation what thou think'st discourse.\n    Else how com'st thou to see these truths so clear,\n    Which so obscure to heathens did appear?\n    Not Plato these, nor Aristotle found,\n    Nor he whose wisdom oracles renowned.\n    Hast thou a wit so deep, or so sublime,\n    Or canst thou lower dive, or higher climb?\n    Canst thou by reason more of godhead know\n    Than Plutarch, Seneca, or Cicero?\n    Those giant wits, in happier ages born,\n    When arms and arts did Greece and Rome adorn,\n    Knew no such system; no such piles could raise\n    Of natural worship, built on prayer and praise\n    To one sole God;\n    Nor did remorse to expiate sin prescribe,\n    But slew their fellow-creatures for a bribe:\n    The guiltless victim groaned for their offence,\n    And cruelty and blood was penitence.\n    If sheep and oxen could atone for men,\n    Ah! at how cheap a rate the rich might sin!\n    And great oppressors might heaven's wrath beguile,\n    By offering his own creatures for a spoil!\n    Darest thou, poor worm, offend Infinity?\n    And must the terms of peace be given by thee?\n    Then thou art justice in the last appeal;\n    Thy easy God instructs thee to rebel;\n    And, like a king remote and weak, must take\n    What satisfaction thou art pleased to make.\n      But if there be a Power too just and strong,\n    To wink at crimes, and bear unpunished wrong;\n    Look humbly upward, see his will disclose\n    The forfeit first, and then the fine impose;\n    A mulct thy poverty could never pay,\n    Had not Eternal Wisdom found the way,\n    And with celestial wealth supplied thy store;\n    His justice makes the fine, his mercy quits the score.\n    See God descending in thy human frame;\n    The offended suffering in the offender's name;\n    All thy misdeeds to him imputed see,\n    And all his righteousness devolved on thee.\n      For, granting we have sinned, and that the offence\n    Of man is made against Omnipotence,\n    Some price that bears proportion must be paid.\n    And infinite with infinite be weighed.\n    See then the Deist lost: remorse for vice\n    Not paid, or paid inadequate in price:\n    What farther means can reason now direct,\n    Or what relief from human wit expect?\n    That shews us sick; and sadly are we sure\n    Still to be sick, till heaven reveal the cure:\n    If then heaven's will must needs be understood,\n    Which must, if we want cure, and heaven be good,\n    Let all records of will revealed be shown;\n    With scripture all in equal balance thrown,\n    And our one sacred Book will be that one.\n      Proof needs not here; for, whether we compare\n    That impious, idle, superstitious ware\n    Of rites, lustrations, offerings, which before,\n    In various ages, various countries bore,\n    With christian faith and virtues, we shall find\n    None answering the great ends of human kind,\n    But this one rule of life; that shews us best\n    How God may be appeased, and mortals blest.\n    Whether from length of time its worth we draw,\n    The word is scarce more ancient than the law:\n    Heaven's early care prescribed for every age;\n    First, in the soul, and after, in the page.\n    Or, whether more abstractedly we look,\n    Or on the writers, or the written book,\n    Whence, but from heaven, could men unskilled in arts,\n    In several ages born, in several parts,\n    Weave such agreeing truths? or how, or why\n    Should all conspire to cheat us with a lie?\n    Unasked their pains, ungrateful their advice,\n    Starving their gain, and martyrdom their price.\n      If on the book itself we cast our view,\n    Concurrent heathens prove the story true:\n    The doctrine, miracles; which must convince,\n    For heaven in them appeals to human sense;\n    And, though they prove not, they confirm the cause,\n    When what is taught agrees with nature's laws.\n      Then for the style, majestic and divine,\n    It speaks no less than God in every line;\n    Commanding words, whose force is still the same\n    As the first fiat that produced our frame.\n    All faiths, beside, or did by arms ascend,\n    Or sense indulged has made mankind their friend;\n    This only doctrine does our lusts oppose,\n    Unfed by nature's soil, in which it grows;\n    Cross to our interests, curbing sense, and sin;\n    Oppressed without, and undermined within,\n    It thrives through pain; it's own tormentors tires,\n    And with a stubborn patience still aspires.\n    To what can reason such effects assign,\n    Transcending nature, but to laws divine?\n    Which in that sacred volume are contained,\n    Sufficient, clear, and for that use ordained.\n      But stay: the Deist here will urge anew,\n    No supernatural worship can be true;\n    Because a general law is that alone\n    Which must to all, and every where, be known;\n    A style so large as not this book can claim,\n    Nor aught that bears revealed religion's name.\n    'Tis said, the sound of a Messiah's birth\n    Is gone through all the habitable earth;\n    But still that text must be confined alone\n    To what was then inhabited, and known:\n    And what provision could from thence accrue\n    To Indian souls, and worlds discovered new?\n    In other parts it helps, that, ages past,\n    The scriptures there were known, and were embraced,\n    Till sin spread once again the shades of night:\n    What's that to these who never saw the light?\n      Of all objections this indeed is chief,\n    To startle reason, stagger frail belief:\n    We grant, 'tis true, that heaven from human sense\n    Has hid the secrets paths of providence;\n    But boundless wisdom, boundless mercy, may\n    Find even for those bewildered souls a way.\n    If from his nature foes may pity claim,\n    Much more may strangers, who ne'er heard his name;\n    And, though no name be for salvation known,\n    But that of his eternal sons[30] alone;\n    Who knows how far transcending goodness can\n    Extend the merits of that son to man?\n    Who knows what reasons may his mercy lead,\n    Or ignorance invincible may plead?\n    Not only charity bids hope the best,\n    But more the great apostle has exprest:\n    That, if the Gentiles, whom no law inspired,\n    By nature did what was by law required;\n    They, who the written rule had never known,\n    Were to themselves both rule and law alone;\n    To nature's plain indictment they shall plead,\n    And by their conscience be condemned or freed.\n    Most righteous doom! because a rule revealed\n    Is none to those from whom it was concealed.\n    Then those, who followed reason's dictates right,\n    Lived up, and lifted high their natural light,\n    With Socrates may see their Maker's face,\n    While thousand rubric-martyrs want a place.\n      Nor does it baulk my charity, to find\n    The Egyptian bishop of another mind;\n    For, though his creed eternal truth contains,\n    'Tis hard for man to doom to endless pains\n    All, who believed not all his zeal required;\n    Unless he first could prove he was inspired.\n    Then let us either think he meant to say,\n    This faith, where published, was the only way;\n    Or else conclude, that, Arius to confute,\n    The good old man, too eager in dispute,\n    Flew high; and, as his christian fury rose,\n    Damned all for heretics who durst oppose.\n      Thus far my charity this path has tried;\n    A much unskilful, but well-meaning guide:\n    Yet what they are, even these crude thoughts were bred\n    By reading that which better thou hast read;\n    Thy matchless author's work, which thou, my friend,\n    By well translating better dost commend;[31]\n    Those youthful hours which, of thy equals, most\n    In toys have squandered, or in vice have lost,\n    Those hours hast thou to nobler use employed,\n    And the severe delights of truth enjoyed.\n    Witness this weighty book, in which appears\n    The crabbed toil of many thoughtful years,\n    Spent by thy author, in the sifting care\n    Of rabbins' old sophisticated ware\n    From gold divine; which he who well can sort\n    May afterwards make algebra a sport;\n    A treasure which, if country-curates buy,\n    They Junius and Tremellius may defy;[32]\n    Save pains in various readings and translations,\n    And without Hebrew make most learned quotations;\n    A work so full with various learning fraught,\n    So nicely pondered, yet so strongly wrought,\n    As nature's height and art's last hand required;\n    As much as man could compass, uninspired;\n    Where we may see what errors have been made\n    Both in the copiers' and translators' trade;\n    How Jewish, Popish, interests have prevailed,\n    And where infallibility has failed.\n      For some, who have his secret meaning guessed,\n    Have found our author not too much a priest;\n    For fashion-sake he seems to have recourse\n    To pope, and councils, and traditions' force;\n    But he that old traditions' could subdue,\n    Could not but find the weakness of the new:\n    If scripture, though derived from heavenly birth,\n    Has been but carelessly preserved on earth;\n    If God's own people, who of God before\n    Knew what we know, and had been promised more,\n    In fuller terms, of heaven's assisting care,\n    And who did neither time nor study spare\n    To keep this book untainted, unperplext,\n    Let in gross errors to corrupt the text,\n    Omitted paragraphs, embroiled the sense,\n    With vain traditions stopt the gaping fence,\n    Which every common hand pulled up with ease,--\n    What safety from such brushwood-helps as these?\n    If written words from time are not secure,\n    How can we think have oral sounds endured?\n    Which thus transmitted, if one mouth has failed,\n    Immortal lies on ages are entailed;\n    And that some such have been, is proved too plain,\n    If we consider interest, church, and gain.\n      O but, says one, tradition set side,\n    Where can we hope for an unerring guide?\n    For, since the original scripture has been lost,\n    All copies disagreeing, maimed the most,\n    Or Christian faith can have no certain ground,\n    Or truth in church-tradition must be found.\n      Such an omniscient church we wish indeed;\n    'Twere worth both Testaments, cast in the Creed:\n    But if this mother be a guide so sure,\n    As can all doubts resolve, all truth secure,\n    Then her infallibility as well\n    Where copies are corrupt or lame can tell;\n    Restore lost canon with as little pains,\n    As truly explicate what still remains;\n    Which yet no council dare pretend to do,     }\n    Unless, like Esdras, they could write it new;}\n    Strange confidence still to interpret true,  }\n    Yet not be sure that all they have explained,\n    Is in the blest original contained.\n    More safe, and much more modest 'tis, to say\n    God would not leave mankind without a way;\n    And that the scriptures, though not every where\n    Free from corruption, or entire, or clear,\n    Are uncorrupt, sufficient, clear, entire,\n    In all things which our needful faith require.\n    If others in the same glass better see,\n    'Tis for themselves they look, but not for me;\n    For my salvation must its doom receive,\n    Not from what others, but what I believe.\n      Must all tradition then be set aside?\n    This to affirm were ignorance or pride.\n    Are there not many points, some needful sure\n    To saving faith, that scripture leaves obscure?\n    Which every sect will wrest a several way,\n    For what one sect interprets, all sects may;\n    We hold, and say we prove from scripture plain,}\n    That Christ is God; the bold Socinian          }\n    From the same scripture urges he's but man.[33] }\n    Now what appeal can end the important suit?\n    Both parts talk loudly, but the rule is mute.\n      Shall I speak plain, and, in a nation free,\n    Assume an honest layman's liberty?\n    I think, according to my little skill,\n    To my own mother-church submitting still,\n    That many have been saved, and many may,\n    Who never heard this question brought in play.\n    The unlettered Christian, who believes in gross,\n    Plods on to heaven, and ne'er is at a loss;\n    For the strait gate would be made straiter yet,\n    Were none admitted there but men of wit.\n    The few by nature formed, with learning fraught,\n    Born to instruct, as others to be taught,\n    Must study well the sacred page; and see\n    Which doctrine, this or that, does best agree\n    With the whole tenor of the work divine,\n    And plainliest points to heaven's revealed design;\n    Which exposition flows from genuine sense,\n    And which is forced by wit and eloquence.\n    Not that tradition's parts are useless here,\n    When general, old, disinterested, and clear;\n    That ancient fathers thus expound the page,\n    Gives truth the reverend majesty of age;\n    Confirms its force by bideing every test;\n    For best authorities, next rules, are best;\n    And still the nearer to the spring we go,\n    More limpid, more unsoiled, the waters flow.\n    Thus, first, traditions were a proof alone;\n    Could we be certain, such they were, so known;\n    But since some flaws in long descent may be,\n    They make not truth, but probability.\n    Even Arius and Pelagius durst provoke\n    To what the centuries preceding spoke:[34]\n    Such difference is there in an oft-told tale;\n    But truth by its own sinews will prevail.\n    Tradition written, therefore, more commends\n    Authority, than what from voice descends;\n    And this, as perfect as its kind can be,\n    Rolls down to us the sacred history;\n    Which from the universal church received,\n    Is tried, and, after, for itself believed.\n      The partial Papists would infer from hence,\n    Their church, in last resort, should judge the sense.\n    But first they would assume, with wonderous art,\n    Themselves to be the whole, who are but part\n    Of that vast frame, the Church; yet grant they were\n    The handers down, can they from thence infer\n    A right to interpret? or, would they alone,\n    Who brought the present, claim it for their own?\n    The book's a common largess to mankind,\n    Not more for them than every man designed;\n    The welcome news is in the letter found;\n    The carrier's not commissioned to expound.\n    It speaks itself, and what it does contain,\n    In all things needful to be known, is plain.\n      In times o'ergrown with rust and ignorance,\n    A gainful trade their clergy did advance;\n    When want of learning kept the laymen low,\n    And none but priests were authorized to know;\n    When what small knowledge was, in them did dwell,\n    And he a god, who could but read and spell,--\n    Then mother Church did mightily prevail:\n    She parcelled out the Bible by retail;\n    But still expounded what she sold or gave,\n    To keep it in her power to damn and save.\n    Scripture was scarce, and, as the market went,\n    Poor laymen took salvation on content,\n    As needy men take money, good or bad.\n    God's word they had not, but the priest's they had;\n    Yet whate'er false conveyances they made,\n    The lawyer still was certain to be paid.\n    In those dark times they learned their knack so well,\n    That by long use they grew infallible.\n    At last, a knowing age began to enquire\n    If they the book, or that did them inspire;\n    And, making narrower search, they found, though late,\n    That what they thought the priest's, was their estate;\n    Taught by the will produced, the written word,\n    How long they had been cheated on record.\n    Then every man, who saw the title fair,\n    Claimed a child's part, and put in for a share;\n    Consulted soberly his private good,\n    And saved himself as cheap as e'er he could.\n      'Tis true, my friend,--and far be flattery hence,--\n    This good had full as bad a consequence;\n    The book thus put in every vulgar hand,\n    Which each presumed he best could understand,\n    The common rule was made the common prey,\n    And at the mercy of the rabble lay.\n    The tender page with horny fists was galled,\n    And he was gifted most, that loudest bawled;\n    The spirit gave the doctoral degree,                     }\n    And every member of a company                            }\n    Was of his trade and of the Bible free.                  }\n    Plain truths enough for needful use they found;\n    But men would still be itching to expound;\n    Each was ambitious of the obscurest place,\n    No measure ta'en from knowledge, all from grace.\n    Study and pains were now no more their care;\n    Texts were explained by fasting and by prayer:\n    This was the fruit the private spirit brought,\n    Occasioned by great zeal and little thought.\n    While crowds unlearned, with rude devotion warm,\n    About the sacred viands buz and swarm;\n    The fly-blown text creates a crawling brood,\n    And turns to maggots what was meant for food.[35]\n    A thousand daily sects rise up and die;\n    A thousand more the perished race supply;\n    So all we make of heaven's discovered will,\n    Is not to have it, or to use it ill.\n    The danger's much the same; on several shelves\n    If others wreck us, or we wreck ourselves.\n      What then remains, but, waving each extreme,\n    The tides of ignorance and pride to stem;\n    Neither so rich a treasure to forego,\n    Nor proudly seek beyond our power to know?\n    Faith is not built on disquisitions vain;\n    The things we must believe are few and plain:\n    But since men will believe more than they need,\n    And every man will make himself a creed,\n    In doubtful questions 'tis the safest way\n    To learn what unsuspected antients say;\n    For 'tis not likely we should higher soar\n    In search of heaven, than all the church before;\n    Nor can we be deceived, unless we see\n    The scripture and the fathers disagree.\n    If, after all, they stand suspected still,\n    (For no man's faith depends upon his will)\n    'Tis some relief, that points, not clearly known,\n    Without much hazard may be let alone;\n    And, after hearing what our church can say,\n    If still our reason runs another way,\n    That private reason 'tis more just to curb,\n    Than by disputes the public peace disturb:\n    For points obscure are of small use to learn;\n    But common quiet is mankind's concern.\n      Thus have I made my own opinions clear,\n    Yet neither praise expect, nor censure fear;\n    And this unpolished rugged verse I chose,\n    As fittest for discourse, and nearest prose;\n    For while from sacred truth I do not swerve,\n    Tom Sternhold's, or Tom Shadwell's rhymes will serve.[36]\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 29: The author applies the same simile to the use of rhyme in\ntragedy;\n\n    Passion's too fierce to be in fetters bound,\n    And nature flies him like enchanted ground.\n\n    _Prologue to Aureng-Zebe._\n]\n\n[Footnote 30: All the editions read _Sons_, which seems to make a\ndouble genitive, unless we construe the line to mean, \"the name of his\nEternal Son's salvation.\" I own I should have been glad to have found\nan authority for reading _Son_.]\n\n[Footnote 31: Simon's Critical History of the Old Testament, translated\nby the young gentleman to whom the poem is addressed.--See Preface.]\n\n[Footnote 32: Calvinistic divines, who made translations of the\nScripture, with commentaries, on which Pere Simon makes learned\ncriticisms.]\n\n[Footnote 33: The Socinians, or followers of Lelius Socinius, denied\nthe doctrine of the Trinity and of Redemption. The modern Unitarians\nhave embraced some of the principles of this sect.]\n\n[Footnote 34: The founders of two noted heresies, who, nevertheless, as\nthe poet observes, ventured to appeal to the traditions of the church\nin support of their doctrines.]\n\n[Footnote 35: Perhaps this idea is borrowed from \"Hudibras:\"\n\n    The learned write, an insect breeze\n    Is but a mongrel prince of bees,\n    That falls before a storm on cows,\n    And stings the founders of his house,\n    From whose corrupted flesh, that breed\n    Of vermin did at first proceed.\n    So, ere the storm of war broke out,\n    Religion spawned a various rout\n    Of petulant capricious sects,\n    The maggots of corrupted texts,\n    That first run all religion down,\n    And after every swarm its own.\n\n    _Hudibras_, Part III. canto 2.\n]\n\n[Footnote 36: The famous Tom Brown is pleased to droll on this\nassociation of persons; being a part of the punishment which he\nsays the laureat inflicted on Shadwell for presuming to dispute\nhis theatrical infallibility. \"But, gentlemen, when I had thus, in\nthe plenitude of my power, issued out the above-mentioned decretal\nepistles, you cannot imagine what abundance of adversaries I created\nmyself: some were for appealing to a free unbiassed synod of impartial\nauthors; others were for suing out a _quo warranto_, to examine the\nvalidity of my charter. Not to mention those of higher quality, I was\nimmediatly set upon by the fierce Elkanah, the Empress of Morocco's\nagent, who at that time commanded a party of Moorish horse, in order\nto raise the siege of Grenada; and a fat old gouty gentleman, commonly\ncalled the King of Basan, who had almost devoured the stage with free\nquarter for his men of wit and humourists. But I countermined all their\ndesigns against my crown and person in a moment; for I presently got\nthe one to be dressed up in a sanbenit, under the unsanctified name\nof Doeg; the other I coupled myself with his namesake Tom Sternhold.\nBeing thus degraded from their poetical functions, and become incapable\nof crowning princes, raising ghosts, and offering any more incense\nof flattery to the living and the dead, I delivered them over to the\nsecular arm, to be chastised by the furious dapper-wits of the Inns\nof Court, and the young critics of the university. Furthermore, to\nprevent all infection of their errors, I directed my monitory letters\nto the Sieur Batterton, advising him to keep no correspondence, either\ndirectly or indirectly, with those aforesaid apostates from sense and\nreason; adding, that in case of neglect, I would certainly put the\ntheatre under an interdict, send a troop of dragoons from Drury-Lane\nto demolish his garrison in Salisbury-court, and absolve all his\nsubjects, even to the sub-deacons and acolythes of the stage, his\ntrusty door-keepers and candle-lighters, from their oaths of fealty and\nallegiance.\" _Reasons for Mr Bayes' changing his Religion._]\n\n\n\n\n    THRENODIA AUGUSTALIS:\n\n    A\n\n    FUNERAL PINDARIC POEM,\n\n    SACRED TO THE\n\n    HAPPY MEMORY OF\n\n    KING CHARLES II.\n\n    _Fortunati ambo si quid mea carmina possunt,\n    Nulla dies unquam memori vos eximet \u00e6vo!_\n\n\n\n\nTHRENODIA AUGUSTALIS.\n\n\nThe death of Charles II. was sudden and unexpected. After he had\napparently completely subdued the popular party, and was preparing, as\nhas been confidently alleged, a similar conquest over the high-flying\nfollowers of the Duke of York, in the midst of his present triumph and\nfuture projects, he was, on the morning of the 2d February, 1684-5,\nseized with a sudden fit, which resembled an apoplexy. He was bled by\none King, a chemist, who happened to be in waiting, and experienced\na temporary relief. From the 2d till the 6th, he continued in a\nlanguishing state, the Duke of York being in constant attendance on his\ndeath-bed. On the forenoon of the 6th, Charles died, to the general\ngrief of his subjects, by whom he was personally beloved, and who had\nreason to fear, that his worst public measures would be followed out\nwith more rigour by his successor.\n\nA numerous host of rhymers stepped forward with their condolences\nupon this event.[37] Among these, we find few eminent names besides\nthat of Dryden. Otway, indeed, has left a poem on the subject, called\n\"Windsor Castle;\" and he began a pastoral, which, fortunately for his\nreputation, he left unfinished.[38] From the laureat a deeper tone of\nlamentation was due. But whether the sense of discharging a task, a\nsense so chilling always to poetical imagination, had fettered Dryden's\npowers, or from whatever other reason, his funeral pindaric has not\nbeen esteemed one of his happiest lyric effusions. It is devoid of\nany appearance of deep feeling on the part of the author himself.\nThis is the more remarkable, as the manners of Charles were eminently\ncalculated to attract affection, and Dryden had been admitted to a\ngreater share of royal intercourse than is usually necessary to excite\nthe personal attachment of a subject to a condescending monarch. But\nwhether Dryden, as he is sometimes believed to have owned, was unapt\nto feel or express the more tender passions, or whether he saw the\ncharacter of Charles so closely, as to discern the selfishness of his\nhollow courtesy, it is certain that the poet seems wonderfully little\ninterested in the sorrowful theme. Even when he mentions his literary\nintercourse with the deceased monarch, he does not suppress a murmur,\nthat he was niggard in rewarding the muses whom he loved; that\n\n    ----little was their hire, and light their gain.\n\nThis absence of personal feeling on the part of the author, spreads\na coldness over the whole elegy; which we regret the less, as the\npensioned monarch ill deserved a deeper lamentation. It is chiefly\nowing to this want of sympathy, connected with an over indulgence in\nconceit, a fault which immediately flows from the other, being an\neffort of ingenuity to supply the want of passion, that the \"Threnodia\nAugustalis\" has been neglected. We have to lament some overstrained\nmetaphors and similes. The sun went back _ten_ degrees in the dial\nof Ahaz; a miraculous sign that Hezekiah was to live; and this is\ncompared to the _five_ days during which the disease of Charles\ngained ground, until it was obvious that he was to die. The prayers\nof the people carrying heaven by storm, and almost forcing heaven to\nrevoke his decrees, is extravagant, not to say profane. Yet, with all\nits faults of coldness and conceit, this poem seems rather to have\nbeen under-rated. It appears to great advantage, when compared with\nothers on the same subject. Otway, who affects a warmer display of\npassion, a particular in which Dryden is said to have acknowledged his\nsuperiority, has fallen into the opposite fault, of describing the\ndeath-bed rather of a tender husband or lover, attended by his wife or\nmistress, than that of a king waited on by his successor.[39] Dryden's\npicture of the duke's grief is much more appropriate and striking:\n\n    Horror in all his pomp was there,\n    Mute and magnificent, without a tear.\n\nThe joy of the people upon the fallacious prospect of the king's\nrecovery, is also a striking picture:\n\n    Men met each other with erected look;\n    The steps were higher that they took;\n    Friends to congratulate their friends made haste,\n    And long inveterate foes saluted as they past.\n\nThere are many other fine passages in the \"Threnodia;\" though the\ngeneral effect is less impressive than might have been expected. The\ndescription in the thirteenth stanza, for example, of the effects on\npoetry and literature produced by the Restoration, and that of the\nreturn of liberty,\n\n    Without whose charms even peace would be\n    But a dull quiet slavery,\n\nare both striking.--The character of Charles; his wit, parts,\nand powers of conversation; his gentle manners, and firmness of\ndisposition, which, like a well-wrought blade, kept, even in yielding,\nthe native toughness of the steel,--are all themes of panegyric, which,\nthough perhaps exaggerated, are well-chosen, and exquisitely brought\nout. It is indeed a peculiar attribute of Dryden's praise, that it is\nalways appropriate; while the gross adulation of his contemporaries\ngave indiscriminately the same broad features to all their subjects,\nand thereby very often converted their intended panegyric into satire,\nnot the less bitter because undesigned. Dryden, for instance, in this\nwhole poem has never once mentioned the queen; sensible that the gaiety\nof Charles' life, and his frequent amours, rendered her conjugal grief,\nwhich some of the elegiasts chose to describe in terms approaching to\nblasphemy, an apocryphal, as well as a delicate theme.[40] He knew,\nthat praise, to do honour to the giver and receiver, must either have a\nreal foundation in desert, or at least what, by the skilful management\nof the poet, may be easily represented as such.\n\nHaving discussed the melancholy part of his subject, the poet,\naccording to the approved custom in such cases, finds cause for\nrejoicing in the succession of James, as he had mourned over the death\nof his predecessor. From his firmness of character, and supposed\nmilitary talents, the poet prophesies a warlike and victorious reign:\na sad instance how seldom the poetic and prophetic character, so\noften claimed, are united in the same individual! for James, as is\nwell known, far from conquering foreign kingdoms, did not draw the\nsword even to defend his own. But very different events were expected,\nand augured, by the shoal of versifiers, who now rushed forwards to\ngratulate his accession.[41]\n\nThe pindaric measure, in which the \"Threnodia Augustalis\" is written,\ncontains nothing pleasing to modern ears. The rhymes are occasionally\nso far disjoined, that, like a fashionable married couple, they\nhave nothing of union but the name. The inequalities of the verse\nare also violent, and remind us of ascending a broken and unequal\nstair-case. But the age had been accustomed to this rythm, which,\nhowever improperly, was considered as a genuine imitation of the\nstyle of Pindar. It must also be owned, that wherever, for a little\nway, Dryden uses a more regular measure, he displays all his usual\ncommand of harmony. The thirteenth stanza, for example, is as happily\ndistinguished by melody of rhyme, as we have already observed it is\neminent in beauty of poetry.\n\nThe Latin title of this poem, like that of the _Religio Laici_, savours\nsomewhat of affectation; and has been taxed by Johnson as not strictly\nclassical, a more unpardonable fault.[42]\n\nMy learned friend, Dr Adam, has favoured me with the following defence\nof Dryden's phrase: \"With respect to the title which that great poet\ngives to his elegy on the death of Charles, making allowance for the\ntaste of the times and the licence of poets in framing names, I see no\njust foundation for Johnson's criticism on the epithet _Augustalis_.\n_Threnodia_ is a word purely Greek, used by no Latin author; and\n_Augustalis_ denotes, 'in honour of Augustus;' thus, _ludi Augustales_,\ngames instituted in honour of Augustis, _Tac. An._ 1, 15 and 54; so\n_sacerdotes_ vel _sodales Augustales_, ib. and 2, 83. Hist. 2, 95. Now\nas _Augustus_ was a name given to the succeeding emperors, I see no\nreason, why _Augustalis_ may not be used to signify, 'in honour of any\nking.' Besides, the very word _Augustus_ denotes, 'venerable, august,\nroyal:' and therefore _Threnodia Augustalis_ may properly be put for,\n'An Elegy in honour of an august Prince.\"\n\nThe full title declared the poem to be written \"by John Dryden, servant\nto his late majesty, and to the present king;\" a style which our author\ndid not generally assume, but which the occasion rendered peculiarly\nproper. The poem appears to have been popular, as it went through two\neditions in the course of 1685.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 37: The following N\u0153nia, among others, occur in Mr Luttrell's\nCollection:\n\n\"A Pindarick Ode, by Sir F. F. Knight of the Bath.\"\n\n\"A Pindarick Ode on the Death of our late Sovereign, with an ancient\nProphecy on his present Majesty, by Afra Behn.\"\n\n\"A Poem, humbly dedicated to the Great Pattern of Piety and Virtue,\nCatherine, Queen Dowager, on the Death of her dear Lord and Husband,\nKing Charles II. By the Same. (4th April, 1685.)\"\n\n\"The Vision, a Pindarick Ode, by Edmund Arwaker, M. A.\"\n\n\"The Second Part of Ditto, on the Coronation of James and Mary.\" This\nauthor poured forth a similar effusion upon the death of Queen Mary.\n\n\"A Pindarick Ode on the Death of Charles II, by J. H.\"\n\n\"Ireland's Tears to the sacred Memory of our late Dread Sovereign, King\nCharles II., 11th April, 1685.\"\n\n\"_Pietas universitatis Oxoniensis in obitum augustissimi et\ndesideratissimi Regis Caroli Secundi._\"\n\nDuke, and others, also invoked Melpomene on this mournful occasion:\nbut, perhaps, the most remarkable of all these lamentations is, \"The\nQuaker's Elegy on the Death of Charles, late King of England, written\nby W. P. a sincere lover of Charles and James; (31st March, 1685.)\"\n\"Tears wiped off, a Second Part, on the Coronation, (22d April.)\" This\ncurious dirge begins thus:\n\n    What wondrous change in waking do I find,\n    For a strange something does my sense unbind;\n    Truth has possessed my darkened soul all o'er\n    With an unusual light, not known before;\n    And doth inform me, that some star is gone,\n    From whose kind influence we had life alone.\n    No sooner had this stranger seized my soul,\n      But Rachel knocked, to raise me from my bed,\n    And, with a voice of sorrow, did condole\n      The loss of Charles, whom she declared was dead;\n    Charles dost thou mean we King of England call,\n    That lived within the mansion of Whitehall?\n    Yes--'tis too true, &c.\n]\n\n[Footnote 38: \"Windsor Castle, in a monument to our late, sovereign,\nKing Charles II.,\" contains some striking passages. But, for the\ntenuity of the pastoral, even the taste of the age can hardly excuse\nthe author of \"Venice Preserved.\" For example:\n\n    Ye tender lambs, stray not so fast away;\n    To weep and mourn, let us together stay;\n    O'er all the universe let it be spread,\n    That now the shepherd of the flock is dead;\n    The royal Pan, that shepherd of the sheep,\n    He, who to leave his flock did dying weep,\n    Is gone! Ah! gone, ne'er to return from death's eternal sleep.\n]\n\n[Footnote 39: We shall here insert the last meeting of the royal\nbrothers, as described in \"Windsor Castle,\" which the reader may\ncontrast with the same theme in the \"Threnodia:\"\n\n      Here, painter, if thou can'st, thy art improve,\n    And show the wonders of fraternal love;\n    How mourning James by fading Charles did stand,\n    The dying grasping the surviving hand;\n    How round each others necks their arms they cast,\n    Moaned, with endearing murmurings, and embraced;\n    And of their parting pangs such marks did give,\n    'Twere hard to guess which yet could longest live.\n    Both their sad tongues quite lost the power to speak,\n    And their kind hearts seemed both prepared to break.\n]\n\n[Footnote 40: Perhaps the most extraordinary instance of flattery,\nwrought up to impiety, occurs in Mrs Behn's address to the queen on the\ndeath of her husband:\n\n    Methinks I see you like the queen of heaven,\n    To whom all patience and all grace was given;\n    When the great lord of life himself was laid\n    Upon her lap, all wounded, pale, and dead;\n    Transpierced with anguish, even to death transformed,\n    So she bewailed her god, so sighed, so mourned,\n    So his blest image in her heart remained,\n    So his blest memory o'er her soul still reigned;\n    She lived the sacred victim to deplore,\n    And never knew, or wished a pleasure more.\n]\n\n[Footnote 41: These are even more numerous than the Elegiasts on\nCharles's death. In the Luttrell Collection there are the following\nrare pieces.\n\n\"_Panegyris Jacobi serenissimi, &c. regi ipso die inaugurationis._\"\n\n\"A Poem on Do. by R. Philips.\"\n\n\"On Do. by a Young Gentleman.\"\n\n\"A Panegyrick on Do. by the Author of the Plea for Succession.\"\n\n\"A New Song on Do.\"\n\n\"A Poem on Do. by John Philips.\"\n\n\"A Poem upon the Coronation, by J. Baber, Esq.\"\n\n\"A Pindarique to their Sacred Majesties on their Coronation.\"\n\n\"A Poem on Do. by R. Mansell, Gent.\"\n\n\"A Panegyrick on Do. by Peter Ker;\" with whose rapturous invitation to\nthe ships to strand themselves for joy, we shall conclude the list:\n\n    Let subjects sing, bells ring, and cannons roar;\n    And every ship come dancing to the shore.\n]\n\n[Footnote 42: Dryden, perhaps, recollected the poem of Fitzpayne\nFisher on Cromwell's death, entitled, _Threnodia Triumphalis in obitum\nserenissimi Nostri Principis Olivari, Angli\u00e6 Scoti\u00e6 Hiberni\u0153 cum\ndominationibus ubicunque jacentibus Nuperi protectoris, (Qui obiit.\nSeptemb. 3tio.) Ubi stupend\u00e6 passim victori\u00e6, et incredibiles domi\nforasque successus, Heroico carmine, succinctim perstringuntur. Per\nFitzpayn\u00e6um Piscatorem. Londini, 1658._]\n\n\n\n\nTHRENODIA AUGUSTALIS.\n\n\nI.\n\n    Thus long my grief has kept me dumb:\n      Sure there's a lethargy in mighty woe,\n      Tears stand congealed, and cannot flow;\n    And the sad soul retires into her inmost room:\n    Tears, for a stroke foreseen, afford relief;\n      But, unprovided for a sudden blow,\n      Like Niobe, we marble grow,\n          And petrify with grief.\n    Our British heaven was all serene,\n      No threatening cloud was nigh,\n      Not the least wrinkle to deform the sky;\n    We lived as unconcerned and happily\n    As the first age in nature's golden scene;\n      Supine amidst our flowing store,\n      We slept securely, and we dreamt of more;\n      When suddenly the thunder-clap was heard,\n      It took us, unprepared, and out of guard,\n      Already lost before we feared.\n    The amazing news of Charles at once were spread,\n    At once the general voice declared,\n      \"Our gracious prince was dead.\"\n    No sickness known before, no slow disease,\n    To soften grief by just degrees;\n    But, like an hurricane on Indian seas,\n        The tempest rose;\n        An unexpected burst of woes,[43]\n    With scarce a breathing space betwixt,\n    This now becalmed, and perishing the next.\n    As if great Atlas from his height\n    Should sink beneath his heavenly weight,\n    And, with a mighty flaw, the flaming wall,\n                  As once it shall,\n    Should gape immense, and, rushing down, o'erwhelm this nether ball;\n    So swift and so surprising was our fear:\n    Our Atlas fell indeed; but Hercules was near.[44]\n\n\nII.\n\n    His pious brother, sure the best\n      Who ever bore that name,\n    Was newly risen from his rest,\n      And, with a fervent flame,\n    His usual morning vows had just addrest,\n      For his dear sovereign's health;\n        And hoped to have them heard,\n        In long increase of years,\n    In honour, fame, and wealth:\n    Guiltless of greatness, thus he always prayed,\n    Nor knew nor wished those vows he made,\n    On his own head should be repaid.\n    Soon as the ill-omen'd rumour reached his ear,\n      (Ill news is winged with fate, and flies apace,)\n      Who can describe the amazement of his face!\n    Horror in all his pomp was there,\n    Mute and magnificent, without a tear;\n    And then the hero first was seen to fear.\n    Half unarrayed he ran to his relief,\n    So hasty and so artless was his grief:\n    Approaching greatness met him with her charms\n      Of power and future state;\n      But looked so ghastly in a brother's fate,\n        He shook her from his arms.\n    Arrived within the mournful room, he saw\n      A wild distraction, void of awe,\n    And arbitrary grief unbounded by a law.\n      God's image, God's anointed, lay\n        Without motion, pulse, or breath,\n      A senseless lump of sacred clay,\n        An image now of death,\n    Amidst his sad attendants' groans and cries,\n      The lines of that adored forgiving face,\n      Distorted from their native grace;\n    An iron slumber sat on his majestic eyes.\n    The pious duke--Forbear, audacious muse!\n    No terms thy feeble art can use\n    Are able to adorn so vast a woe:\n    The grief of all the rest like subject-grief did show,\n      His, like a sovereign's, did transcend;\n    No wife, no brother, such a grief could know,\n        Nor any name but friend.\n\n\nIII.\n\n    O wondrous changes of a fatal scene,\n      Still varying to the last!\n      Heaven, though its hard decree was past,\n    Seemed pointing to a gracious turn again:\n      And death's uplifted arm arrested in its haste.\n      Heaven half repented of the doom,\n    And almost grieved it had foreseen,\n      What by foresight it willed eternally to come.\n    Mercy above did hourly plead\n      For her resemblance here below;\n    And mild forgiveness intercede\n      To stop the coming blow.\n    New miracles approached the etherial throne,\n    Such as his wonderous life had oft and lately known,\n    And urged that still they might be shown.\n      On earth his pious brother prayed and vowed,\n        Renouncing greatness at so dear a rate,\n      Himself defending what he could,\n        From all the glories of his future fate.\n      With him the innumerable crowd\n        Of armed prayers\n    Knocked at the gates of heaven, and knocked aloud;\n      The first well-meaning rude petitioners.[45]\n    All for his life assailed the throne,\n    All would have bribed the skies by offering up their own.\n    So great a throng, not heaven itself could bar;\n    'Twas almost borne by force, as in the giants' war.\n    The prayers, at least, for his reprieve were heard;\n    His death, like Hezekiah's, was deferred:\n      Against the sun the shadow went;\n      Five days, those five degrees, were lent,\n      To form our patience, and prepare the event.[46]\n    The second causes took the swift command,\n    The medicinal head, the ready hand,\n    All eager to perform their part;[47]\n    All but eternal doom was conquered by their art:\n    Once more the fleeting soul came back\n      To inspire the mortal frame;\n    And in the body took a doubtful stand,\n      Doubtful and hovering, like expiring flame,\n    That mounts and falls by turns, and trembles o'er the brand.\n\n\nIV.\n\n    The joyful short-lived news soon spread around,[48]\n    Took the same train, the same impetuous bound:\n      The drooping town in smiles again was drest,\n      Gladness in every face exprest,\n      Their eyes before their tongues confest.\n    Men met each other with erected look,\n    The steps were higher that they took;\n    Friends to congratulate their friends made haste,\n    And long inveterate foes saluted as they past.\n    Above the rest heroic James appeared,\n    Exalted more, because he more had feared.\n    His manly heart, whose noble pride\n      Was still above\n      Dissembled hate, or varnished love,\n    Its more than common transport could not hide;\n    But like an eagre[49] rode in triumph o'er the tide.\n      Thus, in alternate course,\n        The tyrant passions, hope and fear,\n        Did in extremes appear,\n      And flashed upon the soul with equal force.\n    Thus, at half ebb, a rolling sea\n      Returns, and wins upon the shore;\n      The watery herd, affrighted at the roar,\n    Rest on their fins awhile, and stay,\n    Then backward take their wondering way:\n    The prophet wonders more than they,\n      At prodigies but rarely seen before,\n    And cries,--a king must fall, or kingdoms change their sway.\n      Such were our counter-tides at land, and so\n      Presaging of the fatal blow,\n      In their prodigious ebb and flow.\n    The royal soul, that, like the labouring moon,\n    By charms of art was hurried down,\n    Forced with regret to leave her native sphere,\n    Came but a while on liking[50] here:\n    Soon weary of the painful strife,\n    And made but faint essays of life:\n      An evening light\n      Soon shut in night;\n    A strong distemper, and a weak relief,\n    Short intervals of joy, and long returns of grief.\n\n\nV.\n\n    The sons of art all med'cines tried,\n    And every noble remedy applied;\n      With emulation each essayed\n      His utmost skill; nay, more, they prayed:\n      Never was losing game with better conduct played.\n    Death never won a stake with greater toil,\n    Nor e'er was fate so near a foil:\n    But, like a fortress on a rock,\n    The impregnable disease their vain attempts did mock;\n    They mined it near, they battered from afar\n    With all the cannon of the medicinal war;\n    No gentle means could be essayed,\n    'Twas beyond parley when the siege was laid.\n      The extremest ways they first ordain,\n      Prescribing such intolerable pain,\n      As none but C\u00e6sar could sustain:\n      Undaunted C\u00e6sar underwent\n      The malice of their art, nor bent\n      Beneath whate'er their pious rigour could invent.\n    In five such days he suffered more\n    Than any suffered in his reign before;\n      More, infinitely more, than he,\n      Against the worst of rebels could decree,\n      A traitor, or twice pardoned enemy.\n    Now art was tired without success,\n    No racks could make the stubborn malady confess.\n      The vain insurancers of life,\n    And he who most performed, and promised less,\n      Even Short[51] himself, forsook the unequal strife.\n    Death and despair was in their looks,\n    No longer they consult their memories or books;\n    Like helpless friends, who view from shore\n    The labouring ship, and hear the tempest roar;\n      So stood they with their arms across,\n    Not to assist, but to deplore\n      The inevitable loss.\n\n\nVI.\n\n    Death was denounced; that frightful sound\n      Which even the best can hardly bear;\n      He took the summons void of fear,\n    And unconcernedly cast his eyes around,\n      As if to find and dare the grisly challenger.\n        What death could do he lately tried,\n        When in four days he more than died.\n      The same assurance all his words did grace;\n      The same majestic mildness held its place;\n      Nor lost the monarch in his dying face.\n    Intrepid, pious, merciful, and brave,\n    He looked as when he conquered and forgave.\n\n\nVII.\n\n    As if some angel had been sent\n    To lengthen out his government,\n    And to foretel as many years again,\n    As he had numbered in his happy reign;\n      So cheerfully he took the doom\n    Of his departing breath,\n    Nor shrunk nor stept aside for death;\n        But, with unaltered pace, kept on,\n      Providing for events to come,\n        When he resigned the throne.\n    Still he maintained his kingly state,\n    And grew familiar with his fate.\n    Kind, good, and gracious, to the last,\n    On all he loved before his dying beams he cast:\n    Oh truly good, and truly great,\n    For glorious as he rose, benignly so he set!\n      All that on earth he held most dear,\n      He recommended to his care,\n        To whom both heaven\n        The right had given,\n    And his own love bequeathed supreme command:[52]\n    He took and prest that ever-loyal hand,\n      Which could, in peace, secure his reign;\n      Which could, in wars, his power maintain;\n      That hand on which no plighted vows were ever vain.\n    Well, for so great a trust, he chose\n      A prince, who never disobeyed;\n      Not when the most severe commands were laid;\n      Nor want, nor exile, with his duty weighed:[53]\n    A prince on whom, if heaven its eyes could close,\n    The welfare of the world it safely might repose.\n\n\nVIII.\n\n    That king, who lived to God's own heart,\n      Yet less serenely died than he;\n      Charles left behind no harsh decree,\n    For schoolmen, with laborious art,\n      To save from cruelty:[54]\n    Those, for whom love could no excuses frame,\n    He graciously forgot to name.\n    Thus far my muse, though rudely, has designed\n    Some faint resemblance of his godlike mind;\n    But neither pen nor pencil can express\n    The parting brothers tenderness;\n    Though that's a term too mean and low;\n    The blest above a kinder word may know:\n      But what they did, and what they said,\n        The monarch who triumphant went,\n      The militant who staid,\n        Like painters, when their heightening arts are spent,\n      I cast into a shade.\n        That all-forgiving king,\n          The type of him above,\n        That inexhausted spring\n          Of clemency and love,\n    Himself to his next self accused,\n    And asked that pardon which he ne'er refused;\n    For faults not his, for guilt and crimes\n    Of godless men, and of rebellious times;\n    For an hard exile, kindly meant,\n    When his ungrateful country sent\n    Their best Camillus into banishment,\n    And forced their sovereign's act, they could not his consent.\n    Oh how much rather had that injured chief\n      Repeated all his sufferings past,\n      Than hear a pardon begged at last,\n    Which, given, could give the dying no relief!\n    He bent, he sunk beneath his grief;\n    His dauntless heart would fain have held\n    From weeping, but his eyes rebelled.\n    Perhaps the godlike hero, in his breast,\n      Disdained, or was ashamed to show,\n      So weak, so womanish a woe,\n    Which yet the brother and the friend so plenteously confest.\n\n\nIX.\n\n    Amidst that silent shower, the royal mind\n      An easy passage found,\n    And left its sacred earth behind;\n      Nor murmuring groan expressed, nor labouring sound,\n    Nor any least tumultuous breath;\n    Calm was his life, and quiet was his death.\n      Soft as those gentle whispers were,\n      In which the Almighty did appear;\n      By the still voice the prophet knew him there.\n    That peace which made thy prosperous reign to shine,\n    That peace thou leav'st to thy imperial line,\n    That peace, Oh happy shade, be ever thine!\n\n\nX.\n\n    For all those joys thy restoration brought,\n    For all the miracles it wrought,\n      For all the healing balm thy mercy poured\n    Into the nation's bleeding wound,[55]\n    And care, that after kept it sound,\n      For numerous blessings yearly showered,\n    And property with plenty crowned;\n    For freedom, still maintained alive,\n    Freedom, which in no other land will thrive,\n    Freedom, an English subject's sole prerogative,\n    Without whose charms, even peace would be\n    But a dull quiet slavery;--\n      For these, and more, accept our pious praise;\n    'Tis all the subsidy\n      The present age can raise,\n    The rest is charged on late posterity.\n      Posterity is charged the more,\n      Because the large abounding store\n    To them, and to their heirs, is still entailed by thee.\n      Succession of a long descent,\n    Which chastely in the channels ran,\n    And from our demi-gods began,\n      Equal almost to time in its extent,\n    Through hazards numberless and great,\n      Thou hast derived this mighty blessing down,\n      And fixed the fairest gem that decks the imperial crown:\n    Not faction, when it shook thy regal seat,\n    Not senates, insolently loud,\n    Those echoes of a thoughtless crowd,\n    Not foreign or domestic treachery,\n    Could warp thy soul to their unjust decree.\n    So much thy foes thy manly mind mistook,\n    Who judged it by the mildness of thy look;\n    Like a well-tempered sword, it bent at will,\n    But kept the native toughness of the steel.\n\n\nXI.\n\n    Be true, O Clio, to thy hero's name;\n      But draw him strictly so,\n      That all who view the piece may know,\n    He needs no trappings of fictitious fame.\n      The load's too weighty; thou may'st chuse\n      Some parts of praise, and some refuse;\n    Write, that his annals may be thought more lavish than the muse.\n    In scanty truth thou hast confined\n    The virtues of a royal mind,\n    Forgiving, bounteous, humble, just, and kind:\n    His conversation, wit, and parts,\n    His knowledge in the noblest useful arts,\n    Were such, dead authors could not give;\n    But habitudes of those who live,\n    Who, lighting him, did greater lights receive:\n    He drained from all, and all they knew;\n    His apprehension quick, his judgment true,\n    That the most learned, with shame, confess\n    His knowledge more, his reading only less.\n\n\nXII.\n\n    Amidst the peaceful triumphs of his reign,\n      What wonder, if the kindly beams he shed\n    Revived the drooping arts again,\n      If science raised her head,\n      And soft humanity, that from rebellion fled.\n    Our isle, indeed, too fruitful was before;\n      But all uncultivated lay\n      Out of the solar walk, and heaven's high way;[56]\n    With rank Geneva weeds run o'er,\n    And cockle, at the best, amidst the corn it bore:\n    The royal husbandman appeared,\n      And ploughed, and sowed, and tilled;\n    The thorns he rooted out, the rubbish cleared,\n    And blest the obedient field\n    When strait a double harvest rose,\n    Such as the swarthy Indian mows,\n    Or happier climates near the Line,\n    Or paradise manured, and drest by hands divine.\n\n\nXIII.\n\n    As when the new-born phoenix takes his way,\n    His rich paternal regions to survey,\n    Of airy choristers a numerous train\n    Attend his wonderous progress o'er the plain;\n    So, rising from his father's urn,\n    So glorious did our Charles return;\n    The officious muses came along,\n    A gay harmonious quire, like angels ever young;\n    The muse, that mourns him now, his happy triumph sung.[57]\n      Even they could thrive in his auspicious reign;\n    And such a plenteous crop they bore\n      Of purest and well-winnowed grain,\n    As Britain never knew before.\n      Though little was their hire, and light their gain,\n    Yet somewhat to their share he threw;\n    Fed from his hand, they sung and flew,\n    Like birds of paradise, that lived on morning dew.\n    Oh never let their lays his name forget!\n    The pension of a prince's praise is great.\n    Live then, thou great encourager of arts,\n    Live ever in our thankful hearts;\n    Live blest above, almost invoked below;\n    Live and receive this pious vow,\n    Our patron once, our guardian angel now!\n    Thou Fabius of a sinking state,\n    Who didst by wise delays divert our fate,\n    When faction like a tempest rose,\n    In death's most hideous form,\n    Then art to rage thou didst oppose,\n    To weather out the storm;\n    Not quitting thy supreme command,\n    Thou heldst the rudder with a steady hand,\n    Till safely on the shore the bark did land;\n    The bark, that all our blessings brought,\n    Charged with thyself and James, a doubly-royal fraught.\n\n\nXIV.\n\n      Oh frail estate of human things,\n    And slippery hopes below!\n    Now to our cost your emptiness we know;\n    For 'tis a lesson dearly bought,\n    Assurance here is never to be sought.\n    The best, and best beloved of kings,\n    And best deserving to be so,\n    When scarce he had escaped the fatal blow\n    Of faction and conspiracy,\n    Death did his promised hopes destroy;\n    He toiled, he gained, but lived not to enjoy.\n    What mists of Providence are these\n    Through which we cannot see!\n    So saints, by supernatural power set free,\n    Are left at last in martyrdom to die;\n    Such is the end of oft repeated miracles.--\n    Forgive me, heaven, that impious thought,\n    'Twas grief for Charles, to madness wrought,\n      That questioned thy supreme decree!\n    Thou didst his gracious reign prolong,\n    Even in thy saints and angels wrong,\n      His fellow-citizens of immortality:\n    For twelve long years of exile born,\n    Twice twelve we numbered since his blest return:\n    So strictly wer't thou just to pay,\n    Even to the driblet of a day.[58]\n    Yet still we murmur, and complain\n    The quails and manna should no longer rain:\n    Those miracles 'twas needless to renew;\n    The chosen flock has now the promised land in view.\n\n\nXV.\n\n      A warlike prince ascends the regal state,\n    A prince long exercised by fate:\n    Long may he keep, though he obtains it late!\n    Heroes in heaven's peculiar mould are cast;\n    They, and their poets, are not formed in haste;\n    Man was the first in God's design, and man was made the last.\n    False heroes, made by flattery so,\n    Heaven can strike out, like sparkles, at a blow;\n    But ere a prince is to perfection brought,\n    He costs Omnipotence a second thought.\n      With toil and sweat,\n      With hardening cold, and forming heat,\n      The Cyclops did their strokes repeat,\n    Before the impenetrable shield was wrought.\n    It looks as if the Maker would not own\n    The noble work for his,\n    Before 'twas tried and found a master-piece.\n\n\nXVI.\n\n      View then a monarch ripened for a throne.\n    Alcides thus his race began,\n    O'er infancy he swiftly ran;\n    The future God at first was more than man:\n    Dangers and toils, and Juno's hate,\n    Even o'er his cradle lay in wait,\n    And there he grappled first with fate;\n    In his young hands the hissing snakes he prest,\n    So early was the Deity confest;\n    Thus, by degrees, he rose to Jove's imperial seat;\n    Thus difficulties prove a soul legitimately great.\n    Like his, our hero's infancy was tried;\n    Betimes the furies did their snakes provide,\n    And to his infant arms oppose\n    His father's rebels, and his brother's foes;\n    The more opprest, the higher still he rose.\n    Those were the preludes of his fate,\n    That formed his manhood, to subdue\n    The hydra of the many-headed hissing crew.\n\n\nXVII.\n\n    As after Numa's peaceful reign,\n      The martial Ancus[59] did the sceptre wield,\n    Furbished the rusty sword again,\n      Resumed the long-forgotten shield,\n      And led the Latins to the dusty field;\n    So James the drowsy genius wakes\n      Of Britain long entranced in charms,\n      Restiff and slumbering on its arms;\n    'Tis roused, and, with a new-strung nerve, the spear already shakes.\n    No neighing of the warrior steeds,\n    No drum, or louder trumpet, needs\n    To inspire the coward, warm the cold;\n    His voice, his sole appearance, makes them bold,\n    Gaul and Batavia dread the impending blow;\n    Too well the vigour of that arm they know;\n    They lick the dust, and crouch beneath their fatal foe.\n    Long may they fear this awful prince,\n      And not provoke his lingering sword;\n    Peace is their only sure defence,\n      Their best security his word.\n    In all the changes of his doubtful state,\n    His truth, like heaven's, was kept inviolate;\n    For him to promise is to make it fate.\n    His valour can triumph o'er land and main;\n    With broken oaths his fame he will not stain;\n    With conquest basely bought, and with inglorious gain.\n\n\nXVIII.\n\n      For once, O heaven, unfold thy adamantine book;\n    And let his wondering senate see,\n    If not thy firm immutable decree,\n    At least the second page of strong contingency,\n    Such as consists with wills, originally free.\n      Let them with glad amazement look\n    On what their happiness may be;\n      Let them not still be obstinately blind,\n      Still to divert the good thou hast designed,\n    Or, with malignant penury,\n    To starve the royal virtues of his mind.\n    Faith is a Christian's and a subject's test;\n    Oh give them to believe, and they are surely blest.\n    They do; and with a distant view I see\n    The amended vows of English loyalty;\n    And all beyond that object, there appears\n    The long retinue of a prosperous reign,\n      A series of successful years,\n    In orderly array, a martial, manly train.[60]\n      Behold e'en the remoter shores,\n    A conquering navy proudly spread;\n      The British cannon formidably roars,\n    While, starting from his oozy bed,\n    The asserted Ocean rears his reverend head,\n    To view and recognize his ancient lord again;\n      And, with a willing hand, restores\n    The fasces of the main.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 43: Note 1.]\n\n[Footnote 44: Alluding to the fable of Hercules supporting the heavenly\nsphere when Atlas was fatigued.]\n\n[Footnote 45: A very ill-timed sarcasm on those, who petitioned Charles\nto call his parliament. See p. 311.]\n\n[Footnote 46: 2 Kings, chap. xx.]\n\n[Footnote 47: Note II.]\n\n[Footnote 48: Note III.]\n\n[Footnote 49: An _eagre_ is a tide swelling above another tide, which\nI have myself observed in the river Trent.--DRYDEN. This species of\ncombat between the current and the tide is well known on the Severn;\nand, so far back as the days of William of Malmesbury, was called the\n_Higre_. Unhappy is the vessel, says that ancient historian, on whom\nits force falls laterally. _De Gestis Pontificum_, Lib. IV.--Drayton\ndescribes the same river,\n\n    ----With whose tumultuous waves,\n    Shut up in narrower bounds, the Higre wildly raves,\n    And frights the straggling flocks the neighbouring shores to fly.\n    Afar as from the main it comes with hideous cry;\n    And on the angry front the curled foam doth bring,\n    The billows 'gainst the bank when fiercely it doth fling,\n    Hurls up the scaly ooze, and makes the scaly brood\n    Leap madding to the land affrighted from the flood;\n    O'erturns the toiling barch whose steersman does not launch,\n    And thrust the furrowing beak into her ravening paunch.\n\n    _Poly-Albion_, Song VII.\n]\n\n[Footnote 50: To engage upon _liking_, (an image rather too familiar\nfor the occasion,) is to take a temporary trial of a service, or\nbusiness, with licence to quit it at pleasure.]\n\n[Footnote 51: Note IV.]\n\n[Footnote 52: Note V.]\n\n[Footnote 53: Alluding to the Duke's banishment to Flanders. See note\non \"Absalom and Achitophel,\" Vol. IX. p. 384.]\n\n[Footnote 54: The testament of king David, by which he bequeathed to\nhis son the charge of executing vengeance on those enemies whom he had\nspared during his life, has been much canvassed by divines. I indulge\nmyself in a tribute to a most venerable character, when I state, that\nthe most ingenious discourses I ever heard from the pulpit, were upon\nthis and other parts of David's conduct, in a series of lectures by\nthe late Reverend Dr John Erskine, one of the ministers of the Old\nGreyfriars church in Edinburgh.]\n\n[Footnote 55: King Charles' first parliament, from passing the Act of\nIndemnity, and taking other measures to drown all angry recollection of\nthe civil wars, was called the Healing Parliament.]\n\n[Footnote 56: A similar line occurs in the _Annus Mirabilis_, St. 160:\n\n    Beyond the year, and out of heaven's high-way.\n\nThe expression is originally Virgil's:\n\n    _Extra anni, solisque vias_.\n]\n\n[Footnote 57: See the Astr\u00e6a Redux. Note VI.]\n\n[Footnote 58: Reckoning from the death of his father, Charles had\nreigned thirty-six years and eight days; and, counting from his\nrestoration, twenty-four years, eight months, and nine days.]\n\n[Footnote 59: Ancus Martius, who succeeded the peaceful Numa Pompilius\nas king of Rome.]\n\n[Footnote 60: Note VII.]\n\n\n\n\nNOTES\n\nON\n\nTHRENODIA AUGUSTALIS.\n\n\nNote I.\n\n_An unexpected burst of woes._--P. 62.\n\nCharles II. enjoyed excellent health, and was particularly careful\nto preserve it by constant exercise. His danger, therefore, fell\nlike a thunder-bolt on his people, whose hearts were gained by his\neasy manners and good humour, and who considered, that the worst\napprehensions they had ever entertained during his reign, arose from\nthe religion and disposition of his successor. The mingled passions of\naffection and fear produced a wonderful sensation on the nation. The\npeople were so passionately concerned, that North says, and appeals to\nall who recollected the time for the truth of his averment, that it was\nrare to see a person walking the street with dry eyes. _Examen._ p. 647.\n\n\nNote II.\n\n    _The second causes took the swift command,\n    The medicinal head, the ready hand,\n    All eager to perform their part._--P. 64.\n\nIf there is safety in the multitude of counsellors, Charles did not\nfind it in the multitude of physicians. Nine were in attendance, all\nmen of eminence; the presence of the least of whom, Le Sage would have\nsaid, was fully adequate to account for the subsequent catastrophe.\nThey were Sir Thomas Millington, Sir Thomas Witherby, Sir Charles\nScarborough, Sir Edmund King, Doctors Berwick, Charlton, Lower, Short,\nand Le Fevre. They signed a declaration, that the king had died of an\napoplexy.\n\n\nNote III.\n\n    _The joyful short-lived news soon spread around._--P. 65.\n\nAn article was published in the Gazette, on the third day of the king's\nillness, importing, \"That his physicians now conceived him to be in\na state of safety, and that in a few days he would be freed from his\nindisposition.\"[61] North tells us, however, on the authority of his\nbrother, the Lord Keeper, that the only hope which the physicians\nafforded to the council, was an assurance, (joyfully communicated,)\nthat the king was ill of a violent fever. The council seeing little\nconsolation in these tidings, one of the medical gentlemen explained,\nby saying, that they now knew what they had to do, which was to\nadminister the cortex. This was done while life lasted,[62] although\nsome of the physicians seem to have deemed the prescription improper;\nin which case, Charles, after escaping the poniards and pistols of the\nJesuits, may be said to have fallen a victim to their bark.\n\n\nNote IV.\n\n    _And he who most performed, and promised less,\n    Even Short himself, forsook the unequal strife._--P. 67.\n\nDr Thomas Short, an eminent physician, who came into the court practice\nwhen Dr Richard Lower, who formerly enjoyed it, embraced the political\nprinciples of the Whig party. Short, a Roman Catholic, and himself a\nTory, was particularly acceptable to the Tories. To this circumstance\nhe probably owes the compliment paid him by our author, and another\nfrom Lord Mulgrave to the same purpose. Otway reckons, among his\nselected friends,\n\n    Short, beyond what numbers can commend.[63]\n\nDuke has also inscribed to him his translation of the eleventh Idyllium\nof Theocritus; beginning,\n\n    O Short! no herb nor salve was ever found,\n    To ease a lover's heat, or heal his wound.\n\nDr Short, as one of the king's physicians, attended the death-bed of\nCharles, and subscribed the attestation, that he died of an apoplexy.\nYet there has been ascribed to him an expression of dubious import,\nwhich caused much disquisition at the time; namely, that \"the king had\nnot fair play for his life.\" Burnet says plainly, that \"Short suspected\npoison, and talked more freely of it than any Protestant durst venture\nto do at the time.\" He, adds, that \"Short himself was taken suddenly\nill, upon taking a large draught of wormwood wine, in the house of\na Popish patient near the Tower; and while on his death-bed, he\ntold Lower, and Millington, and other physicians, that he believed\nhe himself was poisoned, for having spoken too freely of the king's\ndeath.\"[64] Mulgrave states the same report in these words, which,\ncoming from a professed Tory, are entitled to the greater credit: \"I\nam obliged to observe, that the most knowing and most deserving of all\nhis physicians did not only believe him poisoned, but thought himself\nso too, not long after, for having declared his opinion a little too\nboldly.\"[65] North, in confutation of this report, has interpreted\nShort's expression, as meaning nothing more than that the king's malady\nwas mistaken by his physicians, who, by their improper prescriptions,\ndeprived nature of fair play;[66] and he appeals to all the eminent\nphysicians who attended Dr Short in his last illness, whether he did\nnot fall a victim to his own bold method, in using the cortex. Upon\nthe whole, whatever opinion this individual physician may have adopted\nthrough mistake, or affectation of singularity, and whatever credit\nfaction, or indeed popular prejudice in general, may have given to\nsuch rumours at the time, there appears no solid reason to believe\nthat Charles died of poison. Both Burnet and Mulgrave say, that they\nnever heard a hint that his brother was accessary to such a crime; and\nit is very unlikely that any zealous Catholic should have had either\nopportunity, or inclination, to hasten the reign of a prince of that\nreligion, by the unsolicited service of poisoning his brother. The\nother physicians, several of whom, Lower, for example, were Whigs, as\nwell as Protestants, gave no countenance to this rumour, which was\ncirculated by a Catholic. And, as the symptoms of the king's disorder\nare decidedly apoplectic, the report may be added to those with which\nhistory abounds, and which are raised and believed only because an\nextraordinary end is thought most fit for the eminent and powerful.\n\nShort, as we have incidentally noticed, survived his royal patient but\na few months. He was succeeded in his practice by Ratcliffe, the famous\nTory physician of Queen Anne's reign.\n\n\nNote V.\n\n      _All that on earth he held most dear,\n      He recommended to his care,\n        To whom both heaven\n        The right had given,\n    And his own love bequeathed supreme command._--P. 69.\n\nThe historical accounts of the dying requests of Charles are\ncontradictory and obscure. It seems certain, that he earnestly\nrecommended his favourite mistress, the Duchess of Portsmouth, to the\nprotection of his successor. He had always, he said, loved her, and\nhe now loved her at the last. The Bishop of Bath presented to him his\nnatural son, the Duke of Richmond; whom he blessed, and recommended,\nwith his other children, to his successor's protection; adding, \"Do\nnot let poor Nelly[67] starve.\" He seems to have said nothing of the\nDuke of Monmouth, once so much beloved, and whom, shortly before, he\nentertained thoughts of recalling from banishment, and replacing in\nfavour; perhaps he thought, any recommendation to James of a rival so\nhated would be ineffectual. Burnet says, he spoke not a word of the\nqueen. Echard, on the contrary, affirms, that, at the exhortation of\nthe Bishop of Bath, Charles sent for the queen, and asked and received\nher pardon for the injuries he had done her bed.[68] In Fountainhall's\nManuscript, the queen is said to have sent a message, requesting\nhis pardon if she had ever offended him: \"Alas, poor lady!\" replied\nthe dying monarch, \"she never offended me; I have too often injured\nher.\"[69] This account seems more probable than that of Echard; for\nso public a circumstance, as a personal visit from the queen to her\nhusband's death-bed, could hardly have been disputed by contemporaries.\n\n\nNote VI.\n\n      _The officious muses came along,\n      A gay harmonious quire, like angels ever young;\n    The muse, that mourns him now, his happy triumph sung._--P. 74.\n\nIn Dryden's Life, we had occasion to remark the effect of the\nRestoration upon literature. It was not certainly its least important\nbenefit, that it opened our poet's own way to distinction; which is\nthus celebrated by Baber:\n\n    ----till blest years brought C\u00e6sar home again,\n    Dryden to purpose never drew his pen.\n    He, happy favourite of the tuneful nine!\n    Came with an early offering to your shrine;\n    Embalmed in deathless verse the monarch's fame;\n    Verse, which shall keep it fresh in youthful prime,\n    When Rustal's sacred gift must yield to time.\n\n\nNote VII.\n\n    _Faith is a Christian's and a subject's test._--P. 78.\n\nJames, as well as his poet, was not slack in intimating to his\nsubjects, that he expected them to possess a proper portion of this\nsaving virtue. And, that they might not want an opportunity of\nexercising it, he was pleased, by his own royal proclamation, to\ncontinue the payment of the duties of the custom-house, which had been\ngranted by parliament only during his brother's life.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 61: RALPH, Vol. I. p. 834.]\n\n[Footnote 62: Life of Lord Keeper Guilford, p. 253.]\n\n[Footnote 63: Epistle to Mr Duke.]\n\n[Footnote 64: Burnet's History of his own Times. End of Book III.]\n\n[Footnote 65: Character of Charles II., Sheffield Duke of Buckingham's\nWorks, Vol. II. p. 65.]\n\n[Footnote 66: One Dr Stokeham is said to have alleged, that the king's\nfit was epileptic, not apoplectic, and that bleeding was _ex diametro_\nwrong.]\n\n[Footnote 67: Nell Gwyn.]\n\n[Footnote 68: Echard's History, p. 1046.]\n\n[Footnote 69: Dalrymple's Memoirs, 8vo. vol. i. p. 66.]\n\n\n\n\nTHE\n\nHIND AND THE PANTHER,\n\nA POEM.\n\n\nIN THREE PARTS.\n\n    ----_Antiquam exquirite matrem_----\n    ----_Et vera incessu patuit Dea_. VIRG.\n\n\n\n\nTHE\n\nHIND AND THE PANTHER.\n\n\nIn the Life of Dryden, there is an attempt to trace the progress and\nchanges of those religious opinions, by which he was unfortunately\nconducted into the errors of Popery. With all the zeal of a now\nconvert, he seems to have been impatient to invite others to follow his\nexample, by detailing, in poetry, the arguments which had appeared to\nhim unanswerable. \"The Hind and the Panther\" is the offspring of that\nrage for proselytism, which is a peculiar attribute of his new mother\nchurch. The author is anxious, in the preface, to represent this poem\nas a task which he had voluntarily undertaken, without receiving even\nthe subject from any one. His assertion seems worthy of full credit;\nfor, although it was the most earnest desire of James II. to employ\nevery possible mode for the conversion of his subjects, there is room\nto believe, that, if the poem had been written under his direction,\nthe tone adopted by Dryden towards the sectaries would have been much\nmore mild. It is a well-known point of history, that, in order to\nprocure as many friends as possible to the repeal of the test act and\npenal laws against the Catholics, James extended indulgence to the\npuritans and sectarian non-conformists, the ancient enemies of his\nperson, his family, and monarchical establishments in general. Dryden\nobviously was not in this court secret; the purpose of which was to\nunite those congregations, whom he has described under the parable\nof bloody bears, boars, wolves, foxes, &c. in a common interest with\nthe Hind, against the exclusive privileges of the Panther and her\nsubjects. His work was written with the precisely opposite intention of\nrecommending an union between the Catholics and the church of England;\nat least, of persuading the latter to throw down the barriers, by which\nthe former were kept out of state employments. Such an union had at\none time been deemed practicable; and, in 1685, pamphlets had been\npublished, seriously exhorting the church of England to a league with\nthe Catholics, in order to root out the sectaries as common enemies\nto both. The steady adherence of the church of England to Protestant\nprinciples, rendered all hopes of such an union abortive; and, while\nDryden was composing his poem upon this deserted plan, James was taking\ndifferent steps to accomplish the main purpose both of the poet and\nmonarch.\n\nThe power of the crown to dispense, at pleasure, with the established\nlaws of the kingdom, had been often asserted, and sometimes exercised,\nby former English monarchs. A king was entitled, the favourers of\nprerogative argued, to pardon the breach of a statute, when committed;\nwhy not, therefore, to suspend its effect by a dispensation _a priori_,\nor by a general suspension of the law? which was only doing in general,\nwhat he was confessedly empowered to do in particular cases. But a\ndoctrine so pernicious to liberty was never allowed to take root in the\nconstitution; and the confounding the prerogative of extending mercy to\nindividual criminals, with that of annulling the laws under which they\nhad been condemned, was a fallacy easily detected and refuted. Charles\nII. twice attempted to assert his supposed privilege of suspending\nthe penal laws, by granting a general toleration; and he had, in both\ncases, been obliged to retract, by the remonstrances of Parliament.[70]\nBut his successor, who conceived that his power was situated on a more\nfirm basis, and who was naturally obstinate in his resolutions, was\nnot swayed by this recollection. He took every opportunity to exercise\nthe power of dispensing with the laws, requiring Catholics to take the\ntest agreeable to act of Parliament. He asserted his right to do so in\nhis speech to the Parliament, on 9th November, 1685; he despised the\nremonstrances of both Houses, upon so flagrant and open a violation of\nthe law; and he endeavoured, by a packed bench, and a feigned action\nat law, to extort a judicial ratification of his dispensing power. At\nlength, not contented with granting dispensations to individuals, the\nking resolved at once to suspend the operation of all penal statutes,\nwhich required conformity with the church of England, as well as of the\ntest act.\n\nOn the 4th of April, 1687, came forth the memorable Declaration of\nIndulgence, in favour of all non-conformists of whatever persuasion;\nby which they were not only protected in the full exercise of their\nvarious forms of religion, but might, without conformity, be admitted\nto all offices in the state. With what consequences this act of\nabsolute power was attended, the history of the Revolution makes\nus fully acquainted; for it is surely unnecessary to add, that the\nindulgence occasioned the petition and trial of the bishops, the most\nimportant incident in that momentous period.\n\nAbout a fortnight after the publishing of this declaration of\nindulgence, our author's poem made its appearance; being licensed\non the 11th April, 1687, and published a few days after. If it was\nundertaken without the knowledge of the court, it was calculated,\non its appearance, to secure the royal countenance and approbation.\nAccordingly, as soon as it was published in England, a second edition\nwas thrown off at a printing office in Holyroodhouse, Edinburgh, then\nmaintained for the express purpose of disseminating such treatises as\nwere best calculated to serve the Catholic cause.[71] If the Protestant\ndissenters ever cast their eyes upon profane poetry, \"The Hind and the\nPanther\" must have appeared to them a perilous commentary on the king's\ndeclaration; since it shows clearly, that the Catholic interest alone\nwas what the Catholic king and poet had at heart, and that, however\nthe former might now find himself obliged to court their favour,\nto strengthen his party against the established church, the deep\nremembrance of ancient feuds and injuries was still cherished, and the\ndesire of vengeance on the fanatics neither sated nor subdued.\n\nIn composing this poem, it may be naturally presumed, that Dryden\nexerted his full powers. He was to justify, in the eyes of the world,\na step which is always suspicious; and, by placing before the public\nthe arguments by which he had been induced to change his religion,\nhe was at once to exculpate himself, and induce others to follow his\nexample. He chose, for the mode of conveying this instruction, that\nparabolical form of writing, which took its rise perhaps in the East,\nor rather which, in a greater or less degree, is common to all nations.\nAn old author observes, that there is \"no species of four-footed\nbeasts, of birds, of fish, of insects, reptiles, or any other living\nthings, whose nature is not found in man. How exactly agreeable to the\nfox are some men's tempers; whilst others are profest bears in human\nshape. Here you shall meet a crocodile, who seeks, with feigned tears,\nto entrap you to your ruin; there a serpent creeps, and winds himself\ninto your affections, till, on a sudden, when warmed with favours, he\nwill bite and sting you to death. Tygers, lions, leopards, panthers,\nwolves, and all the monstrous generations of Africa, may be seen\nmasquerading in the forms of men; and 'tis not hard for an observing\nmind to see their natural complexions through the borrowed vizard.\"[72]\nDryden conceived the idea, of extending to religious communities the\nsupposed resemblance between man and the lower animals. Under the\nname of a \"milk-white Hind, immortal and unchanged,\" he described\nthe unity, simplicity, and innocence of the church, to which he had\nbecome a convert; and under that of a Panther, fierce and inexorable\ntowards those of a different persuasion, he bodied forth the church\nof England, obstinate in defending its pale from encroachment, by the\npenal statutes and the test act.[73] There wanted not critics to tell\nhim, that he had mistaken the character of either communion.[74] The\ninferior sects are described under the emblem of various animals,\nfierce and disgusting in proportion to their more remote affinity\nto the church of Rome. And in a dialogue between the two principal\ncharacters, the leading arguments of the controversy between the\nchurches, at least what the poet chose to consider as such, are\nformally discussed.\n\nBut Dryden's plan is far from coming within the limits of a fable or\nparable, strictly so called; for it is strongly objected, that the\npoet has been unable to avoid confounding the real churches themselves\nwith the Hind and the Panther, under which they are represented. \"The\nhind,\" as Johnson observes, \"at one time is afraid to drink at the\ncommon brook, because she may be worried; but, walking home with the\npanther, talks by the way of the Nicene fathers, and at last declares\nherself to be the Catholic church.\" And the same critic complains,\n\"that the king is now C\u00e6sar, and now the lion, and that the name Pan is\ngiven to the Supreme Being.\" \"The Hind and Panther transversed, or the\nCity and Country Mouse,\" which was written in ridicule of this poem,\nturns chiefly upon the incongruity of the emblems adopted by Dryden,\nand the inconsistencies into which his plan had led him.[75] This\nridicule, and the criticism on which it is founded, seems, however, to\nbe carried a little too far. If a fable, or parable, is to be entirely\nand exclusively limited to a detail which may suit the common actions\nand properties of the animals, or things introduced in it, we strike\nout from the class some which have always been held the most beautiful\nexamples of that style of fiction. It is surely as easy to conceive a\nHind and Panther discussing points of religion, as that the trees of\nthe forest should assemble together to chuse a king, invite different\ntrees to accept of that dignity, and, finally, make choice of a\nbramble. Yet no one ever hesitates to pronounce Jotham's Parable of\nthe Trees one of the finest which ever was written. Or what shall we\nsay of one of the most common among \u00c6sop's apologues, which informs us\nin the outset, that the lion, the ox, the sheep, and the ass, went a\nhunting together, on condition of dividing equally whatever should be\ncaught? Yet this and many other fables, in which the animals introduced\nact altogether contrary to their nature, are permitted to rank without\ncensure in the class which they assume. Nay, it may be questioned\nwhether the most proper fables are not those in which the animals are\nintroduced as acting upon the principles of mankind. For instance,\nif an author be compared to a daw, it is no fable, but a simile; but\nif a tale be told of a daw who dressed himself in borrowed feathers,\na thing naturally impossible, the simile becomes a proper fable.\nPerhaps, therefore, it is sufficient for the fabulist, if he can point\nout certain original and leading features of resemblance betwixt his\nemblems, and that which they are intended to represent, and he may be\npermitted to take considerable latitude in their farther approximation.\nIt may be farther urged in Dryden's behalf, that the older poets whom\nhe professed to imitate, Spenser, for example, in \"Mother Hubbart's\nTale,\" which he has actually quoted, and Chaucer, in that of the \"Nun's\nPriest's tale\" have stepped beyond the simplicity of the ancient\nfable, and introduced a species of mixed composition, between that and\ndownright satire. The names and characters of beasts are only assumed\nin \"Mother Hubbart's Tale,\" that the satirist might, under that slight\ncloak, say with safety what he durst not otherwise have ventured upon;\nand in the tale of Chaucer, the learned dialogue about dreams is only\nput into the mouths of a cock and hen, to render the ridicule of such\ndisquisitions more poignant. Had Spenser been asked, why he described\nthe court of the lion as exactly similar to that of a human prince, and\nintroduced the fox as composing madrigals for the courtiers? he would\nhave bidden the querist,\n\n    ----Yield his sense was all too blunt and base,\n    That n'ote without a hound fine footing trace.\n\nAnd if the question had been put to the bard of Woodstock, why, he\nmade his cock an astrologer, and his hen a physician, he would have\nanswered, that his satire might become more ludicrous, by putting\nthese grave speeches into the mouths of such animals. Dryden seems to\nhave proposed as his model this looser kind of parable; giving his\npersonages, indeed, the names of the Hind and Panther, but reserving to\nhimself the privilege of making the supposed animals use the language\nand arguments of the communities they were intended to represent. I\nmust own, however, that this licence appears less pardonable in the\nFirst Part, where he professes to use the majestic turn of heroic\npoetry, than in those which are dedicated to argument and satire.\n\nDryden has, in this very poem, given us two examples of the more\npure and correct species of fable. These, which he terms in the\npreface Episodes, are the tale of the Swallows seduced to defer their\nemigration, and that of the Pigeons, who chose a Buzzard for their\nking.[78] It is remarkable, that, as the former is by much the most\ncomplete story, so, although put in the mouth of a representative of\nthe heretical church, it proved eventually to contain a truth sorrowful\nto our author, and those of the Roman Catholic persuasion: For, while\nthe Buzzard's elevation (Bishop Burnet by name) was not attended with\nany peculiar evil consequences to the church of England, the short\ngleam of Popish prosperity was soon overcast, and the priests and their\nproselytes plunged in reality into all the distress of the swallows in\nthe Panther's fable.\n\nIn conformity to our author's plan, announced in the preface, the\nfable is divided into Three Parts. The First is dedicated to the\ngeneral description and character of the religious sects, particularly\nthe churches of Rome and of England. And here Dryden has used the\nmore elevated strain of heroic poetry. In the Second, the general\narguments of the controversy between the two churches are agitated,\nfor which purpose a less magnificent style of language is adopted.\nIn the Third and last Part, from discussing the disputed points of\ntheology, the Hind and Panther descend to consider the particulars in\nwhich their temporal interests were judged at this period to interfere\nwith each other. And here Dryden has lowered the tone of his verse to\nthat of common conversation. We must admit, with Johnson, that these\ndistinctions of style are not always accurately adhered to. The First\nPart has familiar lines; as, for instance, the four with which it\nconcludes:\n\n    Considering her a civil well-bred beast,\n    And more a gentlewoman than the rest,\n    After some common talk, what rumours ran,\n    The lady of the spotted muff began.\n\nSome passages are not only mean in expression, but border on\nprofaneness; as,\n\n    The smith divine, as with a careless beat,\n    Struck out the mute creation at a heat;\n    But when at last arrived to human race,\n    The Godhead took a deep considering space.\n\nOn the other hand, the Third Part has passages in a higher tone of\npoetry; particularly the whole character of James in the fable of\nthe Pigeons and the Buzzard: but it is enough to fulfil the author's\npromise in the preface, that the parts do each in general preserve a\npeculiar character and style, though occasionally sliding into that of\nthe others.\n\nIt is a main defect of the plan just detailed, that it necessarily\nlimited the interest of the poem to that crisis of politics when it was\npublished. A work, which the author announces as calculated to attract\nthe favour of friends, and to animate the malevolence of enemies, is\nnow read with cold indifference. He launched forth into a tide of\ncontroversy, which, however furious at the time, has long subsided,\nleaving his poem a disregarded wreck, stranded upon the shores which\nthe surges once occupied.\n\nSetting aside this original defect, the First and Last Parts of the\npoem, in particular, abound with passages of excellent poetry. In the\nformer, it is worthy attention, with what ease and command of his\nlanguage and subject Dryden passes from his sublime description of the\nimmortal Hind, to brand and stigmatise the sectaries by whom she was\nhated and persecuted; a rare union of dignity preserved in satire,\nand of satire engrafted upon heroic poetry. The reader cannot, at\nthe same time, fail to observe the felicity with which the poet has\nassigned prototypes to the dissenting churches, agreeing in character\nwith that which he meant to fix upon their several congregations.\nThe Bear, unlicked to forms, is the emblem of the Independents, who\ndisclaimed them;[79] the Wolf, which hunts in herds, to the classes and\nsynods of the Presbyterian church; the Hare, to the peaceful Quakers;\nthe wild Boar, to the fierce and savage Anabaptists, who ravaged\nGermany, the native country of that animal. With similar felicity, the\n\"bird, who warned St Peter of his fall,\" is, from that circumstance,\nand his nocturnal vigils, afterwards assigned as the representative\nof the Catholic clergy. Above all, the attention is arrested by the\npointed description of those dark and sullen enthusiasts, who, scarcely\nagreeing among themselves upon any peculiar points of doctrine, rested\ntheir claim to superior sanctity upon abominating and contemning those\nusual forms of reverence, by which men, in all countries since the\nbeginning of the world, have agreed to distinguish public worship from\nordinary or temporal employments. The whole of this First Part of the\npoem abounds with excellent poetry, rising above the tone of ordinary\nsatire, and yet possessing all its poignancy. The difference, to\nthose against whom it is directed, is like that of being blasted by a\nthunder-bolt, instead of being branded with a red-hot iron.\n\nThe First Part of \"The Hind and Panther,\" although chiefly dedicated to\ngeneral characters, contains some reasoning on the grand controversy,\nsimilar to that which occupies the Second. The author displays, with\nthe utmost art and energy of argumentative poetry, the reasons by\nwhich he was himself guided in adopting the Roman Catholic faith. He\nis led into this discussion, by mentioning the heretical doctrine of\nthe Unitarians; and insists, that the Protestant churches, which have\nconsented to postpone human reason to faith, by acquiescing in the\northodox doctrine of the Trinity, are not entitled to appeal to the\nauthority which they have waived, for arguments against the mystery\nof the real presence in the eucharist. This was a favourite mode\nof reasoning of the Catholics at the time, as may be seen from the\nnumerous treatises which they sent forth upon the controversy. It is\nundoubtedly very fit to impose on the vulgar, but completely overshoots\nthe mark at which it aims. For, if our yielding humble belief to one\nabstruse doctrine of divinity be sufficient to debar the exercise of\nour reason respecting another, it is obvious, that, by the same reason,\nthe appeal to our understanding must be altogether laid aside in\nmatters of doubtful orthodoxy. The Protestant divines, therefore, took\na distinction; and, while they admitted they were obliged to surrender\ntheir human judgment in matters of divine revelation which were above\ntheir reason, they asserted the power of appealing to its guidance in\nthose things of a finite nature which depend on the evidence of sense,\nand the consequent privileges of rejecting any doctrine, which, being\nwithin the sphere of human comprehension, is nevertheless repugnant\nto the understanding: therefore, while they received the doctrine\nof the Trinity as an infinite mystery, far above their reason, they\ncontended against that of transubstantiation as capable of being tried\nby human faculties, and as contradicted by an appeal to them. In a\nsubsequent passage, the author taxes the church of England with an\nattempt to reconcile contradictions, by admitting the real presence in\nthe eucharist, and yet denying actual transubstantiation. Dryden boldly\nappeals to the positive words of scripture, and sums his doctrine thus:\n\n    The literal sense is hard to flesh and blood,\n    But nonsense never can be understood.\n\nGranting, however, the obscurity or mystery of the one doctrine, it is\na hard choice to be obliged to adopt, in its room, that which asserts\nan acknowledged impossibility.\n\nIn the Second Part, another point of the controversy is agitated;\nthe infallibility, namely, which is claimed by the Roman church. The\nauthor appears here to have hampered himself in the toils of his own\nargument in a former poem. He had asserted in the \"Religio Laici,\"\nthat the Scriptures contained all things necessary for salvation;\nwhile he yet admitted, that those, whose bent inclined them to the\nstudy of polemical divinity, were to be guided by the expositions of\nthe fathers, and the earlier, especially the written, traditions of\nthe Church. There is, as has been noticed in the remarks on \"Religio\nLaici,\" a certain vacillation in our author's arguments concerning\ntradition, while yet a Protestant, which prepares us for his finally\nreposing his doubts in the bosom of that church, which pretends to\nbe the sole depositary of the earlier doctrines of Christianity, and\nclaims a right to ascertain all doubts in point of faith, by the same\nmode, and with the same unerring certainty, as the original church in\nthe days of the apostles and fathers. These doubts, with which Dryden\nseems to have been deeply impressed while within the pale of the Church\nof England, he now objects to her as inconsistencies, and accuses\nher of having recourse to tradition, or discarding it, as suited the\nargument which, for the time, she had in agitation. It is unnecessary\nhere to trace the various grounds on which reformed churches prove,\nthat the chain of apostolical tradition has been broken and shivered;\nand that the church, claiming the proud title of Infallible, has\nrepeatedly sanctioned heresy and error. Neither is it necessary to\nshew, how the Church of England stops short in her reception of\ntraditions, adopting only those of the primitive church. Something on\nthese points may be found in the notes. I may remark, that Dryden is\nof the Gallican or _low_ Church of Rome, if I may so speak, and rests\nthe infallibility which he claims for her in the Pope and Council of\nthe Church, and not in the Vicar of Christ alone. In point of literary\ninterest, this Second Part is certainly beneath the other two. It\nfurnishes, however, an excellent specimen of poetical ratiocination\nupon a most unpromising subject.\n\nThe Third Part refers entirely to the politics of the day; and the\npoet has endeavoured, by a number of arguments, to remove the deep\njealousy and apprehensions which the king's religion, and his zeal\nfor proselytism, had awakened in the Church of England. He does not\neven spare to allege a recent adoption of presbyterian doctrines, as\nthe reason for her unwonted resistance to the royal will; and all the\nvigour of his satire is pointed against the latitudinarian clergy,\nor, as they were finally called, the Low Church Party, who now began\nto assert, what James at length found a melancholy truth, that the\ndoctrine of passive obedience and non-resistance was not peremptorily\nbinding, when the church herself was endangered by the measures of the\nmonarch. Stillingfleet, the personal antagonist of our author, in the\ncontroversy concerning the Duchess of York's posthumous declaration of\nfaith, is personally and ferociously attacked. The poem concludes with\na fable delivered by each of the disputants, of which the moral applies\nto the project and hopes of her rival. We have already said, that which\nis told by the Panther, as it is most spirited and pointed, proved,\nto the great regret of the author, most strictly prophetic. It is\nremarkable for containing a beautiful character of King James, as the\nother exhibits a satirical portrait of the historian Burnet, with whom\nthe court party in general, and Dryden personally, was then at enmity.\n\nThe verse in which these doctrines, polemical and political, are\ndelivered, is among the finest specimens of the English heroic stanza.\nThe introductory verses, in particular, are lofty and dignified in\nthe highest degree; as are those, in which the splendour and majesty\nof the Church of Rome are set forth, in all the glowing colours of\nrich imagery and magnificent language. But the same praise extends\nto the versification of the whole poem. It never falls, never becomes\nrugged; rises with the dignified strain of the poetry; sinks into\nquaint familiarity, where sarcasm and humour are employed; and winds\nthrough all the mazes of theological argument, without becoming either\nobscure or prosaic. The arguments are in general advanced with an air\nof conviction and candour, which, in those days, must have required\nthe protestant reader to be on his guard in the perusal, and which\nseems completely to ascertain the sincerity of the author in his new\nreligious creed.\n\nThis controversial poem, containing a bold defiance to all who opposed\nthe king's measures or faith, had no sooner appeared, than our author\nbecame a more general object of attack than he had been even on the\npublication of \"Absalom and Achitophel.\" Indeed, his enemies were now\nfar more numerous, including most of his former friends, the _Tories_\nof the high church, excepting a very few who remained attached to\nJames, and saw, with anxiety, his destruction precipitated by the\nmeasures he was adopting.\n\nMontague and Prior were among the first to assail our author, in the\nparody, of which we have just given a large specimen. It must have been\npublished before the 24th October 1687, for it is referred to in \"The\nLaureat,\" another libel against Dryden, inscribed by Mr Luttrel with\nthat date. This assault affected him the more, as coming from persons\nwith whom he had lived on habits of civility. He is even said to have\nshed tears upon this occasion; a report probably exaggerated, but which\nserves to shew, that he was sensible he had exposed himself to the\nmost unexpected assailants, by the unpopularity of the cause which he\nhad espoused. Some further particulars respecting this controversy are\nmentioned in Dryden's Life. Another poet, or parodier, published \"The\nRevolter, a tragi-comedy,\" in which he brings the doctrines of the\n\"Religio Laici,\" and of the \"Hind and Panther,\" in battle array against\neach other, and rails at the author of both with the most unbounded\nscurrility.[80]\n\nNot only new enemies arose against him, but the hostility of former\nand deceased foes seemed to experience a sort of resurrection. Four\nLetters, by Matthew Clifford of the Charter-House, containing notes\nupon Dryden's poems and plays, were now either published for the first\ntime, or raked up from the obscurity of a dead-born edition, to fill\nup the cry of criticism against him on all sides. They are coarse and\nvirulent to the last degree, and so far served the purpose of the\npublishers; but, as they had no reference to \"The Hind and Panther,\"\nthat defect was removed by a supplementary Letter from the facetious\nTom Brown, an author, whose sole wish was to attain the reputation\nof a successful buffoon, and who, like the jesters of old, having\nonce made himself thoroughly absurd and ridiculous, gained a sort of\nprivilege to make others feel his grotesque raillery.[81] Besides the\nreflections contained in this letter, Brown also published \"The New\nConverts exposed, or Reasons for Mr Bayes changing his Religion,\" in\ntwo parts; the first of which appeared in 1688, and the second in 1690.\nFrom a passage in the preface to the first part, which may serve as\na sample of Tom's buffoonery, we learn, Dryden publicly complained,\nthat, although he had put his name to \"The Hind and Panther,\" those who\ncriticized or replied to that poem had not imitated his example.[82]\n\nAnother of these witty varlets published, in 1688, \"Religio Laici, or a\nLayman's Faith, touching the Supreme Head and Infallible Guide of the\nChurch, in two letters, &c. by J. R. a convert of Mr Bayes,\" licensed\nJune the 1st, 1688. From this pamphlet we have given some extracts in\nthe introductory remarks to \"Religio Laici,\" pp. 9, 10.\n\nThere were, besides, many libels of the most personal kind poured\nforth against Dryden by the poets who supplied the usual demand of\nthe hawkers. One of the most virulent contains a singular exhibition\nof rage and impotence. It professes to contain a review of our poet's\nlife and literary labours, and calls itself \"The Laureat.\" This, as\ncontaining some curious particulars, is given below.[83]\n\nThe cry against our author being thus general, we may reasonably\nsuppose, that he would have taken some opportunity to exercise his\npowers of retort upon those who were most active or most considerable\namong the aggressors, and that Montague and Prior stood a fair chance\nof being coupled up with Doeg and Og, his former antagonists. But,\nif Dryden entertained any intention of retaliation, the Revolution,\nwhich crushed his rising prospects, took away both the opportunity\nand inclination. From that period, the fame of \"The Hind and Panther\"\ngradually diminished, as the controversy between Protestant and Papist\ngave way to that between Whig and Tory. Within a few years after the\nfirst publication of the poem, Swift ranks it among the compositions\nof Grubstreet; ironically terms it, \"the master-piece of a famous\nauthor, now living, intended as a complete abstract of sixteen thousand\nschoolmen, from Scotus to Bellarmine;\" and immediately subjoins,\n\"Tommy Potts, supposed by the same hand, by way of Supplement to the\nformer.\"[84] With such acrimony do men of genius treat the productions\nof each other; and so certain it is, that, to enjoy permanent\nreputation, an author must chuse a theme of permanent interest.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 70: In the years 1662 and 1674. See Vol. IX, p. 448.]\n\n[Footnote 71: Our author was not the only poet who hailed this dawn of\ntoleration; for there is in Luttrell's Collection, \"A Congratulatory\nPoem, dedicated to his Majesty, on the late gracious Declaration (9th\nJune, 1687); by a Person of Quality.\"]\n\n[Footnote 72: Turkish Spy, Vol. viii. p. 19.]\n\n[Footnote 73: Perhaps the poet recollected the attributes ascribed to\nthe panther by one of the fathers: \"_Panther\u00e6, ut Divus Basilius ait,\ncum immani sint ac crudeli odio in homines a natura incens\u00e6, in hominum\nsimulacra furibund\u00e6 irruunt, nec aliter hominum effigiem, quam homines\nipsos dilacerant._\"--GRANATEUS _Concion. de Tempore_, Tom. i. p. 492.]\n\n[Footnote 74: \"Only by the way, before we bring D. against D. to the\nstake, I would fain know how Mr Bayes, that so well understood the\nnature of beasts, came to pitch upon the Hind and the Panther, to\nsignify the church of Rome and the church of England? Doubtless his\nreply will be, because the hind is a creature harmless and innocent;\nthe panther mischievous and inexorable. Let all this be granted; what\nis this to the author's absurdity in the choice of his beasts? For the\nscene of the persecution is Europe, a part of the world which never\nbred panthers since the creation of the universe. On the other side,\ngrant his allusion passable, and then he stigmatizes the church of\nEngland to be the most cruel and most voracious creature that ranges\nall the Lybian deserts;--a character, which shows him to have a strange\nmist before his eyes when he reads ecclesiastical history. And then,\nsays he,\n\n    The panther, sure the noblest next the hind,\n    And fairest creature of the spotted kind.\n\nWhich is another blunder, _cujus contrarium verum est_: For if beauty,\nstrength, and courage, advance the value of the several parts of the\ncreation, without question the panther is far to be preferred before\nthe hind, a poor, silly, timorous, ill-shaped, bobtailed creature, of\nwhich a score will hardly purchase the skin of a true panther. Had\nhe looked a little farther, Ludolphus would have furnished him with\na zebra, the most beautiful of all the four-footed creatures in the\nworld, to have coped with his panther for spots, and with his hind for\ngentleness and mildness; of which one was sold singly to the Turkish\ngovernor of Suaquena for 2000 Venetian ducats. There had been a beast\nfor him, as pat as a pudding for a friar's mouth. But to couple the\nhind and the panther was just like _sic magna parvis componere_;\nand, therefore, he had better have put his hind in a good pasty, or\nreserved her for some more proper allusion; for this, though his nimble\nbeast have four feet, will by no means run _quatuor pedibus_, though\nshe had a whole kennel of hounds at her heels.\"--_The Revolter, a\nTragi-comedy._]\n\n[Footnote 75: The following justification of their plan is taken from\nthe preface, which is believed to have been entirely the composition of\nMontague.\n\n\"The favourers of 'The Hind and Panther' will be apt to say in its\ndefence, that the best things are capable of being turned to ridicule;\nthat Homer has been burlesqued, and Virgil travestied, without\nsuffering any thing in their reputation from that buffoonery; and that,\nin like manner,'The Hind and the Panther' may be an exact poem, though\nit is the subject of our raillery: But there is this difference, that\nthose authors are wrested from their true sense, and this naturally\nfalls into ridicule; there is nothing represented here as monstrous\nand unnatural, which is not equally so in the original.--First, as\nto the general design; Is it not as easy to imagine two mice bilking\ncoachmen, and supping at the Devil, as to suppose a hind entertaining\nthe panther at a hermit's cell, discussing the greatest mysteries of\nreligion, and telling you her son Rodriguez writ very good Spanish?\nWhat can be more improbable and contradictory to the rules and examples\nof all fables, and to the very design and use of them? They were first\nbegun, and raised to the highest perfection, in the eastern countries,\nwhere they wrote in signs, and spoke in parables, and delivered the\nmost useful precepts in delightful stories; which, for their aptness,\nwere entertaining to the most judicious, and led the vulgar into\nunderstanding by surprizing them with their novelty, and fixing their\nattention. All their fables carry a double meaning; the story is one\nand entire; the characters the same throughout, not broken or changed,\nand always conformable to the nature of the creatures they introduce.\nThey never tell you, that the dog, which snapt at a shadow, lost his\ntroop of horse; that would be unintelligible; a piece of flesh is\nproper for him to drop, and the reader will apply it to mankind: They\nwould not say, that the daw, who was so proud of her borrowed plumes,\nlooked very ridiculous, when Rodriguez came and took away all the book\nbut the 17th, 24th, and 25th chapters, which she stole from him. But\nthis is his new way of telling a story, and confounding the moral and\nthe fable together.\n\n    Before the word was written, said the hind,\n    Our Saviour preached the faith to all mankind.\n\nWhat relation has the hind to our Saviour? or what notion have we of a\npanther's bible? If you say he means the church, how does the church\nfeed on lawns, or range in the forest? Let it be always a church, or\nalways the cloven-footed beast, for we cannot bear his shifting the\nscene every line. If it is absurd in comedies to make a peasant talk in\nthe strain of a hero, or a country wench use the language of the court,\nhow monstrous is it to make a priest of a hind, and a parson of a\npanther? To bring them in disputing with all the formalities and terms\nof the school? Though as to the arguments themselves, those we confess\nare suited to the capacity of the beasts; and if we would suppose a\nhind expressing herself about these matters, she would talk at that\nrate.\"\n\nThe reader may be curious to see a specimen of the manner in which\nthese two applauded wits encountered Dryden's controversial poem,\nwith such eminent success, that a contemporary author has said, \"that\n'The City and Country Mouse' ruined the reputation of the divine, as\nthe 'Rehearsal' ruined the reputation of the poet.\"[76] The plan is a\ndialogue between Bayes, and Smith, and Johnson, his old friends in the\n\"Rehearsal;\" the poet recites to them a new work, in which the Popish\nand English churches are represented as the city and country mouse, the\nformer spotted, the latter milk-white. The following is a specimen both\nof the poetry and dialogue:\n\n    \"_Bayes. Reads._ With these allurements, Spotted did invite,\n    From hermit's cell, the female proselyte.\n    Oh, with what ease we follow such a guide,\n    Where souls are starved, and senses gratified!\n\n\"Now, would not you think she's going? but, egad, you're mistaken; you\nshall hear a long argument about infallibility before she stir yet:\n\n    But here the White, by observation wise,\n    Who long on heaven had fixed her prying eyes,\n    With thoughtful countenance, and grave remark,\n    Said, \"Or my judgment fails me, or 'tis dark;\n    Lest, therefore, we should stray, and not go right,\n    Through the brown horror of the starless night,\n    Hast thou Infallibility, that wight?\"\n    Sternly the savage grinned, and thus replied,\n    \"That mice may err, was never yet denied.\"\n    \"That I deny,\" said the immortal dame,\n    \"There is a guide,--Gad, I've forgot his name,--\n    Who lives in Heaven or Rome, the Lord knows where;\n    Had we but him, sweet-heart, we could not err.--\n    But hark ye, sister, this is but a whim,\n    For still we want a guide to find out him.\"\n\n\"Here, you see, I don't trouble myself to keep on the narration, but\nwrite White speaks, or Dapple speaks, by the side. But when I get\nany noble thought, which I envy a mouse should say, I clap it down\nin my own person, with a _poeta loquitur_; which, take notice, is a\nsurer sign of a fine thing in my writings, than a hand in the margent\nanywhere else.--Well now, says White,\n\n    What need we find him? we have certain proof\n    That he is somewhere, dame, and that's enough;\n    For if there is a guide that knows the way,\n    Although we know not him, we cannot stray.\n\n\"That's true, egad: Well said, White.--You see her adversary has\nnothing to say for herself; and, therefore, to confirm the victory, she\nshall make a simile.\n\n_Smith._ Why, then, I find similes are as good after victory, as after\na surprize.\n\n_Bayes_. Every jot, egad; or rather better. Well, she can do it two\nways; either about emission or reception of light, or else about Epsom\nwaters: But I think the last is most familiar; therefore speak, my\npretty one. [_Reads._]\n\n    As though 'tis controverted in the school,\n    If waters pass by urine, or by stool;\n    Shall we, who are philosophers, thence gather,\n    From this dissention, that they work by neither?\n\n\"And, egad, she's in the right on't; but, mind now, she comes upon her\nscoop. [_Reads._]\n\n    All this I did, your arguments to try.\n\n\"And, egad, if they had been never so good, this next line confutes\n'em. [_Reads._]\n\n    Hear, and be dumb, thou wretch! that guide am I.\n\n\"There's a surprize for you now!--How sneakingly t'other looks?--Was\nnot that pretty now, to make her ask for a guide first, and tell her\nshe was one? Who could have thought that this little mouse had the\nPope, and a whole general council, in her belly?--Now Dapple had\nnothing to say to this; and, therefore, you'll see she grows peevish.\n[_Reads._]\n\n          Come leave your cracking tricks; and, as they say,}\n          Use not that barber that trims time, delay;--     }\n    Which, egad, is new, and my own.--                      }\n          I've eyes as well as you to find the way.\"--      }\n          Then on they jogged; and, since an hour of talk\n          Might cut a banter on the tedious walk,\n          \"As I remember,\" said the sober Mouse,\n          \"I've heard much talk of the Wit's Coffee-house.\"\n          \"Thither,\" says Brindle, \"thou shalt go, and see\n          Priests sipping coffee, sparks and poets tea,\n          Here, rugged frieze; there, quality well drest;\n          These, baffling the Grand Seigneur; those, the Test;\n          And here shrewd guesses made, and reasons given,\n          That human laws were never made in heaven.\n          But, above all, what shall oblige thy sight,\n          And fill thy eye-balls with a vast delight,\n          Is the poetic Judge of sacred wit,[77]\n          Who does i'the darkness of glory sit.\n          And as the moon, who first receives the light\n          With which she makes these nether regions bright,\n          So does he shine, reflecting from afar\n          The rays he borrowed from a better star;\n          For rules, which from Corneille and Rapin flow,\n          Admired by all the scribbling herd below,\n          From French tradition while he does dispense,     }\n          Unerring truths, 'tis schism,--a damned offence,--}\n          To question his, or trust your private sense.     }\n\n\"Ha! is not that right, Mr Johnson?--Gad forgive me, he is fast asleep!\nOh the damned stupidity of this age! Asleep!--Well, sir, since you're\nso drowsy, your humble servant.\n\n_John._ Nay, pray, Mr Bayes! Faith, I heard you all the while.--The\nwhite mouse----\n\n_Bayes._ The white mouse! Ay, ay, I thought how you heard me. Your\nservant, sir, your servant.\n\n_John._ Nay, dear Bayes: Faith, I beg thy pardon, I was up late last\nnight. Prithee, lend me a little snuff, and go on.\n\n_Bayes._ Go on! Pox, I don't know where I was.--Well, I'll begin. Here,\nmind, now they are both come to town. [_Reads._]\n\n    But now at Piccadilly they arrive,\n    And, taking coach, t'wards Temple-Bar they drive;\n    But, at St Clement's church, eat out the back,\n    And, slipping through the palsgrave, bilked poor hack.\n\n\"There's the _utile_ which ought to be in all poetry. Many a young\nTemplar will save his shilling by this stratagem of my mice.\n\n_Smith._ Why, will any young Templar eat out the back of a coach?\n\n_Bayes._ No, egad! But you'll grant, it is mighty natural for a\nmouse.\"--_Hind and Panther Transversed._\n\nSuch was the wit, which, bolstered up by the applause of party, was\ndeemed an unanswerable ridicule of Dryden's favourite poem.]\n\n[Footnote 76: Preface to the Second Part of \"The Reasons of Mr Bayes\nchanging his Religion.\"]\n\n[Footnote 77: i.e. _Dryden himself_.]\n\n[Footnote 78: I know not, however, but a critic might here also point\nout an example of that discrepancy, which is censured by Johnson, and\nridiculed by Prior. The cause of dissatisfaction in the pigeon-house\nis, that the proprietor chuses rather to feed upon the flesh of his\ndomestic poultry, than upon theirs; no very rational cause of mutiny on\nthe part of the doves.]\n\n[Footnote 79: Butler, however, assigns the Bear-Garden as a type of my\nMother Kirk; and the resemblance is thus proved by Ralpho:\n\n    Synods are mystical bear-gardens,\n    Where elders, deputies, church-wardens,\n    And other members of the court,\n    Manage the Babylonish sport;\n    For prolocutor, scribe, and bear-ward,\n    Do differ only in a mere word;\n    Both are but several synagogues\n    Of carnal men, and bears, and dogs;\n    Both antichristian assemblies,\n    To mischief bent as far's in them lies;\n    Both slave and toil with fierce contests,\n    The one with men, the other beasts:\n    The difference is, the one fights with\n    The tongue, the other with the teeth;\n    And that they bait but bears in this,\n    In t'other souls and consciences.\n\nHudibras denies the resemblance, and answers by an appeal to the senses:\n\n    For bears and dogs on four legs go\n    As beasts, but synod-men have two;\n    'Tis true, they all have teeth and nails,\n    But prove that synod-men have tails;\n    Or that a rugged shaggy fur\n    Grows o'er the hide of presbyter;\n    Or that his snout and spacious ears\n    Do hold proportion with a bear's.\n    A bear's a savage beast, of all\n    Most ugly and unnatural;\n    Whelped without form, until the dam\n    Has licked it into shape and frame;\n    But all thy light can ne'er evict,\n    That ever synod-man was lickt,\n    Or brought to any other fashion,\n    Than his own will and inclination.\n\n    _Hudibras_, Part 1. Canto 3.\n]\n\n[Footnote 80: \"In short, the whole poem, if it may deserve that name,\nis a piece of deformed, arrogant nonsense, and self-contradiction,\ndrest up in fine language, like an ugly brazen-faced whore, peeping\nthrough the costly trappings of a _point de Venise cornet_. I call it\nnonsense, because unseasonable; and arrogant, because impertinent:\nFor could Mr Bayes have so little wit, to think himself a sufficient\nchampion to decide the high mysteries of faith and transubstantiation,\nand the nice disputes concerning traditions and infallibility, in a\ndiscourse between \"The Hind and the Panther,\" which, undetermined\nhitherto, have exercised all the learning in the world? Or, could\nhe think the grand arcana of divinity a subject fit to be handled\nin flourishing rhyme, by the author of \"The Duke of Guise,\" or \"The\nConquest of Peru,\" or \"The Spanish Friar:\" Doubts which Mr Bayes is no\nmore able to unfold, than Saffold to resolve a question in astrology.\nAnd all this only as a tale to usher in his beloved character, and to\nshew the excellency of his wit in abusing honest men. If these were\nhis thoughts, as we cannot rationally otherwise believe, seeing that\nno man of understanding will undertake an enterprise, wherein he does\nnot think himself to have some advantage of his predecessors; then\ndoes this romance, I say, of The Panther and the Hind, fall under the\nmost fatal censure of unseasonable folly and saucy impertinence. Nor\ncan I think, that the more solid, prudent, and learned persons of the\nRoman Church, con him any thanks for laying the prophane fingers of a\nturn-coat upon the altar of their sacred debates.\"--_The Revolter_, a\ntragi-comedy, acted between The Hind and Panther and Religio Laici, &c.\n1687.]\n\n[Footnote 81: The following is the commencement of his \"Reflections on\nthe Hind and Panther,\" in a letter to a friend, 1687:\n\n\"The present you have made me of \"The Hind and Panther,\" is variously\ntalked of here in the country. Some wonder what kind of champion the\nRoman Catholics have now gotten; for they have had divers ways of\nrepresenting themselves; but this of rhyming us to death, is altogether\nnew and unheard of, before Mr Bayes set about it; and, indeed, he hath\ndone it in the sparkishest poem that ever was seen. 'Tis true, he hath\nwritten a great many things; but he never had such pure swiftness of\nthought, as in this composition, nor such fiery flights of fancy. Such\nhath always been his dramatical and scenical way of scribbling, that\nthere was no post nor pillar in the town exempt from the pasting up of\nthe titles of his plays; insomuch, that the footboys, for want of skill\nin reading, do now (as we hear) often bring away, by mistake, the title\nof a new book against the Church of England, instead of taking down the\nplay for the afternoon. Yet, if he did it well or handsomely, he might\ndeserve some pardon; but, alas! how ridiculously doth he appear in\nprint for any religion, who hath made it his business to laugh at all!\nHow can he stand up for any mode of worship, who hath been accustomed\nto bite, and spit his venom against the very name thereof?\n\n\"Wherefore, I cannot but wish our adversaries joy on their\nnew-converted hero, Mr Bayes; whose principle it is to fight single\nwith whole armies; and this one quality he prefers before all the moral\nvirtues put together. The Roman Catholics may talk what they will, of\ntheir Bellarmine and Perrone, their Hector and Achilles, and I know not\nwho; but I desire them all, to shew one such champion for the cause,\nas this Drawcansir: For he is the man that kills whole nations at\nonce; who, as he never wrote any thing, that any one can imagine has\never been the practice of the world, so, in his late endeavours to pen\ncontroversy, you shall hardly find one word to the purpose. He is that\naccomplished person, who loves reasoning so much in verse, and hath\ngot a knack of writing it smoothly. The subject (he treats of in this\npoem) did, in his opinion, require more than ordinary spirit and flame;\ntherefore, he supposed it to be too great for prose; for he is too\nproud to creep servilely after sense; so that, in his verse, he soars\nhigh above the reach of it. To do this, there is no need of brain, 'tis\nbut scanning right; the labour is in the finger, not in the head.\n\n\"However, if Mr Bayes would be pleased to abate a little of the\nexuberancy of his fancy and wit; to dispense with his ornaments and\nsuperfluencies of invention and satire, a man might consider, whether\nhe should submit to his argument; but take away the railing, and no\nargument remains; so that one may beat the bush a whole day, and, after\nso much labour, only spring a butterfly, or start a hedge-hog.\n\n\"For all this, is it not great pity to see a man, in the flower of his\nromantic conceptions, in the full vigour of his studies on love and\nhonour, to fall into such a distraction, as to walk through the thorns\nand briars of controversy, unless his confessor hath commanded it, as a\npenance for some past sins? that a man, who hath read Don Quixote for\nthe greatest part of his life, should pretend to interpret the Bible,\nor trace the footsteps of tradition, even in the darkest ages?\"--_Four\nLetters_, &c.]\n\n[Footnote 82: \"To draw now to an end, Mr Bayes, I hear, has lately\ncomplained, at Willis' Coffeehouse, of the ill usage he has met in\nthe world; that whereas he had the generosity and assurance to set\nhis own name to his late piece of polemic poetry, yet others, who\nhave pretended to answer him, wanted the breeding and civility to do\nthe like: Now, because I would not willingly disoblige a person of Mr\nBayes's character, I do here fairly, and before all the world, assure\nhim that my name is Dudly Tomkinson, and that I live within two miles\nof St Michael's Mount, in Cornwall, and have, in my time, been both\nconstable, church-warden, and overseer of the parish; by the same\ntoken, that the little gallery next the belfry, the new motto about\nthe pulpit, the king's arms, the ten commandments, and the great\nsun-dial in the church-yard, will transmit my name to all posterity.\nFurthermore, (if it will do him any good at all) I can make a pretty\nshift to read without spectacles; wear my own hair, which is somewhat\ninclining to red; have a large mole on my left cheek; am mightily\ntroubled with corns; and, what is peculiar to my constitution, after\nhalf-a-dozen bottles of claret, which I generally carry home every\nnight from the tavern, I never fail of a stool or two next morning;\nbesides, use to smoke a pipe every day after dinner, and afterwards\nsteal a nap for an hour or two in the old wicker-chair near the oven;\ntake gentle purgatives spring and fall; and it has been my custom, any\ntime these sixteen years, (as all the parish can testify) to ride in\nGambadoes. Nay, to win the heart of him for ever, I invite him here,\nbefore the courteous reader, to a country regale, (provided he will\nbefore hand promise not to debauch my wife,) where he shall have sugar\nto his roast beef, and vinegar to his butter; and lastly, to make him\namends for the tediousness of the journey, a parcel of relics to carry\nhome with him, which I believe can scarce be matched in the whole\nChristian world; but, because I have no great fancy that way, I don't\ncare if I part with them to so worthy a person; they are as followeth:\n\n\"St Gregory's Ritual, bound up in the same calve's-skin that the old\ngentleman, in St Luke, roasted at the return of his prodigal son.\n\n\"The quadrant that a Philistine tailor took the height of Goliah\nby, when he made him his last suit of clothes; for the giant being\na man of extraordinary dimensions, it was impossible to do this in\nany other way than your designers use when they take the height of\na country-steeple,\" &c. &c.--_Reasons for Mr Bayes changing his\nReligion._ See Preface.]\n\n[Footnote 83: THE LAUREAT.\n\n    _Jack Squab's history, in a little drawn,\n    Down to his evening from his morning dawn._\n\n    (Bought by Mr Luttrel, 24th October, 1687.)\n\n    Appear, thou mighty bard, to open view;\n    Which yet, we must confess, you need not do.\n    The labour to expose thee we may save;\n    Thou standst upon thy own records a knave,\n    Condemned to live in thy apostate rhymes,\n    The curse of ours, and scoff of future times.\n    Still tacking round with every turn of state, }\n    Reverse to Shaftesbury, thy cursed fate       }\n    Is always, at a change, to come too late.     }\n    To keep his plots from coxcombs, was his care;\n    His villainy was masked, and thine is bare.\n    Wise men alone could guess at his design,           }\n    And could but guess, the threads were spun so fine; }\n    But every purblind fool may see through thine.      }\n    Had Dick still kept the regal diadem,\n    Thou hadst been poet laureat still to him,\n    And, long ere now, in lofty verse proclaimed\n    His high extraction, among princes famed;\n    Diffused his glorious deed from pole to pole,\n    Where winds can carry, or where waves can roll:\n    Nay, had our Charles, by heaven's severe decree,\n    Been found and murdered in the royal tree,\n    Even thou hadst praised the fact; his father slain,\n    Thou callest but gently breathing of a vein.\n    Impious and villainous, to bless the blow   }\n    That laid at once three lofty nations low,  }\n    And gave the royal cause a fatal overthrow! }\n    Scandal to all religions, new and old;           }\n    Scandal to them, where pardon's bought and sold, }\n    And mortgaged happiness redeemed for gold.       }\n    Tell me, for 'tis a truth you must allow,\n    Who ever changed more in one moon than thou?\n    Even thy own Zimri was more stedfast known,\n    He had but one religion, or had none.\n    What sect of Christians is't thou hast not known,\n    And at one time or other made thy own?\n    A bristled baptist bred, and then thy strain\n    Immaculate was far from sinful stain;\n    No songs, in those blest times, thou didst produce,\n    To brand and shame good manners out of use;\n    The ladies had not then one b---- bob,\n    Nor thou the courtly name of Poet Squab.\n      Next, thy dull muse, an independant jade,\n    On sacred tyranny fine stanzas made;\n    Praised Noll, who even to both extremes did run,\n    To kill the father and dethrone the son.\n    When Charles came in, thou didst a convert grow,\n    More by thy interest, than thy nature so;\n    Under his 'livening beams thy laurels spread;   }\n    He first did place that wreath about thy head,  }\n    Kindly relieved thy wants, and gave thee bread. }\n    Here 'twas thou mad'st thy bells of fancy chime,\n    And choked the town with suffocating rhyme;\n    Till heroes, formed by thy creating pen,\n    Were grown as cheap and dull as other men.\n    Flushed with success, full gallery and pit,\n    Thou bravest all mankind with want of wit;\n    Nay, in short time wer't grown so proud a ninny,\n    As scarce to allow that Ben himself had any;\n    But when the men of sense thy error saw,\n    They checked thy muse, and kept the termagant in awe.\n      To satire next thy talent was addrest,\n    Fell foul on all, thy friends among the rest:\n    Those who the oft'nest did thy wants supply,\n    Abused, traduced, without a reason why;\n    Nay, even thy royal patron was not spared,\n    But an obscene, a santring wretch declared.\n    Thy loyal libel we can still produce;\n    Beyond example, and beyond excuse.\n    O strange return to a forgiving king!\n    But the warmed viper wears the greatest sting.\n    Thy pension lost, and justly without doubt;\n    When servants snarl, we ought to kick 'em out;\n    They that disdain their benefactor's bread,\n    No longer ought by bounty to be fed.\n    That lost, the visor changed, you turn about,\n    And straight a true blue Protestant crept out.\n    The \"Friar\" now was writ; and some will say,\n    They smell a mal-content through all the play.\n    The Papist too was damned, unfit for trust,        }\n    Called treacherous, shameless, profligate, unjust; }\n    And kingly power thought arbitrary lust.           }\n    This lasted till thou didst thy pension gain,\n    And that changed both thy morals and thy strain.\n      If to write contradictions nonsense be,\n    Who has more nonsense in their works than thee?\n    We'll mention but thy Layman's Faith and Hind:\n    Who'll think both these, such clashing do we find,\n    Could be the product of one single mind!\n    Here thou wouldst charitable fain appear,\n    Find fault that Athanasius was severe;\n    Thy pity straight to cruelty is raised,\n    And even the pious inquisition praised,\n    And recommended to the present reign,\n    \"O happy countries, Italy and Spain!\"\n    Have we not cause, in thine own words, to say, }\n    Let none believe what varies every day,        }\n    That never was, nor will be, at a stay?        }\n    Once heathens might be saved, you did allow,\n    But not, it seems, we greater heathens now.\n    The loyal church, that buoys the kingly line,\n    Damned with a breath, but 'tis such a breath as thine.\n    What credit to thy party can it be,\n    To have gained so lewd a profligate as he,\n    Strayed from our fold, makes us to laugh, not weep;\n    We have but lost what was disgrace to keep.\n    By them mistrusted, and to us a scorn;\n    For 'tis but weakness at the best to turn.\n    True, hadst thou left us in the former reign, }\n    Y'had proved it was not wholly done for gain; }\n    Now the meridian sun is not so plain.         }\n    Gold is thy god; for a substantial sum,           }\n    Thou to the Turk wouldst run away from Rome,      }\n    And sing his holy expedition against Christendom. }\n    But, to conclude; blush with a lasting red,\n    If thou'rt not moved by what's already said,\n    To see thy boars, bears, buzzards, wolves, and owls,\n    And all thy other beasts and other fowls,\n    Routed by two poor mice (unequal fight!);\n    But easy 'tis to conquer in the right.\n    See, there a youth, (a shame to thy gray hairs)\n    Make a mere dunce of all thy threescore years.\n    What in that tedious poem hast thou done,\n    But crammed all Esop's fables into one?\n    But why do I the precious minutes spend\n    On him, that would much rather hang than mend?\n    No, wretch, continue still just as thou art,\n    Thou'rt now in this last scene that crowns thy part.\n    To purchase favour veer with every gale,                }\n    And against interest never cease to rail,               }\n    Though thou'rt the only proof how interest can prevail. }\n]\n\nFOOTNOTE:\n\n[Footnote 84: \"Tale of a Tub,\" first part. \"Tommy Potts\" is a silly\npopular ballad, for which see Ritson's \"Ancient Songs.\"]\n\n\n\n\nTHE\n\nPREFACE.\n\n\nThe nation is in too high a ferment, for me to expect either fair\nwar, or even so much as fair quarter, from a reader of the opposite\nparty. All men are engaged either on this side or that; and though\nconscience is the common word which is given by both, yet if a writer\nfall among enemies, and cannot give the marks of _their_ conscience,\nhe is knocked down before the reasons of his own are heard. A preface,\ntherefore, which is but a bespeaking of favour, is altogether useless.\nWhat I desire the reader should know concerning me, he will find in the\nbody of the poem, if he have but the patience to peruse it. Only this\nadvertisement let him take before-hand, which relates to the merits of\nthe cause.\n\nNo general characters of parties (call them either sects or churches)\ncan be so fully and exactly drawn, as to comprehend all the several\nmembers of them; at least all such as are received under that\ndenomination. For example; there are some of the church by law\nestablished, who envy not liberty of conscience to dissenters; as being\nwell satisfied that, according to their own principles, they ought not\nto persecute them. Yet these, by reason of their fewness, I could not\ndistinguish from the numbers of the rest, with whom they are embodied\nin one common name. On the other side, there are many of our sects,\nand more indeed than I could reasonably have hoped, who have withdrawn\nthemselves from the communion of the Panther, and embraced this\ngracious indulgence of his majesty in point of toleration. But neither\nto the one nor the other of these is this satire any way intended: it\nis aimed only at the refractory and disobedient on either side. For\nthose, who are come over to the royal party, are consequently supposed\nto be out of gun-shot.[85] Our physicians have observed, that, in\nprocess of time, some diseases have abated of their virulence, and have\nin a manner worn out their malignity, so as to be no longer mortal;\nand why may not I suppose the same concerning some of those, who\nhave formerly been enemies to kingly government, as well as Catholic\nreligion? I hope they have now another notion of both, as having found,\nby comfortable experience, that the doctrine of persecution is far from\nbeing an article of our faith.[86]\n\nIt is not for any private man to censure the proceedings of a foreign\nprince:[87] but, without suspicion of flattery, I may praise our own,\nwho has taken contrary measures, and those more suitable to the spirit\nof Christianity. Some of the dissenters, in their addresses to his\nmajesty, have said, \"That he has restored God to his empire over\nconscience.\"[88] I confess, I dare not stretch the figure to so great\na boldness: but I may safely say, that conscience is the royalty and\nprerogative of every private man. He is absolute in his own breast, and\naccountable to no earthly power for that which passes only betwixt God\nand him. Those who are driven into the fold are, generally speaking,\nrather made hypocrites than converts.\n\nThis indulgence being granted to all the sects, it ought in reason\nto be expected, that they should both receive it, and receive it\nthankfully. For, at this time of day, to refuse the benefit, and adhere\nto those whom they have esteemed their persecutors, what is it else but\npublicly to own, that they suffered not before for conscience-sake, but\nonly out of pride and obstinacy, to separate from a church for those\nimpositions, which they now judge may be lawfully obeyed? After they\nhave so long contended for their classical ordination (not to speak of\nrites and ceremonies) will they at length submit to an episcopal? If\nthey can go so far, out of complaisance to their old enemies, methinks\na little reason should persuade them to take another step, and see\nwhither that will lead them.[89]\n\nOf the receiving this toleration thankfully, I shall say no more, than\nthat they ought, and I doubt not they will consider from what hand\nthey received it. It is not from a Cyrus, a heathen prince, and a\nforeigner,[90] but from a christian king, their native sovereign; who\nexpects a return in specie from them, that the kindness, which he has\ngraciously shewn them, may be retaliated on those of his own persuasion.\n\nAs for the poem in general, I will only thus far satisfy the reader,\nthat it was neither imposed on me, nor so much as the subject given me\nby any man. It was written during the last winter, and the beginning\nof this spring; though with long interruptions of ill health and other\nhindrances. About a fortnight before I had finished it, his majesty's\nDeclaration for liberty of conscience came abroad; which, if I had so\nsoon expected, I might have spared myself the labour of writing many\nthings which are contained in the third part of it. But I was always\nin some hope, that the church of England might have been persuaded to\nhave taken off the penal laws and the test, which was one design of the\npoem, when I proposed to myself the writing of it.\n\nIt is evident that some part of it was only occasional, and not first\nintended: I mean that defence of myself, to which every honest man is\nbound, when he is injuriously attacked in print; and I refer myself\nto the judgment of those, who have read the answer to the Defence of\nthe late king's Papers, and that of the duchess, (in which last I was\nconcerned) how charitably I have been represented there.[91] I am now\ninformed both of the author and supervisors of this pamphlet, and will\nreply, when I think he can affront me: for I am of Socrates's opinion,\nthat all creatures cannot. In the mean time let him consider whether\nhe deserved not a more severe reprehension than I gave him formerly,\nfor using so little respect to the memory of those, whom he pretended\nto answer; and, at his leisure, look out for some original treatise of\nhumility, written by any Protestant in English; (I believe I may say in\nany other tongue:) for the magnified piece of Duncombe on that subject,\nwhich either he must mean, or none, and with which another of his\nfellows has upbraided me, was translated from the Spanish of Rodriguez;\nthough with the omission of the seventeenth, the twenty-fourth, the\ntwenty-fifth, and the last chapter, which will be found in comparing of\nthe books.[92]\n\nHe would have insinuated to the world, that her late Highness died\nnot a Roman Catholic. He declares himself to be now satisfied to the\ncontrary, in which he has given up the cause: for matter of fact was\nthe principal debate betwixt us. In the mean time, he would dispute the\nmotives of her change; how preposterously, let all men judge, when he\nseemed to deny the subject of the controversy, the change itself.[93]\nAnd because I would not take up this ridiculous challenge, he tells\nthe world I cannot argue: but he may as well infer, that a Catholic\ncannot fast, because he will not take up the cudgels against Mrs\nJames,[94] to confute the Protestant religion.\n\nI have but one word more to say concerning the poem as such, and\nabstracting from the matters, either religious or civil, which are\nhandled in it. The First Part, consisting most in general characters\nand narration, I have endeavoured to raise, and give it the majestic\nturn of heroic poesy. The Second, being matter of dispute, and chiefly\nconcerning church authority, I was obliged to make as plain and\nperspicuous as possibly I could; yet not wholly neglecting the numbers,\nthough I had not frequent occasions for the magnificence of verse. The\nThird, which has more of the nature of domestic conversation, is, or\nought to be, more free and familiar than the two former.\n\nThere are in it two episodes, or fables, which are interwoven with the\nmain design; so that they are properly parts of it, though they are\nalso distinct stories of themselves. In both of these I have made use\nof the common-places of satire, whether true or false, which are urged\nby the members of the one church against the other: at which I hope no\nreader of either party will be scandalized, because they are not of my\ninvention, but as old, to my knowledge, as the times of Boccace and\nChaucer on the one side, and as those of the Reformation on the other.\n\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 85: The tumultuary joy of the sectaries, upon their first\nview of this triumph over the church of England, led them into all\nthe extravagancies of loyalty, which used to be practised by their\nancient enemies the Tories. Addresses teeming with affection, and\nfoaming with bombast, were poured in upon King James from all corners\nof his dominions; Presbyterians, Anabaptists, Quakers, Sectaries of all\nsorts and persuasions, strove to be foremost in the race of gratitude.\nAnd when similar addresses came in from corporations, who had been\nformerly anxious to shew their loyalty on the subject of the Rye-house\nplot, the king's accession, and other occasions of triumph to the\nTories, the tone of these bodies also was wonderfully changed; and,\ninstead of raving against excluders, rebels, regicides, republicans,\nand fanatics, whose hellish contrivances endeavoured to destroy the\nsafety of the kingdom, and the life of the king, these same gentlemen\nmention the Sectaries as their brethren and fellow-subjects, to whom\nthe king, their common father, had been justly, liberally, royally\npleased to grant freedom of conscience, for which the addressers\noffer their hearty and unfeigned thanks. These were the two classes\nof persons, whom Dryden, as they had closed with the measures of\ngovernment, declares to be exempted from his satire. Those, therefore,\nagainst whom it is avowedly directed, are first, the Church of England,\nwhose adherents saw her destruction aimed at through the pretence of\ntoleration. 2dly, Those Sectaries, who distrusted the boon which the\nking presented, and feared that the consequences of this immediate\nindulgence at the hands of an ancient enemy, would be purchased by\nfuture persecution. These formed a body, small at first, but whose\nnumbers daily increased.\n\nAmong the numerous addresses which were presented to the court on\nthis occasion, there are two somewhat remarkable from the quality and\ncondition of the persons in whose name they are offered. The one is\nfrom the persons engaged in the schemes of Shaftesbury and Monmouth,\nand who set out by acknowledging their lives and fortunes forfeited to\nKing James; a singular instance of convicts offering their sentiments\nupon state affairs. The other is from no less a corporation than the\ncompany of London Cooks, which respectable persons declare their\napprobation of the indulgence, upon a principle recognized in their\nprofession, \"the difference of _men's gusto_, in religion, as in\neatables;\" and assure his majesty, that his declaration \"somewhat\nresembles the Almighty's manna, which suited every man's palate.\"\n_History of Addresses_, pp. 106, 132.]\n\n[Footnote 86: Most readers will, I think, acknowledge with me, the\nextreme awkwardness with which Dryden apologizes, for hoping well of\nthose Sectaries, against whom he had so often discharged the utmost\nseverity of his pen. Yet there is much real truth in the observation,\nthough the compliment to the new allies of the Catholics is but a cold\none. Many sects have distinguished themselves by faction, fanaticism,\nand furious excess at their rise, which, when their spirits have\nceased to be agitated by novelty, and exasperated by persecution, have\nsubsided into quiet orderly classes of citizens, only remarkable for\nsome peculiarities of speculative doctrine.]\n\n[Footnote 87: Alluding to the persecution of the Huguenots in France,\nafter the recall of the edict of Nantes.]\n\n[Footnote 88: This phrase occurs in the address of the Ministers of the\nGospel in and about the city of London, commonly called Presbyterians:\n\"Your majesty's princely wisdom,\" say these reverend sycophants, \"now\nrescues us from our long sufferings, and by the same royal act restores\nGod to the empire over conscience.\" This it is to be too eloquent; when\npeople set no bounds to their rhetoric, it betrays them often into\nnonsense, and not seldom into blasphemy.--_History of Addresses_, p.\n107.]\n\n[Footnote 89: A gentle insinuation, that, if the sectaries could\nrenounce the ordination by presbyteries or classes, in favour of the\nchurch of England, it would require but a step or two farther to bring\nthem to a conformity with that of Rome.]\n\n[Footnote 90: Who freed the Jews from their bondage, and gave them\npermission to rebuild their city and temple.--See the _Book of Esdras_.]\n\n[Footnote 91: In his ardour for extending the Catholic religion,\nJames II. had directed copies of the papers found in his brother's\nstrongbox in favour of that communion, with the copy of a paper by his\nfirst duchess, giving the reasons for her conversion to that faith,\nto be printed, and circulated through the kingdom. These papers were\nanswered by the learned Stillingfleet, then Dean of St Paul's. A\nDefence of the Papers was published \"by command,\" of which it appears,\nfrom the passage in the text, that our author wrote the third part,\nwhich applies to the Duchess of York's paper. Stillingfleet published\na vindication of his answer, in which he attacks our author with some\nseverity. A full account of the controversy will be found attached to\nDryden's part of the Defence, among his prose works.]\n\n[Footnote 92: In the controversy between Dryden and Stillingfleet,\nthe former had concluded his Defence of the Duchess of York's paper,\nby alleging, that \"among all the volumes of divinity written by the\nProtestants, there is not one original treatise, at least that I have\nseen or heard of, which has handled distinctly, and by itself, the\nChristian virtue of humility.\" This Stillingfleet, in his reply, calls\na \"bare-faced assertion of a thing known to be false;\" for, \"with-in\na few years, besides what has been printed formerly, such a book\nhath been published in London.\" Dryden, in the text, replies to this\nallegation, that Duncombe's treatise, which he supposes to be meant, is\na translation from the Spanish of Rodriguez, therefore, not originally\na Protestant work. Montague, in the preface to \"The Hind and Panther\nTransversed\" alleges, that Dryden has mistaken the name of the author\nof the treatise alluded to; which was not, he asserts, Duncombe, but\nAllen. See the matter more fully canvassed in a note on the original\npassage, in \"The Duchess of York's Paper Defended.\"]\n\n[Footnote 93: Dryden is not quite candid in his statement. In\nStillingfleet's answer to the Duchess's paper, it is indeed called, the\n\"paper _said_ to be written by a great lady;\" but there is not another\nword upon the authority, which, indeed, considering it was published\nunder the king's immediate inspection, could not be very decorously\ndisputed. Dryden seizes upon this phrase in his defence, and, coupling\nwith it some expressions of the Bishop of Winchester, he argues that\nit was the intention of these sons of the church of England, to\ngive the lie to their sovereign. In this vindication of the answer,\nStillingfleet thus expresses himself: \"As to the main design of the\nthird paper, I declared, that I considered it, as it was supposed to\ncontain the reasons and motives of the conversion of so great a lady to\nthe church of Rome.\n\n\"But this gentleman has now eased me of the necessity of farther\nconsidering it on that account. For he declares, that none of those\nmotives or reasons are to be found in the paper of her highness. Which\nhe repeats several times. 'She writ this paper, not as to the reasons\nshe had herself for changing, &c.' 'As for her reasons, they were only\nbetwixt God and her own soul, and the priest with whom she spoke at\nlast.'\n\n\"And so my work is at an end as to her paper. For I never intended to\nransack the private papers or secret narratives of great persons; and\nI do not in the least question the relation now given from so great\nauthority, as that he mentions of the passages concerning her; and\ntherefore I have nothing more to say as to what relates to the person\nof the duchess.\"\n\nIt is obvious that Dryden, probably finding the divine too hard for\nhim on the controversial part of the subject, affects to consider the\ndispute as entirely limited to the authenticity of the paper, which it\ncannot be supposed Stillingfleet ever seriously intended to impeach.]\n\n[Footnote 94: Eleanor James, a lady who was at this period pleased\nto stand up as a champion for the test, against the repeal which\nJames had so deeply at heart. This female theologian is mentioned\nin the \"Remarks from the country, upon the two Letters, relating to\nthe convocation, and alterations in the liturgy.\" \"It is a thousand\npities, so instructive and so eloquent papers should ever fall under\nsuch an imputation, (of being too forward, and solemn impertinence,)\nand be ranked among the scribblings of Eleanor James, with this only\nadvantage of having better language, whereas the woman counsellor is\njudged to have the better meaning.\" Although Mrs James's lucubrations\nwere thus vilipended by the male disputants, one of her own sex thought\nit necessary to enter the lists in opposition to her. _See Elizabeth\nRone's short Answer to Eleanor James's Long Preamble, or Vindication of\nthe New Test_:\n\n    The book called Mistress James's Vindication,\n    Does seem to me but her great indignation;\n    Against the Romans and dissenters too,\n    She for the church of England makes adoe;\n    Calling her Christ's spouse, but she's mistaken,\n    Christ's spouse is she that is by her forsaken.\n\nMrs James's work was entitled, \"A Vindication of the Church of\nEngland, in answer to a pamphlet, entitled, a New Test of the Church\nof England's Loyalty.\" She was herself the wife of a printer, who\nleft many books to the library of Sion college. Mrs James's picture\nis preserved in the library, in the full dress of a citizen's wife of\nthat period. She survived her husband many years, and carried on the\nprinting business on her own account.--MALONE, Vol. III. p. 539.]\n\n\n\n\nTHE\n\nHIND AND THE PANTHER.\n\n\n    A milk-white Hind,[95] immortal and unchanged,\n    Fed on the lawns, and in the forest ranged;\n    Without unspotted, innocent within,\n    She feared no danger, for she knew no sin.\n    Yet had she oft been chased with horns and hounds,\n    And Scythian shafts; and many winged wounds\n    Aimed at her heart; was often forced to fly,\n    And doomed to death, though fated not to die.[96]\n      Not so her young; for their unequal line\n    Was hero's make, half human, half divine.\n    Their earthly mould obnoxious was to fate,\n    The immortal part assumed immortal state.\n    Of these a slaughtered army lay in blood,[97]\n    Extended o'er the Caledonian wood,\n    Their native walk; whose vocal blood arose,\n    And cried for pardon on their perjured foes.\n    Their fate was fruitful, and the sanguine seed,\n    Endued with souls, increased the sacred breed.\n    So captive Israel multiplied in chains,\n    A numerous exile, and enjoyed her pains.\n    With grief and gladness mixed, the mother viewed\n    Her martyr'd offspring, and their race renewed;\n    Their corps to perish, but their kind to last,\n    So much the deathless plant the dying fruit surpassed.\n      Panting and pensive now she ranged alone,\n    And wandered in the kingdoms, once her own.\n    The common hunt, though from their rage restrained\n    By sovereign power, her company disdained,\n    Grinned as they passed, and with a glaring eye\n    Gave gloomy signs of secret enmity\n    'Tis true, she bounded by, and trip'd so light,\n    They had not time to take a steady sight;\n    For truth has such a face and such a mien,\n    As to be loved needs only to be seen.\n      The bloody Bear, an independent beast,\n    Unlicked to form, in groans her hate exprest.[98]\n    Among the timorous kind, the quaking Hare\n    Professed neutrality, but would not swear.[99]\n    Next her the buffoon Ape, as atheists use,\n    Mimicked all sects, and had his own to chuse;\n    Still when the Lion looked, his knees he bent,\n    And paid at church a courtier's compliment.[100]\n    The bristled baptist Boar, impure as he,[101]\n    But whitened with the foam of sanctity,\n    With fat pollutions filled the sacred place,}\n    And mountains levelled in his furious race; }\n    So first rebellion founded was in grace.    }\n    But since the mighty ravage, which he made\n    In German forests, had his guilt betrayed,\n    With broken tusks, and with a borrowed name,\n    He shunned the vengeance, and concealed the shame;\n    So lurked in sects unseen. With greater guile\n    False Reynard fed on consecrated spoil;[102]\n    The graceless beast by Athanasius first\n    Was chased from Nice, then by Socinus nursed;\n    His impious race their blasphemy renewed,\n    And nature's king through nature's optics viewed.\n    Reversed, they viewed him lessened to their eye,\n    Nor in an infant could a God descry;\n    New swarming sects to this obliquely tend,\n    Hence they began, and here they all will end.\n      What weight of antient witness can prevail,\n    If private reason hold the public scale?\n    But, gracious God, how well dost thou provide\n    For erring judgments an unerring guide!\n    Thy throne is darkness in the abyss of light,\n    A blaze of glory that forbids the sight.\n    O teach me to believe thee, thus concealed,\n    And search no farther than thyself revealed;\n    But her alone for my director take,\n    Whom thou hast promised never to forsake!\n    My thoughtless youth was winged with vain desires;\n    My manhood, long misled by wandering fires,\n    Followed false lights; and, when their glimpse was gone,\n    My pride struck out new sparkles of her own.\n    Such was I, such by nature still I am;\n    Be thine the glory, and be mine the shame!\n    Good life be now my task; my doubts are done;[103]\n    What more could fright my faith, than three in one?\n    Can I believe eternal God could lie         }\n    Disguised in mortal mould, and infancy?     }\n    That the great Maker of the world could die?}\n    And after that trust my imperfect sense,\n    Which calls in question his omnipotence?\n    Can I my reason to my faith compel,\n    And shall my sight, and touch, and taste rebel?\n    Superior faculties are set aside;\n    Shall their subservient organs be my guide?\n    Then let the moon usurp the rule of day,\n    And winking tapers shew the sun his way;\n    For what my senses can themselves perceive,\n    I need no revelation to believe.\n    Can they, who say the host should be descried\n    By sense, define a body glorified?\n    Impassable, and penetrating parts?\n    Let them declare by what mysterious arts\n    He shot that body through the opposing might,         }\n    Of bolts and bars impervious to the light,            }\n    And stood before his train confessed in open sight.[104]}\n    For since thus wondrously he passed, 'tis plain,\n    One single place two bodies did contain;\n    And sure the same Omnipotence as well\n    Can make one body in more places dwell.\n    Let reason then at her own quarry fly,\n    But how can finite grasp infinity?\n      'Tis urged again, that faith did first commence\n    By miracles, which are appeals to sense,\n    And thence concluded, that our sense must be\n    The motive still of credibility;\n    For latter ages must on former wait,\n    And what began belief, must propagate.\n      But winnow well this thought, and you shall find\n    'Tis light as chaff that flies before the wind.\n    Were all those wonders wrought by power divine,\n    As means or ends of some more deep design?\n    Most sure as means, whose end was this alone,\n    To prove the Godhead of the Eternal Son.\n    God thus asserted, man is to believe\n    Beyond what sense and reason can conceive,\n    And, for mysterious things of faith, rely\n    On the proponent, heaven's authority.\n    If, then, our faith we for our guide admit,\n    Vain is the farther search of human wit;\n    As when the building gains a surer stay,\n    We take the unuseful scaffolding away.\n    Reason by sense no more can understand;\n    The game is played into another hand.\n    Why chuse we then like bilanders[105] to creep}\n    Along the coast, and land in view to keep,  }\n    When safely we may launch into the deep?    }\n    In the same vessel, which our Saviour bore,    }\n    Himself the pilot, let us leave the shore,     }\n    And with a better guide a better world explore.}\n    Could he his Godhead veil with flesh and blood,\n    And not veil these again to be our food?\n    His grace in both is equal in extent,\n    The first affords us life, the second nourishment.\n    And if he can, why all this frantic pain,   }\n    To construe what his clearest words contain,}\n    And make a riddle what he made so plain?    }\n    To take up half on trust, and half to try,\n    Name it not faith, but bungling bigotry;\n    Both knave and fool the merchant we may call,                }\n    To pay great sums, and to compound the small;                }\n    For who would break with heaven, and would not break for all?}\n    Rest then, my soul, from endless anguish freed;\n    Nor sciences thy guide, nor sense thy creed.\n    Faith is the best ensurer of thy bliss;\n    The bank above must fail, before the venture miss.\n      But heaven and heaven-born faith are far from thee,\n    Thou first apostate to divinity.\n    Unkennelled range in thy Polonian plains;\n    A fiercer foe the insatiate Wolf remains.\n    Too boastful Britain, please thyself no more,\n    That beasts of prey are banished from thy shore;\n    The bear, the boar, and every savage name,\n    Wild in effect, though in appearance tame,\n    Lay waste thy woods, destroy thy blissful bower,\n    And, muzzled though they seem, the mutes devour.\n    More haughty than the rest, the wolfish race}\n    Appears with belly gaunt, and famished face;}\n    Never was so deformed a beast of grace.     }\n    His ragged tail betwixt his legs he wears,           }\n    Close clap'd for shame; but his rough crest he rears,}\n    And pricks up his predestinating ears.[106]            }\n    His wild disordered walk, his hagard eyes,\n    Did all the bestial citizens surprise.\n    Though feared and hated, yet he ruled a while,\n    As captain or companion of the spoil.\n    Full many a year his hateful head had been\n    For tribute paid, nor since in Cambria seen;\n    The last of all the litter 'scaped by chance,\n    And from Geneva first infested France.\n    Some authors thus his pedigree will trace,\n    But others write him of an upstart race;\n    Because of Wickliffe's brood no mark he brings,\n    But his innate antipathy to kings.\n    These last deduce him from the Helvetian kind,\n    Who near the Leman-lake his consort lined;\n    That fiery Zuinglius first the affection bred,\n    And meagre Calvin blest the nuptial bed.\n    In Israel some believe him whelped long since,\n    When the proud sanhedrim oppressed the prince;\n    Or, since he will be Jew, derive him higher,\n    When Corah with his brethren did conspire\n    From Moses' hand the sovereign sway to wrest,\n    And Aaron of his ephod to divest;\n    'Till opening earth made way for all to pass,\n    And could not bear the burden of a class.[107]\n    The Fox and he came shuffled in the dark,\n    If ever they were stowed in Noah's ark;\n    Perhaps not made; for all their barking train\n    The dog (a common species) will contain;\n    And some wild curs, who from their masters ran,}\n    Abhorring the supremacy of man,                }\n    In woods and caves the rebel-race began.       }\n      O happy pair, how well have you increased!\n    What ills in church and state have you redressed!\n    With teeth untried, and rudiments of claws,\n    Your first essay was on your native laws;\n    Those having torn with ease, and trampled down,}\n    Your fangs you fastened on the mitred crown,   }\n    And freed from God and monarchy your town.     }\n    What though your native kennel still be small,\n    Bounded betwixt a puddle and a wall;[108]\n    Yet your victorious colonies are sent\n    Where the north ocean girds the continent.\n    Quickened with fire below, your monsters breed\n    In fenny Holland, and in fruitful Tweed;\n    And, like the first, the last affects to be\n    Drawn to the dregs of a democracy.\n    As, where in fields the fairy rounds are seen,\n    A rank sour herbage rises on the green;\n    So, springing where those midnight elves advance,\n    Rebellion prints the footsteps of the dance.\n    Such are their doctrines, such contempt they show}\n    To heaven above, and to their prince below,      }\n    As none but traitors and blasphemers know.       }\n    God like the tyrant of the skies is placed,\n    And kings, like slaves, beneath the crowd debased.\n    So fulsome is their food, that flocks refuse\n    To bite, and only dogs for physic use.\n    As, where the lightning runs along the ground,\n    No husbandry can heal the blasting wound;\n    Nor bladed grass, nor bearded corn succeeds,\n    But scales of scurf and putrefaction breeds;\n    Such wars, such waste, such fiery tracks of dearth\n    Their zeal has left, and such a teemless earth.\n    But, as the poisons of the deadliest kind\n    Are to their own unhappy coasts confined;\n    As only Indian shades of sight deprive,\n    And magic plants will but in Colchos thrive;\n    So presbytery and pestilential zeal\n    Can only flourish in a commonweal.\n    From Celtic woods is chased the wolfish crew;[109]\n    But ah! some pity e'en to brutes is due;\n    Their native walks, methinks, they might enjoy,\n    Curbed of their native malice to destroy.\n    Of all the tyrannies on human-kind,\n    The worst is that which persecutes the mind.\n    Let us but weigh at what offence we strike;\n    'Tis but because we cannot think alike.\n    In punishing of this, we overthrow\n    The laws of nations and of nature too.\n    Beasts are the subjects of tyrannic sway,\n    Where still the stronger on the weaker prey;\n    Man only of a softer mould is made,\n    Not for his fellows' ruin, but their aid;\n    Created kind, beneficent and free,\n    The noble image of the Deity.\n      One portion of informing fire was given\n    To brutes, the inferior family of heaven.\n    The smith divine, as with a careless beat,\n    Struck out the mute creation at a heat;\n    But, when arrived at last to human race,\n    The Godhead took a deep considering space;\n    And, to distinguish man from all the rest,\n    Unlocked the sacred treasures of his breast;\n    And mercy mixt with reason did impart,\n    One to his head, the other to his heart;\n    Reason to rule, but mercy to forgive;\n    The first is law, the last prerogative.\n    And like his mind his outward form appeared,            }\n    When, issuing naked to the wondering herd,              }\n    He charmed their eyes; and, for they loved, they feared }\n    Not armed with horns of arbitrary might,                   }\n    Or claws to seize their furry spoils in fight,             }\n    Or with increase of feet to o'ertake them in their flight; }\n    Of easy shape, and pliant every way,             }\n    Confessing still the softness of his clay,       }\n    And kind as kings upon their coronation day;[110]}\n    With open hands, and with extended space\n    Of arms, to satisfy a large embrace.\n    Thus kneaded up with milk, the new-made man\n    His kingdom o'er his kindred world began;\n    Till knowledge misapplied, misunderstood,\n    And pride of empire, soured his balmy blood.\n    Then, first rebelling, his own stamp he coins;\n    The murderer Cain was latent in his loins;\n    And blood began its first and loudest cry,\n    For differing worship of the Deity.\n    Thus persecution rose, and farther space\n    Produced the mighty hunter[111] of his race.\n    Not so the blessed Pan[112] his flock increased,\n    Content to fold them from the famished beast:\n    Mild were his laws; the sheep and harmless hind\n    Were never of the persecuting kind.\n    Such pity now the pious pastor shows,         }\n    Such mercy from the British Lion flows,[113]  }\n    That both provide protection from their foes. }\n      Oh happy regions, Italy and Spain,\n    Which never did those monsters entertain!\n    The Wolf, the Bear, the Boar, can there advance\n    No native claim of just inheritance;\n    And self-preserving laws, severe in show,\n    May guard their fences from the invading foe.\n    Where birth has placed them, let them safely share\n    The common benefit of vital air;\n    Themselves unharmful, let them live unharmed,\n    Their jaws disabled, and their claws disarmed;\n    Here, only in nocturnal howlings bold,\n    They dare not seize the Hind, nor leap the fold.\n    More powerful, and as vigilant as they,\n    The Lion awfully forbids the prey.\n    Their rage repressed, though pinched with famine sore, }\n    They stand aloof, and tremble at his roar;             }\n    Much is their hunger, but their fear is more.          }\n    These are the chief; to number o'er the rest,\n    And stand, like Adam, naming every beast,\n    Were weary work; nor will the muse describe\n    A slimy-born and sun-begotten tribe;\n    Who, far from steeples and their sacred sound,\n    In fields their sullen conventicles found.[114]\n    These gross, half-animated, lumps I leave;\n    Nor can I think what thoughts they can conceive.\n    But if they think at all, 'tis sure no higher\n    Than matter, put in motion, may aspire;\n    Souls that can scarce ferment their mass of clay; }\n    So drossy, so divisible are they,                 }\n    As would but serve pure bodies for allay;         }\n    Such souls as shards produce, such beetle things\n    As only buz to heaven with evening wings;\n    Strike in the dark, offending but by chance,\n    Such are the blindfold blows of ignorance.\n    They know not beings, and but hate a name;\n    To them the Hind and Panther are the same.\n      The Panther, sure the noblest, next the Hind,\n    And fairest creature of the spotted kind;\n    Oh, could her in-born stains be washed away,\n    She were too good to be a beast of prey!\n    How can I praise, or blame, and not offend,\n    Or how divide the frailty from the friend?\n    Her faults and virtues lie so mixed, that she\n    Nor wholly stands condemned, nor wholly free.\n    Then, like her injured Lion, let me speak;\n    He cannot bend her, and he would not break.\n    Unkind already, and estranged in part,\n    The Wolf begins to share her wandering heart.\n    Though unpolluted yet with actual ill,\n    She half commits who sins but in her will.\n    If, as our dreaming platonists report,\n    There could be spirits of a middle sort,\n    Too black for heaven, and yet too white for hell,\n    Who just dropt half-way down, nor lower fell;[115]\n    So poised, so gently she descends from high,\n    It seems a soft dismission from the sky.\n    Her house not ancient, whatsoe'er pretence\n    Her clergy-heralds make in her defence;\n    A second century not half-way run,\n    Since the new honours of her blood begun.\n    A lion, old, obscene, and furious made\n    By lust, compressed her mother in a shade;\n    Then, by a left-hand marriage, weds the dame,\n    Covering adultery with a specious name;[116]\n    So schism begot; and sacrilege and she,\n    A well matched pair, got graceless heresy.\n    God's and kings' rebels have the same good cause,\n    To trample down divine and human laws;\n    Both would be called reformers, and their hate\n    Alike destructive both to church and state.\n    The fruit proclaims the plant; a lawless prince }\n    By luxury reformed incontinence;                }\n    By ruins, charity; by riots, abstinence.        }\n    Confessions, fasts, and penance set aside,     }\n    Oh with what ease we follow such a guide,      }\n    Where souls are starved, and senses gratified! }\n    Where marriage-pleasures midnight prayer supply,        }\n    And mattin bells, a melancholy cry,                     }\n    Are tuned to merrier notes, Increase and multiply.[117] }\n    Religion shews a rosy-coloured face;                }\n    Not hattered[118] out with drudging works of grace; }\n    A down-hill reformation rolls apace.                }\n    What flesh and blood would crowd the narrow gate,  }\n    Or, till they waste their pampered paunches, wait? }\n    All would be happy at the cheapest rate.           }\n      Though our lean faith these rigid laws has given,\n    The full-fed Musselman goes fat to heaven;\n    For his Arabian prophet with delights\n    Of sense allured his eastern proselytes.\n    The jolly Luther, reading him, began\n    To interpret scriptures by his alcoran;\n    To grub the thorns beneath our tender feet,\n    And make the paths of paradise more sweet,\n    Bethought him of a wife, ere half way gone,\n    For 'twas uneasy travelling alone;\n    And, in this masquerade of mirth and love,\n    Mistook the bliss of heaven for Bacchanals above.\n    Sure he presumed of praise, who came to stock\n    The etherial pastures with so fair a flock,\n    Burnished, and battening on their food, to show\n    Their diligence of careful herds below.[119]\n      Our Panther, though like these she changed her head,\n    Yet, as the mistress of a monarch's bed,[120]\n    Her front erect with majesty she bore,\n    The crosier wielded, and the mitre wore.\n    Her upper part of decent discipline\n    Shewed affectation of an ancient line;\n    And fathers, councils, church and churches head,\n    Were on her reverend phylacteries[121] read.\n    But what disgraced and disavowed the rest,\n    Was Calvin's brand, that stigmatized the beast.\n    Thus, like a creature of a double kind,\n    In her own labyrinth she lives confined;\n    To foreign lands no sound of her is come,\n    Humbly content to be despised at home.\n    Such is her faith, where good cannot be had,\n    At least she leaves the refuse of the bad:\n    Nice in her choice of ill, though not of best,\n    And least deformed, because reformed the least.\n    In doubtful points betwixt her differing friends,\n    Where one for substance, one for sign contends,\n    Their contradicting terms she strives to join;[122]\n    Sign shall be substance, substance shall be sign.\n    A real presence all her sons allow,            }\n    And yet 'tis flat idolatry to bow,             }\n    Because the god-head's there they know not how.}\n    Her novices are taught, that bread and wine}\n    Are but the visible and outward sign,      }\n    Received by those who in communion join;   }\n    But the inward grace, or the thing signified,\n    His blood and body, who to save us died,[123]\n    The faithful this thing signified receive:\n    What is't those faithful then partake or leave?\n    For, what is signified and understood,\n    Is, by her own confession, flesh and blood.\n    Then, by the same acknowledgment, we know\n    They take the sign, and take the substance too.\n    The literal sense is hard to flesh and blood,\n    But nonsense never can be understood.\n      Her wild belief on every wave is tost;\n    But sure no church can better morals boast.\n    True to her king her principles are found;\n    Oh that her practice were but half so sound![124]\n    Stedfast in various turns of state she stood,\n    And sealed her vowed affection with her blood:[125]\n    Nor will I meanly tax her constancy,     }\n    That interest or obligement made the tye,}\n    Bound to the fate of murdered monarchy.  }\n    Before the sounding axe so falls the vine,\n    Whose tender branches round the poplar twine.\n    She chose her ruin, and resigned her life,\n    In death undaunted as an Indian wife:\n    A rare example! but some souls we see\n    Grow hard, and stiffen with adversity:\n    Yet these by fortune's favours are undone; }\n    Resolved,[126] into a baser form they run,   }\n    And bore the wind, but cannot bear the sun.}\n    Let this be nature's frailty, or her fate,\n    Or Isgrim's counsel, her new-chosen mate,[127]\n    Still she's the fairest of the fallen crew;\n    No mother more indulgent, but the true.\n      Fierce to her foes, yet fears her force to try,\n    Because she wants innate authority;\n    For how can she constrain them to obey,\n    Who has herself cast off the lawful sway?\n    Rebellion equals all, and those, who toil\n    In common theft, will share the common spoil.\n    Let her produce the title and the right,\n    Against her old superiors first to fight;\n    If she reform by text, even that's as plain\n    For her own rebels to reform again.\n    As long as words a different sense will bear,\n    And each may be his own interpreter,\n    Our airy faith will no foundation find,\n    The word's a weathercock for every wind:\n    The bear, the fox, the wolf, by turns prevail;\n    The most in power supplies the present gale.\n    The wretched Panther cries aloud for aid\n    To church and councils, whom she first betrayed;\n    No help from fathers or tradition's train:\n    Those ancient guides she taught us to disdain,\n    And by that scripture, which she once abused\n    To reformation, stands herself accused.[128]\n    What bills for breach of laws can she prefer,\n    Expounding which she owns herself may err?\n    And, after all her winding ways are tried,      }\n    If doubts arise, she slips herself aside,       }\n    And leaves the private conscience for the guide.}\n    If, then, that conscience set the offender free,\n    It bars her claim to church authority.\n    How can she censure, or what crime pretend,\n    But scripture may be construed to defend?\n    Even those, whom for rebellion she transmits\n    To civil power, her doctrine first acquits;\n    Because no disobedience can ensue,\n    Where no submission to a judge is due;\n    Each judging for himself by her consent,\n    Whom, thus absolved, she sends to punishment.\n    Suppose the magistrate revenge her cause,\n    'Tis only for transgressing human laws.\n    How answering to its end a church is made,\n    Whose power is but to counsel and persuade?\n    O solid rock, on which secure she stands!\n    Eternal house, not built with mortal hands!\n    O sure defence against the infernal gate,\n    A patent during pleasure of the state!\n      Thus is the Panther neither loved nor feared,\n    A mere mock queen of a divided herd;\n    Whom soon by lawful power she might controul,\n    Herself a part submitted to the whole.\n    Then, as the moon who first receives the light\n    By which she makes our nether regions bright,\n    So might she shine, reflecting from afar\n    The rays she borrowed from a better star;\n    Big with the beams which from her mother flow,\n    And reigning o'er the rising tides below:[129]\n    Now, mixing with a savage crowd, she goes,\n    And meanly flatters her inveterate foes;\n    Ruled while she rules, and losing every hour\n    Her wretched remnants of precarious power.\n      One evening, while the cooler shade she sought,\n    Revolving many a melancholy thought,\n    Alone she walked, and looked around in vain,\n    With rueful visage, for her vanished train:\n    None of her sylvan subjects made their court;\n    Lev\u00e9es and couch\u00e9es passed without resort.\n    So hardly can usurpers manage well\n    Those, whom they first instructed to rebel:\n    More liberty begets desire of more;\n    The hunger still increases with the store.\n    Without respect, they brushed along the wood,     }\n    Each in his clan, and, filled with loathsome food,}\n    Asked no permission to the neighbouring flood.    }\n    The Panther, full of inward discontent,\n    Since they would go, before them wisely went;\n    Supplying want of power by drinking first,\n    As if she gave them leave to quench their thirst.\n    Among the rest, the Hind, with fearful face,\n    Beheld from far the common watering place,\n    Nor durst approach; till with an awful roar\n    The sovereign Lion bade her fear no more.[130]\n    Encouraged thus, she brought her younglings nigh,\n    Watching the motions of her patron's eye,\n    And drank a sober draught; the rest, amazed,\n    Stood mutely still, and on the stranger gazed;\n    Surveyed her part by part, and sought to find}\n    The ten-horned monster in the harmless Hind, }\n    Such as the Wolf and Panther had designed.[131]}\n    They thought at first they dreamed; for 'twas offence\n    With them, to question certitude of sense,\n    Their guide in faith: but nearer when they drew,}\n    And had the faultless object full in view,      }\n    Lord, how they all admired her heavenly hue!    }\n    Some, who, before, her fellowship disdained,         }\n    Scarce, and but scarce, from in-born rage restrained,}\n    Now frisked about her, and old kindred feigned.      }\n    Whether for love or interest, every sect\n    Of all the savage nation shewed respect.\n    The viceroy Panther could not awe the herd;\n    The more the company, the less they feared.\n    The surly Wolf with secret envy burst,               }\n    Yet could not howl; (the Hind had seen him first;)[132]}\n    But what he durst not speak, the Panther durst.      }\n      For when the herd, sufficed, did late repair\n    To ferny heaths, and to their forest lair,\n    She made a mannerly excuse to stay,\n    Proffering the Hind to wait her half the way;\n    That, since the sky was clear, an hour of talk\n    Might help her to beguile the tedious walk.\n    With much good-will the motion was embraced,\n    To chat a while on their adventures passed;\n    Nor had the grateful Hind so soon forgot\n    Her friend and fellow-sufferer in the plot.[133]\n    Yet wondering how of late she grew estranged,\n    Her forehead cloudy, and her countenance changed,\n    She thought this hour the occasion would present,\n    To learn her secret cause of discontent;\n    Which well she hoped, might be with ease redressed,}\n    Considering her a well-bred civil beast,           }\n    And more a gentlewoman than the rest.              }\n    After some common talk what rumours ran,\n    The lady of the spotted muff began.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 95: The Roman Catholic church.]\n\n[Footnote 96: Note I.]\n\n[Footnote 97: The Roman Catholic priests executed in England, at\ndifferent times since the Reformation, and regarded as martyrs and\nsaints by those of their communion.]\n\n[Footnote 98: The Independents. See Note II.]\n\n[Footnote 99: The Quakers. See Note III.]\n\n[Footnote 100: Free-thinkers. See Note IV.]\n\n[Footnote 101: Anabaptists. See Note V.]\n\n[Footnote 102: Unitarians. See Note VI.]\n\n[Footnote 103: See Introductory remarks.]\n\n[Footnote 104: Note VII.]\n\n[Footnote 105: _Quasi_ By-land-er, an old word for a boat, used in\ncoast navigation.]\n\n[Footnote 106: Note VIII.]\n\n[Footnote 107: Alluding to the classical ordination, which the\nPresbyterian church has adopted, instead of that by Bishops.]\n\n[Footnote 108: Geneva, the cradle of Calvinism. The territories of the\nlittle republic, _dum Troja fuit_, were bounded by its ramparts and\nlake.]\n\n[Footnote 109: Alluding to the recall of the Edict of Nantz, and\npersecution of the Huguenots. See Note IX.]\n\n[Footnote 110: Which is usually distinguished by an act of grace, or\ngeneral pardon.]\n\n[Footnote 111: Nimrod.]\n\n[Footnote 112: Jesus Christ.]\n\n[Footnote 113: King James II.]\n\n[Footnote 114: Note X.]\n\n[Footnote 115: Our author recollected his own Philidel in \"King Arthur:\"\n\n    An airy shape, the tenderest of my kind,\n    The last seduced and least deformed of hell;\n    Half-white, and shuffled in the crowd I fell,\n    Desirous to repent and loath to sin,\n    Awkward in mischief, piteous of mankind;\n    My name is Philidel, my lot in air,\n    Where, next beneath the moon, and nearest heaven,\n    I soar, I have a glimpse to be received.\n\n    Vol. VIII. p. 135.\n]\n\n[Footnote 116: Henry the Eighth's passion for Anna Bullen led the way\nto the Reformation.]\n\n[Footnote 117: The marriage of the clergy, licensed by the Reformation.]\n\n[Footnote 118: Worn out, or become hagard.]\n\n[Footnote 119: A Popish advocate, in the controversy with Tennison,\ntells us exultingly, \"That Martin Luther himself, Dr T's excellent\ninstrument, after he had eat a feasting supper, and drank\n_lutheranice_, as the German proverb has it, was called into another\nworld at two o'clock in the night, February 18, 1546.\" This was one\nof the reasons why his adversaries alleged, that Martin Luther set\nsail for hell in the manner described by Sterne, in his tale from\nSlawkenbergius.]\n\n[Footnote 120: The king being owned the head of the church of England,\ncontrary to the doctrine of the other reformed churches.]\n\n[Footnote 121: Phylacteries are little scrolls of parchment worn by the\nJews on their foreheads and wrists, inscribed with sentences from the\nlaw. They are supposed, as is expressed by the phrase in the original,\nto have the virtue of preserving the wearer from danger and evil.]\n\n[Footnote 122: The Lutherans adopt the doctrine of consubstantiation;\nthat is to say, they believe, that, though the elements are not\nchanged into the body and blood of Christ by consecration, which is\nthe Roman faith, yet the participants, at the moment of communicating,\ndo actually receive the real body and blood. The Calvinists utterly\ndeny the real presence in the eucharist, and affirm, that the words of\nChrist were only symbolical. The church of England announces a doctrine\nsomewhat between these. See Note XI.]\n\n[Footnote 123: Note XI.]\n\n[Footnote 124: Note XII.]\n\n[Footnote 125: Alluding to the fate of the church and monarchy of\nEngland, which fell together in the great rebellion. See Note XI.]\n\n[Footnote 126: _Resolved_, i.e. dissolved.]\n\n[Footnote 127: The Wolf, or Presbytery.--See note XIII.]\n\n[Footnote 128: Note XIV.]\n\n[Footnote 129: That is, if the church of England would be reconciled\nto Rome, she should be gratified with a delegated portion of innate\nauthority over the rival sectaries; instead of being obliged to depend\nupon the civil power for protection.]\n\n[Footnote 130: Alluding to the exercise of the dispensing power, and\nthe Declaration of Indulgence.]\n\n[Footnote 131: The ten-horned monster, in the Revelations, was usually\nexplained by the reformers as typical of the church of Rome.]\n\n[Footnote 132: There was a classical superstition, that, if a wolf saw\na man before he saw the wolf, the person lost his voice:\n\n    ----_voxque M\u00e6rin\n    Jam fugit ipsa: lupi M\u00e6rin videre priores._\n\nDryden has adopted, in the text, the converse of this superstitious\nbelief.]\n\n[Footnote 133: Although the Roman Catholic plot was made the pretence\nof persecuting the Papists in the first instance, yet the high-flying\nparty of the Church of England were also levelled at, and accused of\nbeing Tantivies, Papists in masquerade, &c. &c.]\n\n\n\n\nNOTES\n\nON\n\nTHE HIND AND THE PANTHER.\n\nPART I.\n\n\nNote I.\n\n    _And doomed to death, though fated not to die._--P. 119.\n\nThe critics fastened on this line with great exultation, concluding,\nthat doomed and fated mean precisely the same thing. \"Faith, Mr Bayes,\"\nsays one of these gentlemen, \"if you were _doomed_ to be hanged,\nwhatever you were _fated_ to 'twould give you but small comfort.\"[134]\nThis criticism is quite erroneous; doom, in its general acceptation,\nmeaning merely a sentence of any kind, the pronouncing which by no\nmeans necessarily implies its execution. In the criminal courts of\nScotland, the sentence is always concluded with this formula, \"and\nthis I pronounce for doom.\" Till of late years, a special officer\nrecited the sentence after the judge, and was thence called the\n_doomster_,[135] an office now performed by the clerk of court. The\ncriticism is founded on the word _doom_ having been often, and even\ngenerally, used as synonimous to the sentence of heaven, and therefore\ninevitable. But in the text, it is obvious that the doom, or sentence,\nof an earthly tribunal is placed in opposition to the decree of\nProvidence.\n\n\nNote II.\n\n    _The bloody Bear, an independent beast,\n    Unlicked to forms, &c._--P. 120.\n\nThe sect of Independents arose to great eminence in the civil wars,\nwhen the enthusiastic spirits were deemed entitled to preferment upon\nearth, in proportion to the extravagance of their religious zeal. Hume\nhas admirably described their leading tenets, or rather the scorn with\nwhich they discarded the principles of other religious sects; for their\npeculiarities consisted much more in their neglect and contempt of all\nforms, than in any rules or dogmata of their own.\n\n\"The Independents rejected all ecclesiastical establishments, and\nwould admit of no spiritual courts, no government among pastors,\nno interposition of the magistrate in religious concerns, no fixed\nencouragement annexed to any system of doctrines or opinions. According\nto their principles, each congregation, united voluntarily and by\nspiritual ties, composed, within itself, a separate church, and\nexercised a jurisdiction, but one destitute of temporal sanctions,\nover its own pastor and its own members. The election alone of the\ncongregation was sufficient to bestow the sacerdotal character; and,\nas all essential distinction was denied between the laity and the\nclergy, no ceremony, no institution, no vocation, no imposition of\nhands, was, as in all other churches, supposed requisite to convey a\nright to holy orders. The enthusiasm of the Presbyterians led them\nto reject the authority of prelates, to throw off the restraint of\nliturgies, to retrench ceremonies, to limit the riches and authority of\nthe priestly office. The fanaticism of the Independents, exalted to a\nhigher pitch, abolished ecclesiastical government, disdained creeds and\nsystems, neglected every ceremony, and confounded all ranks and orders.\nThe soldier, the merchant, the mechanic, indulging the fervours of\nzeal, and guided by the illapses of the spirit, resigned himself to an\ninward and superior direction, and was consecrated, in a manner, by an\nimmediate intercourse and communication with heaven.\"\n\nButler thus describes the Independents:\n\n    The Independents, whose first station\n    Was in the rear of reformation:\n    A mongrel kind of church dragoons,\n    That served for horse and foot at once,\n    And in the saddle of one steed,\n    The Saracen and Christian rid,\n    Were free of every spiritual order,\n    To preach, and fight, and pray, and murder.\n\nIt is well known, that these sectaries obtained the final ascendancy in\nthe civil wars. Cromwell, their chief, was highly gifted as a preacher\nas well as a warrior; witness his \"learned, devout, and conscientious\nexercise, held at Sir Peter Temple's, in Lincoln's Inn Fields, upon\nRomans xiii. 1.\"\n\n\nNote III.\n\n    _Among the timorous kind, the quaking Hare\n    Professed neutrality, but would not swear._--P. 120.\n\nAs Mr Hume's account of the rise of this sect (the quakers) is\nuncommonly lively, I take the liberty to insert it at length; though,\nperhaps, the passage does not call for so prolonged a quotation. After\ndescribing the ascetic solitude of George Fox, their founder, he\nproceeds:\n\n\"When he had been sufficiently consecrated, in his own imagination, he\nfelt that the fumes of self-applause soon dissipate, if not continually\nsupplied by the admiration of others; and he began to seek proselytes.\nProselytes were easily gained, at a time when all men's affections\nwere turned towards religion, and when extravagant modes of it were\nsure to be most popular. All the forms of ceremony, invented by pride\nand ostentation, Fox and his disciples, from a superior pride and\nostentation, carefully rejected: Even the ordinary rites of civility\nwere shunned, as the nourishment of carnal vanity and self-conceit.\nThey would bestow no titles of distinction: The name of friend was the\nonly salutation with which they indiscriminately accosted every one. To\nno person would they make a bow, or move their hat, or give any signs\nof reverence. Instead of that affected adulation introduced into modern\ntongues, of speaking to individuals as if they were a multitude, they\nreturned to the simplicity of ancient languages; and _thou_ and _thee_\nwere the only expressions which, on any consideration, they would be\nbrought to employ.\n\n\"Dress too, a material circumstance, distinguished the members of this\nsect. Every superfluity and ornament was carefully retrenched: No\nplaits to their coat, no buttons to their sleeves: No lace, no ruffles,\nno embroidery. Even a button to the hat, though sometimes useful, yet\nnot being always so, was universally rejected by them with horror and\ndetestation.\n\n\"The violent enthusiasm of this sect, like all high passions, being\ntoo strong for the weak nerves to sustain, threw the preachers into\nconvulsions, and shakings, and distortions in their limbs; and\nthey thence received the appellation of Quakers. Amidst the great\ntoleration which was then granted to all sects, and even encouragement\ngiven to all innovations, this sect alone suffered persecution. From\nthe fervour of their zeal, the quakers broke into churches, disturbed\npublic worship, and harrassed the minister and audience with railing\nand reproaches. When carried before a magistrate, they refused him all\nreverence, and treated him with the same familiarity as if he had been\ntheir equal. Sometimes they were thrown into mad-houses, sometimes\ninto prisons: Sometimes whipped, sometimes pilloried. The patience\nand fortitude with which they suffered, begat compassion, admiration,\nesteem. A supernatural spirit was believed to support them under those\nsufferings, which the ordinary state of humanity, freed from the\nillusions of passion, is unable to sustain.\n\n\"The quakers creep'd into the army: But, as they preached universal\npeace, they seduced the military zealots from their profession, and\nwould soon, had they been suffered, have put an end, without any defeat\nor calamity, to the dominion of the saints. These attempts became a\nfresh ground for persecution, and a new reason for their progress among\nthe people.\n\n\"Morals, with this sect, were carried, or affected to be carried, to\nthe same degree of extravagance as religion. Give a quaker a blow\non one cheek, he held up the other: Ask his cloke, he gave you his\ncoat also. The greatest interest could not engage him in any court of\njudicature, to swear even to the truth. He never asked more for his\nwares than the precise sum which he was determined to accept. This last\nmaxim is laudable, and continues still to be religiously observed by\nthat sect.\n\n\"No fanatics ever carried farther the hatred to ceremonies, forms,\norders, rites, and positive institutions. Even baptism and the Lord's\nsupper, by all other sects believed to be interwoven with the very\nvitals of Christianity, were disdainfully rejected by them. The very\nSabbath they profaned. The holiness of churches they derided; and they\nwould give to these sacred edifices no other appellation than that of\nshops, or steeple-houses. No priests were admitted in their sects:\nEvery one had received, from immediate illumination, a character much\nsuperior to the sacerdotal. When they met for divine worship, each rose\nup in his place, and delivered the extemporary inspirations of the\nHoly Ghost: Women were also admitted to teach the brethren, and were\nconsidered as proper vehicles to convey the dictates of the spirit.\nSometimes a great many preachers were moved to speak at once: Sometimes\na total silence prevailed in their congregation.\n\n\"Some quakers attempted to fast forty days in imitation of Christ;\nand one of them bravely perished in the experiment. A female quaker\ncame naked into the church where the protector sat; being moved by the\nspirit, as she said, to appear as a sign to the people. A number of\nthem fancied, that the renovation of all things had commenced, and that\nclothes were to be rejected, together with other superfluities.--The\nsufferings which followed the practice of this doctrine, were a species\nof persecution not well calculated for promoting it.\"\n\nThe quakers were particularly favoured by James II., owing to the\ninterest which Penn, the settler of Pennsylvania, had with that\nmonarch. That person took a lead in the controversy concerning the\nIndulgence, by publishing a pamphlet, entitled, \"Good Advice to the\nChurch of England.\"\n\n\nNote IV.\n\n    _Next her, the buffoon Ape, as atheists use,\n    Mimicked all sects, and had his own to chuse;\n    Still, when the Lion looked, his knees he bent,\n    And paid at church a courtier's compliment._--P. 120.\n\nThe sect of free-thinkers, who professed a disbelief in revealed\nreligion, was to be found even among the fanatical ranks of the Long\nParliament. Harvey, Martin, Sidney, and others, were considered as the\nchiefs of this little party. After the restoration of Charles II.,\nthese loose principles became prevalent among his gay courtiers, and\nwere supposed to have been privately adopted by the king himself, who\nwas educated by the sceptic Hobbes. As the free-thinkers taught a total\ndisbelief of revelation, and indifference for religious forms, they\nleft their disciples at liberty occasionally to conform to whatever\ncreed, or form of worship, might appear most conducive to their\ntemporal interests. Sunderland was supposed to belong to this sect,\nfor he made his change to Popery, without even the form of previous\ninstruction or conference; evincing to the whole world, that, being\ntotally indifferent about all religions, he was ready to embrace any\nthat would best serve his immediate views. This statesman's character,\nas a latitudinarian in religion, is mentioned with great bitterness\nby the Princess Anne, afterwards queen, in her private correspondence\nwith her sister, the Princess of Orange.--See _Dalrymple's Memoirs_,\nVol. II. p. 169. 8vo. edit. Dryden probably intended a sarcasm at\nSunderland, or some such time-serving courtier, for his occasional\nconformity with the royal faith, of which there were several instances\nat the time. These persons, as they attended James to mass, were\ncompared to Naaman, who, on adopting the Jewish religion, craved an\nindulgence for waiting upon his master to the house of the idol Rimmon.\nIt is hinted in \"The Hind and Panther Transversed,\" that Dryden's\nsatire is personal; for he is made to quote the lines, and to add, by\nway of commentary, \"That galls somewhere! Egad, I cannot leave it off,\nthough I were cudgelled every day for it.\"\n\nThe church party, among other pamphlets intended to ridicule the\nDeclaration of Indulgence, and as a parody of the addresses of\nthe dissenters on that occasion, published, \"To the King's Most\nExcellent Majesty, the Humble Address of the Atheists, or the Sect of\nEpicureans.\" After congratulating the king on having freed his subjects\nfrom the solemn superstition of oaths, they proceed: \"Your majesty was\npleased to wish, that all your subjects were of your own religion;\nand perhaps every division wishes you were of theirs; but, for our\nparts, we freely declare, that if ever we should be obliged to profess\nany religion, we would prefer the Church of Rome, which does not much\ntrouble the world with the affairs of invisible beings, and is very\ncivil and indulgent to the failings of human nature. That church can\nease us from the grave fatigues of religion, and, for our monies, allow\nus proxies, both for piety and penances: We can easily swallow and\ndigest a wafer deity, and will never cavil at the mass in an unknown\ntongue, when the sacrifice itself is so unintelligible. We shall never\nscruple the adoration of an image, when the chiefest religion is but\nimagination; and we are willing to allow the Pope an absolute power\nto dispense with all penal laws, in this world and in another. But\nbefore we return to Rome, the greatest origin of atheism, we wish the\nPope, and all his vassal princes, would free the world from the fear of\nhell and devils, the inquisition and dragoons, and that he would take\noff the chimney-money of purgatory, and custom and excise of pardons\nand indulgencies, which are so much inconsistent with the flourishing\ntrade and grandeur of the nation. As for the engagements of lives and\nfortunes, the common compliment of addressers, we confess we have a\nmore peculiar tenderness for those most sacred concernments; but yet we\nwill hazard them in defence of your majesty, with as much constancy and\nresolution as your majesty will defend your indulgence; that is, so far\nas the adventure will serve our designs and interest.\n\n    From the Devil-Tavern, the 5th of         }\n      November, 1688. Presented by            }\n      Justice Baldock, and was graciously     }\n      received.\"                              }\n\n\nNote V.\n\n    _The bristled baptist Boar, impure as he,\n    But whitened with the foam of sanctity,\n    With fat pollutions filled the sacred place,\n    And mountains levelled in his furious race;\n    So first rebellion founded was in grace.\n    But since the mighty ravage, which he made\n    In German forests, had his guilt betrayed,\n    With broken tusks, and with a borrowed name,\n    He shunned the vengeance, and concealed the shame._\n\n    P. 120.\n\nThe sect of Anabaptists, whose principal tenet is the disallowing\nof infant baptism, arose in Germany and the Low Countries about\nthe year 1521. This new light, for such it was esteemed, happened\nunfortunately to appear to some of the most ignorant and ferocious of\nthe Low German burghers and boors. Thomas Muncer, by birth a Saxon,\nwas the principal apostle of this sect. He preached both against the\nPapists and Luther, recommending the eschewing of open crimes, the\nchastening of the body by severities of abstinence, and the wearing\na long beard. With these tenets, he combined that of an immediate\nintercourse with God, by demanding of him signs and tokens, which would\nbe infallibly granted, and that of an universal community of goods.\nThese two last doctrines, concerning spiritual and temporal matters,\nwere admirably calculated to turn the heads of his followers. Being\nbanished from Saxony, he seized upon the monastery of Muhlhans, from\nwhich he expelled the monks; and afterwards made a convert of one\nPfeifer, a daring enthusiast, who, because in a dream he had put to\nflight an innumerable number of mice, made no doubt he was destined to\nvanquish all principalities and powers. Muncer easily prevailed on this\nvisionary conqueror to head the miners of the country of Mansfeldt, in\nsome ferocious inroads into Saxony. The Dukes of Saxony and Brunswick,\nthe Landgrave of Hesse, and other German princes, marched against these\nmadmen, whom Muncer stimulated to resistance, by assuring them, that a\nrainbow, which happened then to be visible, was an indubitable sign of\nvictory. The poor deluded wretches accordingly suffered themselves to\nbe quietly cut to pieces, with their eyes fixed on the heavenly sign,\nin expectation of divine assistance. Muncer was made prisoner, and\nrecanted before his death, only blaming the princes for their cruelty\nand oppression to their vassals, which drove them to desperation;--so,\nif he lived a false prophet, he died a true preacher. His death, and\nthat of Pfeifer, with the slaughter made among their followers, did\nnot extirpate the heresy; and the most dreadful consequences attended,\nfor some time, the progress of these enthusiastic opinions. A tailor,\ncalled Bockholdt, better known by the name of John of Leyden, with his\nassociates, Rotman, Matthews, and Cnipperdoling, in 1535, actually\npossessed themselves of the city of Munster, expelled the bishop, and\ncommenced the reign of the saints. Their leader, under the strange and\nhorrible delusion that he was inspired by the Holy Ghost, played the\nmost outrageous pranks of lust and cruelty that ever madness dictated:\nYet, amidst their frenzy, the Anabaptists had valour and conduct\nsufficient to defend the city for a length of time against the bishop\nand his allies; and while the unfortunate inhabitants were in the\nutmost misery, the enthusiasts themselves revelled in the indulgence\nof every licentious appetite. At length the city was taken, and a\ncruel, though deserved punishment, inflicted upon those who had been\nthe leaders in this holy warfare. John of Leyden himself was torn to\npieces with hot pincers. After this memorable event, those who retained\nthe principles of this sect were not desirous of being distinguished\nby a name which the excesses of these fanatics had rendered an\nabomination to all the Christian world. They were generally confounded\nwith the Independents, with whom they hold many principles in common,\nparticularly, I believe, the disavowal of any clerical order. Yet if,\nfor a time, they \"lurked in sects unseen,\" as Dryden assures us, the\nsunshine of general toleration soon brought them out under their own\nproper appellation. We have, among the addresses of various classes of\ndissenters upon the Declaration of Indulgence, that of the Anabaptists\nin and about the city of London, who, indeed, were the very first in\nexpressing their thanks and loyalty. The Anabaptists of Leicestershire,\nthe Independents and Baptists of Gloucester, the Anabaptists of\nCheshire, Shropshire, and Staffordshire, &c. &c. &c. all came forward\nwith loyal acclamations on the same occasion.\n\n\nNote VI.\n\n    ----_With greater guile\n    False Reynard fed on consecrated spoil;\n    The graceless beast by Athanasius first\n    Was chased from Nice, then by Socinus nursed._--P. 121.\n\nArius, the propagator of a great heresy in the Christian church,\ndenied that God the Son was equal to God the Father, or that he was\nco-existent with him. See page 16. This doctrine he maintained in the\ncouncil at Nice against Athanasius, the champion of orthodoxy; and\nalthough his doctrines were condemned by the general council, and\nhe himself banished, yet his party was so powerful as to accomplish\nhis restoration, and the banishment of Athanasius, who fled into the\nThebais, or deserts of Upper Egypt. The schism thus occasioned,\ncontinued long to divide the Christian church. Lelius Socinus, a\nnobleman of Sienna, revived and enlarged the doctrine of Arius,\nabout the latter end of the sixteenth century. His nephew Faustus\ncollected, arranged, and published his opinions, which have since had\nmany followers. The Socinians teach the worship of one God, without\ndistinction of persons; affirming, that the Holy Ghost is but another\nexpression for the power of God; and that Jesus Christ is only the\nSon of God by adoption. As they deny our Saviour's divinity, they\ndisavow, of course, the doctrine of redemption, and consider him only\nas a prophet, gifted with a more than usual share of inspiration, and\nsealing his mission by his blood. This heresy has, at different times,\nand under various disguises and modifications, insinuated itself into\nthe Christian church, forming, as it were, a resting place, though but\na tottering one, between natural and revealed religion. Here, I fear,\nthe author's lines apply:\n\n    To take up half on trust, and half to try,\n    Name it not faith, but bungling bigotry;\n    Both knave and fool the merchant we may call,\n    To pay great sums, and to compound the small;\n    For who would break with heaven, and would not break for all?\n\nThis heretical belief was adopted by the Protestants of Poland and of\nHungary, especially those who were about this time in arms under Count\nTeckeli against the emperor. Hence Dryden bids the Fox,\n\n    Unkennelled, range in thy Polonian plains.\n\n\nNote VII.\n\n    _Let them declare by what mysterious arts\n    He shot that body through the opposing might,\n    Of bolts and bars, impervious to the light,\n    And stood before his train confessed in open sight._--P. 122.\n\n\"Then the same day, at evening, being the first day of the week, when\nthe doors were shut, where the disciples were assembled for fear of the\nJews, came Jesus, and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be\nunto you.\"\n\nAgain, \"And after eight days, again his disciples were within, and\nThomas with them; then came Jesus, the doors being shut, and stood in\nthe midst, and said, Peace be unto you.\"--_The Gospel of St John_,\nchap. xx. verses 19. 26.\n\nFrom these passages of Scripture, Dryden endeavours to confute the\nobjection to transubstantiation, founded on the host being consecrated\nin various places at the same time, in each of which, however, the\nbody of Christ becomes present, according to the Papist doctrine.\nThis being predicated of the real body of our Saviour, the Protestants\nallege is impossible, as matter can only be in one place at the same\ntime. Dryden, in answer, assumes, that Christ entered into the meeting\nof the disciples, by actually passing through the closed doors of the\napartment; and as, at the moment of such passage, two bodies must have\nbeen in the same place at the same instant, the body of Jesus namely,\nand the substance through which he passed, the poet founds on it as an\ninstance of a transgression of a natural law, proved from Scripture, as\nviolent as that of one body being in several different places at once.\nBut the text does not prove the major part of Dryden's proposition; it\nis not stated positively by the evangelist, that our Saviour passed\n_through_ the doors which were shut, but merely that he _came and stood\namong his disciples_ without the doors being opened; which miraculous\nappearance might take place many ways besides that on which Dryden has\nfixed for the foundation of his argument.\n\n\nNote VIII.\n\n    _More haughty than the rest, the Wolfish race}\n    Appears with belly gaunt, and famished face;   }\n    Never was so deformed a beast of grace.        }\n    His ragged tail betwixt his legs he wears,\n    Close clapped for shame; but his rough crest he rears,\n    And pricks up his predestinating ears._--P. 124.\n\nThe personal appearance of the Presbyterian clergy was suited by an\naffectation of extreme plainness and rigour of appearance. A Geneva\ncloak and band, with the hair close cropped, and covered with a sort\nof black scull-cap, was the discriminating attire of their teachers.\nThis last article of dress occasioned an unseemly projection of their\nears, and procured those who affected it the nick-name of prick-eared\nfanatics, and the still better known appellation of Round-heads. Our\nauthor proceeds, with great bitterness, to investigate the origin\nof Calvinism. His account of the rise and destruction of a sect of\nheretics in Cambria may be understood to refer to the ancient British\nchurch, which disowned the supremacy of the see of Rome, refused to\nadopt her ritual, and opposed St Augustin's claims to be metropolitan\nof Britain, in virtue of Pope Gregory's appointment. They held two\nconferences with Augustin; at one of which he pretended to work a\nmiracle by the cure of a blind man; at the second, seven British\nbishops, and a numerous deputation from the monastery of Bangor,\ndisputed with Augustin, who denounced vengeance against them by the\nsword of the Saxons, in case they refused to submit to the see of Rome.\nHis prophecy, which had as little effect upon the Welch clergy as his\nmiracle, was shortly afterwards accomplished: For Ethelfred, the Saxon\nking of Northumberland, having defeated the British under the walls of\nChester, cut to pieces no fewer than twelve hundred of the monks of\nBangor, who had come to assist their countrymen with their prayers. Our\nauthor alludes to this extermination of the British recusant clergy,\nby comparing it to the census, or tribute of wolves-heads, imposed\non the Cambrian kings. It has been surmised by some authors, that\nAugustin himself instigated this massacre, and thereby contributed to\nthe accomplishment of his own prophecy. Other authorities say, that he\ndied in 604, and that the monks of Bangor were slain in 613. Perhaps,\nhowever, our author did not mean to carry the rise of Presbytery so\nfar back, but only referred to the doctrines of Wiccliff, who, in the\nreign of Edward III., and his successor Richard II., taught publicly at\nOxford several doctrines inconsistent with the supremacy of the Pope,\nand otherwise repugnant to the doctrines of the Roman church. He was\nprotected during his lifetime by John of Gaunt; but, forty years after\nhis death, his bones were dug up and burned for heresy. His followers\nwere called Lollards, and were persecuted with great severity in the\nreign of Henry V., Lord Cobham and many others being burned to death.\nThinking, perhaps, either of these too honourable and ancient a descent\nfor the English Presbyterians, our author next refers to Heylin, who\nbrings them from Geneva,[136] where the reformed doctrine was taught\nby the well known Zuinglius, and the still more famous Calvin. The\nformer began to preach the Reformation at Zurich about 1518, and\ndisputed publicly with one Sampson, a friar, whom the Pope had sent\nthither to distribute indulgences. Zuinglius was persecuted by the\nbishop of Constance; but, being protected by the magistrates of Zurich,\nhe set him at defiance, and in 1523 held an open disputation before\nthe senate, with such success, that they commanded the traditions of\nthe church to be thrown aside, and the gospel to be taught through\nall their canton. Zuinglius, in some respects, merited the epithet of\n_fiery_, which Dryden has given him; he was an ardent lover of liberty,\nand dissuaded his countrymen from a league with the French, by which it\nmust have been endangered; he vindicated, from Scripture, the doctrine\nof resisting oppressors and asserting liberty, of which he said God was\nthe author, and would be the defender;[137] and, finally, he was killed\nin battle between the inhabitants of Zurich and those of the five small\ncantons. The conquerors, being Catholics, treated his dead body with\nthe most shameless indignity.\n\nThe history of Calvin is too well known to need recital in this place.\nHe was expelled from France, his native country, on account of his\nhaving adopted the doctrines of the reformers, and, taking refuge in\nGeneva, was appointed professor of divinity there in 1536. But being\nafterwards obliged to retire from thence, on account of a quarrel about\nthe administration of the communion to certain individuals, Calvin\ntaught a French congregation at Strasburgh. He may be considered as the\nfounder of the Presbyterian doctrine, differing from that of Luther\nin denying consubstantiation, and affirming, in a large extent, the\ndoctrine of predestination, founded upon election to grace. The poet\nproceeds to describe the progress of this sect:\n\n    With teeth untried, and rudiments of claws,\n    Your first essay was on your native laws;\n    Those having torn with ease, and trampled down,}\n    Your fangs you fastened on the mitred crown,   }\n    And freed from God and monarchy your town.     }\n    What though your native kennel still be small,\n    Bounded betwixt a puddle and a wall;\n    Yet your victorious colonies are sent\n    Where the north ocean girds the continent.\n    Quickened with fire below, your monsters breed\n    In fenny Holland, and in fruitful Tweed;\n    And like the first the last affects to be,\n    Drawn to the dregs of a democracy.\n\nThe citizens of Geneva, before they adopted the reformed religion,\nwere under the temporal, as well as the ecclesiastical, authority of\na bishop. But, in 1528, when they followed the example of the city of\nBerne, in destroying images, and abolishing the Roman ceremonies, the\nbishop and his clergy were expelled from the city, which from that\ntime was considered as the cradle of Presbytery. As they had made\nchoice of a republican form of government for their little state,\nour author infers, that democracy is most congenial to their new\nform of religion. It is no doubt true, that the Presbyterian church\ngovernment is most purely democratical; which perhaps recommended it\nin Holland. It is also true, that the Presbyterian divines have always\npreached, and their followers practised, the doctrine of resistance to\noppression, whether affecting civil or religious liberty. But if Dryden\nhad looked to his own times, he would have seen, that the Scottish\nPresbyterians made a very decided stand for monarchy after the death\nof Charles I.; and even such as were engaged in the conspiracy of\nBaillie of Jerviswood, which was in some respects the counter-part of\nthe Ryehouse-plot, refused to take arms, because they suspected that\nthe intentions of Sidney, and others of the party in England, were to\nestablish a commonwealth. I may add, that, in latter times, no body of\nmen have shewn themselves more attached to the king and constitution\nthan the Presbyterian clergy of Scotland.\n\nThere is room for criticism also in the poetry of these lines. I\nquestion whether _fenny Holland_ and _fruitful Tweed_, in other words,\na marsh and a river, could form a favourable medium for communicating\nthe influence of the _quickening fire below_.\n\n\nNote IX.\n\n    _From Celtic woods is chased the wolfish crew;\n    But ah! some pity e'en to brutes is due;\n    Their native walks, methinks, they might enjoy,\n    Curbed of their native malice to destroy._--P. 126.\n\nIt is remarkable how readily sentiments of toleration occur, even\nto the professors of the most intolerant religion, when their minds\nhave fair play to attend to them. The edict of Nantes, by which\nHenry IV. secured to his Huguenot subjects the undisturbed exercise\nof their religion, was the recompense of the great obligations he\nowed to them, and a sort of compensation for his having preferred\npower to conscience; an edict, declared unalterable, and which had\neven been sanctioned by Louis XIV. himself, so late as 1680, was,\nin 1685, finally abrogated. The violence with which the persecution\nof the Protestants was then pushed on, almost exceeds belief. The\nprincipal and least violent mode of conversion, adopted by the king\nand his minister Louvois, was by quartering upon those of the reformed\nreligion large parties of soldiers, who were licenced to commit every\noutrage in their habitations short of rape and murder. When, by this\nspecies of persecution, a Huguenot had been once compelled to hear\nmass, he was afterwards treated as a relapsed heretic, if he shewed\nthe slightest disposition to resume the religion in which he had\nbeen brought up. James II., in two letters to the Prince of Orange,\nbeseeching toleration for the regular priests in Holland, fails not\nto condemn the conduct of Louis towards his Protestant subjects; yet,\nwith gross inconsistency, or the deepest dissimulation, he was at the\nsame time congratulating Barillon on his Most Christian Majesty's care\nfor the conversion of his subjects, and hoping God would grant him the\nfavour of completing so great a work.[138] And just so our author,\nafter blaming the persecution of the Huguenots, congratulates Italy and\nSpain upon possessing such just and excellent laws, as the rules of the\ninquisitorial church courts.\n\n\nNote X.\n\n    _A slimy-born and sun-begotten tribe,\n    Who far from steeples, and their sacred sound,\n    In fields their sullen conventicles found._--P. 129.\n\nThe dregs of the fanaticism of the last age fermented, during that\nof Charles II., into various sects of sullen enthusiasts, who\ndistinguished themselves by the different names of Brownists, Families\nof Love, &c. &c. In many cases they rejected all the usual aids of\ndevotion, and, holding their meetings in the open air, and in solitary\nspots, nursed their fanaticism by separating themselves from the more\nrational part of mankind. Dryden has elsewhere described them with\nequal severity;\n\n    A numerous host of dreaming saints succeed,\n    Of the true old enthusiastic breed;\n    'Gainst form and order they their powers employ,\n    Nothing to build, and all things to destroy.\n\nIn Scotland, large conventicles were held in the mountains and morasses\nby the fiercest of the Covenanters, whom persecution had driven\nfrantic. These men, known now by the name of Cameronians, considered\npopery and prelacy as synonymous terms; and even stigmatized, as\nErastians and self-seekers, the more moderate Presbyterians, who were\ncontented to exercise their religion as tolerated by the government.\n\n\nNote XI.\n\n    _Her novices are taught, that bread and wine\n    Are but the visible and outward sign,\n    Received by those who in communion join;\n    But the inward grace, or the thing signified,\n    His blood and body, who to save us died_, &c.--P. 133.\n\nThe poet alludes to the doctrine of the church of England concerning\nthe eucharist, thus expressed in the twenty-eighth article of faith:\n\n\"The Supper of the Lord is not only a sign of the love that Christians\nought to have among themselves one to another, but rather it is a\nsacrament of our redemption by Christ's death; insomuch, that to such\nas rightly, worthily, and with faith receive the same, the bread which\nwe break is a partaking of the body of Christ, and likewise the cup of\nblessing is a partaking of the blood of Christ.\n\n\"Transubstantiation, or the change of the substance of bread and wine,\nin the Supper of the Lord, cannot be proved by holy writ; but it is\nrepugnant to the plain words of Scripture, overthroweth the nature of a\nsacrament, and hath given occasion to many superstitions.\n\n\"The body of Christ is given, taken, and eaten in the supper only,\nafter an heavenly and spiritual manner. And the mean, whereby the body\nof Christ is received and eaten in the supper, is faith.\"\n\nDryden insists upon a supposed inconsistency in this doctrine; but his\nargument recoils upon the creed of his own church. The words of our\nSaviour are to be interpreted as they must have been meant when spoken;\na circumstance which excludes the literal interpretation contended\nfor by the Romanists: For, by the words \"_Hoc est corpus meum_,\" our\nSaviour cannot be then supposed to have meant, that the morsel which\nhe gave to his disciples was transformed into his body, which then\nstood before their eyes, and which all but heretics allow to have been\na real, natural, human body, incapable, of course, of being multiplied\ninto as many bodies as there were persons to partake of the communion,\nand of retaining its original and identical form at the same time.\nBut unless such a multiplied transformation actually took place, our\nSaviour's words to his apostles must have been emblematical only. Queen\nElizabeth's homely lines are, after all, an excellent comment on this\npoint of divinity:\n\n    His was the word that spake it;\n    He took the bread and brake it;\n    And what that word did make it,\n    That I believe, and take it.\n\n\nNote XII.\n\n    _True to her king her principles are found;\n    Oh that her practice were but half so sound!_--P. 133.\n\nThe pretensions of the church of England to loyalty were carried\nto a degree of extravagance, which her divines were finally unable\nto support, unless they had meant to sign the destruction of their\nreligion. This was owing to the recollection of the momentous period\nwhich had lately elapsed. The interest of the church had been deeply\ninterwoven with that of the crown; their struggle, sufferings, and\nfall, during the civil wars, had been in common, as well as their\ntriumphant restoration: the maxim of \"no king no bishop,\" was indelibly\nimprinted on the hearts of the clergy; in fine, it seemed impossible\nthat any thing should cut asunder the ties which combined them. In\nsanctioning, therefore, the doctrines of the most passive loyalty,\nthe English divines probably thought that they were only paying a\ntribute to the throne, which was to be returned by the streams of royal\nbounty and grace towards the church. Even the religion of James did\nnot, before his accession, shake their confidence, or excite their\napprehensions. They were far more afraid of the fanatics, under whose\niron yoke they had so lately groaned, than of the Roman Catholics,\nwho, for three generations, had been a depressed, and therefore a\ntractable body, whose ceremonies and church government resembled, in\nsome respects, their own, and who had sided with them during the civil\nwars against the Protestant sectaries. But when the members of the\nestablished church perceived, that the rapid steps which James adopted\nwould soon place the Catholics in a condition to rival, and perhaps to\noverpower her, they were obliged to retract and explain away many of\ntheir former hasty expressions of absolute and unconditional devotion\nto the royal pleasure. The king, and his Catholic counsellors, saw\nwith astonishment and indignation, that professions of the most ample\nsubjection were now to be understood as limited and restricted by the\ninterests of the church. In the height of their resentment, even the\nchurch of England's pretensions to a peculiar degree of loyalty were\nunthankfully turned into ridicule, in such bitter and sarcastic terms\nas the following, which occur in a pamphlet published expressly \"with\nallowance,\" _i. e._ by royal permission.\n\n\"I have often considered, but could never yet find a convincing reason,\nwhy that part of the nation, (which is commonly called the church of\nEngland) should dare appropriate to themselves alone the principles of\ntrue loyalty; and that no other church or communion on earth can be\nconsistent with monarchy, or, indeed, with any government.\n\n\"This is a presumption of so high a nature, that it renders the church\nof England a despicable enemy to the rest of mankind: For, what can be\nmore ridiculous than to say, that a congregation of people, calling\nthemselves a church, which cannot pretend to an infallibility even in\nmatters of faith, having, since their first institution, made several\nfundamental changes of religious worship, should, however, assume to\nthemselves an inerribility in point of civil obedience to the temporal\nmagistrate? Or, what can be more injurious than to aver, that no other\nsect or community on earth, from the rising to the setting sun, can be\ncapable of this singular gift of loyalty? So that the church of England\nalone, (if you have faith enough to believe her own testimony,) is\nthat beautiful spouse of Christ, holy in her doctrine, and infallible\nin her duty to the supreme magistrate, whom (by a revelation peculiar\nto herself) she owns both for her temporal and spiritual head. But I\ndoubt much, whether her _ipsa dixit_ alone will pass current with all\nthe nations of the universe, without making further search into the\nveracity of this bold assertion.\"\n\n    _A New Test of the Church of England's Loyalty._\n\n\nNote XIII.\n\n    _Or Isgrim's counsel._--P. 134.\n\nThis name for the Wolf is taken from an ancient political satire,\ncalled \"Reynard the Fox;\" in which an account is given of the intrigues\nat the court of the Lion; the impeachment of the Fox; his various\nwiles and escapes; finally, his conquering his accuser in single\ncombat. This ancient apologue was translated from the German by the\nvenerable Caxton, and published the 6th day of June, 1481. It became\nvery popular in England; and we derive from it all the names commonly\napplied to animals in fable, as Reynard the fox, Tybert the cat, Bruin\nthe bear, Isgrim the wolf, &c. The original of this piece is still so\nhighly esteemed in Germany, that it was lately modernized by Goeth\u00e9,\nand is published among his \"Ne\u00fce Schriften.\" It is probable that this\nancient satire might be the original of \"Mother Hubbard's Tale,\" and\nthat Dryden himself may have had something of its plan in his eye,\nwhen writing \"The Hind and Panther.\" As it had become merely a popular\nstory-book, some of his critics did not fail to make merry with his\nadopting any thing from such a source. \"_Smith._ I have heard you\nquote Reynard the fox.--_Bayes._ Why, there's it now; take it from me,\nMr Smith, there is as good morality, and as sound precepts, in The\nDelectable History of Reynard the Fox, as in any book I know, except\nSeneca. Pray, tell me, where, in any other author, could I have found\nso pretty a name for a wolf as Isgrim?\"[139]\n\n\nNote XIV.\n\n    _The wretched Panther cries aloud for aid\n    To church and councils, whom she first betrayed;\n    No help from fathers or tradition's train,\n    Those ancient guides she taught us to disdain,\n    And by that Scripture, which she once abused\n    To reformation, stands herself accused._--P. 135.\n\nThe author here prefers an argument much urged by the Catholic divines\nagainst those of the church of England, and which he afterwards resumes\nin the Second Part. The English divines, say they, halt between two\nopinions; they will not allow the weight of tradition when they dispute\nwith the church of Rome, but refer to the scripture, interpreted by\neach man's private opinion, as the sole rule of faith; while, on the\nother hand, they are obliged to have recourse to tradition in their\ndisputes with the Presbyterians and dissenters, because, without its\naid, they could not vindicate from scripture alone their hierarchy and\nchurch-government. To this it was answered, by the disputants on the\nchurch of England's side, that they owned no such inconsistent opinion\nas was imputed to them; but that they acknowledged, for their rule of\nfaith, the word of God in general; that by this they understood the\n_written word_, or _scripture_, in contradistinction to the Roman rule\nof scripture and traditions; and as distinguished, both from the church\nof Rome, and from heretics and sectaries, they understood by it more\nparticularly the written word or scripture, delivering a sense, owned\nand declared by the primitive church of Christ in the three creeds,\nfour first general councils, and harmony of the fathers.\n\nDryden's argument, however, had been, by the Catholics, thought so\nsound, that it is much dwelt upon in a tract, called, \"A Remonstrance,\nby way of Address to both Houses of Parliament, from the Church of\nEngland,\" the object of which is to recommend an union between the\nchurches of England and of Rome. The former is there represented as\nholding the following language:\n\n\"You cannot be ignorant, that ever since my separation from the church\nof Rome, I have been attacked by all sorts of dissenters: So that my\nfate, in this encounter, may be compared to that of a city, besieged\nby different armies, who fight both against it and one another; where,\nif the garrison make a sally to damage one, another presently takes an\nadvantage to make an attack. Thus, whilst I set myself vigorously to\nsuppress the papist, the puritan seeks to undermine me; and, whilst I\nam busied to oppose the puritan, the papist gains ground upon me. If I\ntell the church of Rome, I did not forsake her, but her errors, which\nI reformed; my rebellious subjects tell me the same, and that they\nmust make a thorough reformation; and, let me bring what arguments I\nplease, to justify my dissent, they still produce the same against me.\nIf, on the other hand, I plead against the puritan dissenter, and show,\nthat he ought to stand to church-authority, where he is not infallibly\ncertain it commands a sin; the papist presently catches at it, and\ntells me, I destroy my own grounds of reformation, unless I will\npretend to that infallibility which I condemn in them.\n\n\"Matters standing thus betwixt me and them, why would it not be a\npoint of prudence in me, (as I doubt not but you would esteem it in a\ngovernor of that city I lately mentioned,) to make peace with one of my\nadversaries, to the end I may with more ease resist the onsets of the\nother?\"\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 134: Hind and Panther Transversed.]\n\n[Footnote 135: This office was usually held by the executioner, who,\nto this extent, was a pluralist; and the change was chiefly made,\nto prevent the necessity of producing that person in court, to the\naggravation of the criminal's terrors.]\n\n[Footnote 136: \"But separating this obliquity from the main intendment,\nthe work was vigorously carried on by the king and his counsellors,\nas appears clearly by the doctrinals in the Book of Homilies, and by\nthe practical part of Christian piety, in the first public Liturgy,\nconfirmed by act of parliament, in the second and third year of the\nking; and in that act (and, which is more, by Fox himself) affirmed\nto have been done by the especial aid of the Holy Ghost. And here the\nbusiness might have rested, if Catin's pragmatical spirit had not\ninterposed. He first began to quarrel at some passages in this sacred\nliturgy, and afterwards never left soliciting the Lord Protector,\nand practising by his agents on the court, the country, and the\nuniversities, till he had laid the first foundation of the Zuinglian\nfaction; who laboured nothing more, than innovation both in doctrine\nand discipline; to which they were encouraged by nothing more than some\nimprovident indulgence granted unto John A-Lasco; who, bringing with\nhim a mixt multitude of Poles and Germans, obtained the privilege of a\nchurch for himself and his, distinct in government and forms of worship\nfrom the church of England.\n\n\"This gave powerful animation to the Zuinglian gospellers, (as they\nare called by Bishop Hooper, and some other writers) to practise first\nupon the church; who being countenanced, if not headed, by the Earl\nof Warwick, (who then began to undermine the Lord Protector,) first\nquarrelled the episcopal habit, and afterwards inveighed against\ncaps and surplices, against gowns and tippets, but fell at last upon\nthe altars, which were left standing in all churches by the rules of\nliturgy. The touching on this string made excellent music to most of\nthe grandees of the court, who had before cast many an envious eye on\nthose costly hangings, that massy plate, and other rich and precious\nutensils, which adorned those altars. And what need all this waste?\nsaid Judas, when one poor chalice only, and perhaps not that, might\nhave served the turn. Besides, there was no small spoil to be made of\ncopes, in which the priest officiated at the holy sacrament; some of\nthem being made of cloth of tissue, of cloth of gold and silver, or\nembroidered velvet; the meanest being made of silk, or satin, with\nsome decent trimming. And might not these be handsomely converted into\nprivate use, to serve as carpets for their tables, coverlids to their\nbeds, or cushions to their chairs or windows. Thereupon some rude\npeople are encouraged under-hand to beat down some altars, which makes\nway for an order of the council-table, to take down the rest, and set\nup tables in their places; followed by a commission, to be executed in\nall parts of the kingdom, for seizing on the premises to the use of the\nking.\"]\n\n[Footnote 137: \"_Quo animo ipsum quoque Paulum dicere existimo_,\nsi potes liber fieri utere potius, _1. Cor. 7. Quod eternum Dei\nconcilium, patres nostri, fortissimi viri, infracto animo secuti,\nmiris victoriarum successibus ut Sempachii,\" &c._ And again, \"_Ipse\nDominus libertatis author exstitit, et honestam libertatem querentibus\nadest_.\"--Pia et Amica Paran\u00e6sis ad Suitensium rempublicam.]\n\n[Footnote 138: Dalrymple's Memoirs, Vol. II. p. 108.]\n\n[Footnote 139: The Hind and the Panther Transversed, p. 14.]\n\n\n\n\nTHE\n\nHIND AND THE PANTHER,\n\nA POEM.\n\nPART II.\n\n\n\n\nTHE\n\nHIND AND PANTHER.\n\nPART SECOND.\n\n\n    Dame, said the Panther, times are mended well,\n    Since late among the Philistines you fell.[140]\n    The toils were pitched, a spacious tract of ground\n    With expert huntsmen was encompassed round;\n    The inclosure narrowed; the sagacious power\n    Of hounds and death drew nearer every hour.\n    'Tis true, the younger lion[141] 'scaped the snare,\n    But all your priestly calves lay struggling there,\n    As sacrifices on their altars laid;[142]     }\n    While you, their careful mother, wisely fled,}\n    Not trusting destiny to save your head.      }\n    For, whate'er promises you have applied }\n    To your unfailing church, the surer side}\n    Is four fair legs in danger to provide; }\n    And whate'er tales of Peter's chair you tell, }\n    Yet, saving reverence of the miracle,         }\n    The better luck was yours to 'scape so well.--}\n      As I remember, said the sober Hind,\n    Those toils were for your own dear self designed,\n    As well as me; and with the self-same throw,\n    To catch the quarry[143] and the vermin too,--\n    Forgive the slanderous tongues that called you so.\n    Howe'er you take it now, the common cry\n    Then ran you down for your rank loyalty,[144]\n    Besides, in popery they thought you nurst,\n    As evil tongues will ever speak the worst,\n    Because some forms, and ceremonies some\n    You kept, and stood in the main question dumb.\n    Dumb you were born indeed; but, thinking long,\n    The test, it seems, at last has loosed your tongue:[145]\n    And to explain what your forefathers meant,\n    By real presence in the sacrament,\n    After long fencing pushed against a wall,              }\n    Your salvo comes, that he's not there at all:          }\n    There changed your faith, and what may change may fall.}\n    Who can believe what varies every day,\n    Nor ever was, nor will be at a stay?--\n      Tortures may force the tongue untruths to tell,\n    And I ne'er owned myself infallible,\n    Replied the Panther: grant such presence were,\n    Yet in your sense I never owned it there.\n    A real virtue we by faith receive,\n    And that we in the sacrament believe.--\n    Then, said the Hind, as you the matter state,\n    Not only Jesuits can equivocate;\n    For real, as you now the word expound,\n    From solid substance dwindles to a sound.\n    Methinks, an \u00c6sop's fable you repeat;\n    You know who took the shadow for the meat:\n    Your church's substance thus you change at will,\n    And yet retain your former figure still.\n    I freely grant you spoke to save your life;\n    For then you lay beneath the butcher's knife.\n    Long time you fought, redoubled battery bore,\n    But, after all, against yourself you swore,\n    Your former self; for every hour your form\n    Is chopped and changed, like winds before a storm.\n    Thus fear and interest will prevail with some;\n    For all have not the gift of martyrdom.--\n      The Panther grinned at this, and thus replied:\n    That men may err was never yet denied;\n    But, if that common principle be true,\n    The canon, dame, is levelled full at you.\n    But, shunning long disputes, I fain would see\n    That wonderous wight, Infallibility.\n    Is he from heaven, this mighty champion, come?\n    Or lodged below in subterranean Rome?\n    First, seat him somewhere, and derive his race,\n    Or else conclude that nothing has no place.--\n      Suppose, though I disown it, said the Hind,\n    The certain mansion were not yet assigned;\n    The doubtful residence no proof can bring\n    Against the plain existence of the thing.\n    Because philosophers may disagree,             }\n    If sight by emission, or reception be,         }\n    Shall it be thence inferred, I do not see?[146]}\n    But you require an answer positive,           }\n    Which yet, when I demand, you dare not give;  }\n    For fallacies in universals live.[147]        }\n    I then affirm, that this unfailing guide\n    In pope and general councils must reside;\n    Both lawful, both combined; what one decrees   }\n    By numerous votes, the other ratifies:         }\n    On this undoubted sense the church relies.[148]}\n    'Tis true, some doctors in a scantier space,\n    I mean, in each apart, contract the place.\n    Some, who to greater length extend the line,\n    The church's after-acceptation join.\n    This last circumference appears too wide;\n    The church diffused is by the council tied,\n    As members by their representatives\n    Obliged to laws, which prince and senate gives.\n    Thus, some contract, and some enlarge the space;}\n    In pope and council, who denies the place,      }\n    Assisted from above with God's unfailing grace? }\n    Those canons all the needful points contain;\n    Their sense so obvious, and their words so plain,\n    That no disputes about the doubtful text\n    Have hitherto the labouring world perplexed.\n    If any should in after-times appear,\n    New councils must be called, to make the meaning clear;\n    Because in them the power supreme resides,\n    And all the promises are to the guides.[149]\n    This may be taught with sound and safe defence;\n    But mark how sandy is your own pretence,\n    Who, setting councils, pope, and church aside,\n    Are every man his own presuming guide.[150]\n    The sacred books, you say, are full and plain,\n    And every needful point of truth contain;\n    All who can read interpreters may be.\n    Thus, though your churches disagree,\n    Yet every saint has to himself alone\n    The secret of this philosophic stone.\n    These principles your jarring sects unite,\n    When differing doctors and disciples fight.\n    Though Luther, Zuinglius, Calvin, holy chiefs,\n    Have made a battle-royal of beliefs;\n    Or, like wild horses, several ways have whirled\n    The tortured text about the Christian world;\n    Each Jehu lashing on with furious force,\n    That Turk or Jew could not have used it worse;\n    No matter what dissension leaders make,\n    Where every private man may save a stake:\n    Ruled by the scripture and his own advice,\n    Each has a blind bye-path to Paradise;\n    Where, driving in a circle slow or fast,\n    Opposing sects are sure to meet at last.\n    A wonderous charity you have in store    }\n    For all reformed to pass the narrow door;}\n    So much, that Mahomet had scarcely more. }\n    For he, kind prophet, was for damning none;\n    But Christ and Moses were to save their own:\n    Himself was to secure his chosen race,\n    Though reason good for Turks to take the place,\n    And he allowed to be the better man,\n    In virtue of his holier Alcoran.\n      True, said the Panther, I shall ne'er deny\n    My brethren may be saved as well as I:\n    Though Huguenots condemn our ordination,\n    Succession, ministerial vocation;\n    And Luther, more mistaking what he read,\n    Misjoins the sacred body with the bread:[151]\n    Yet, lady, still remember I maintain,\n    The word in needful points is only plain.--\n      Needless, or needful, I not now contend,\n    For still you have a loop-hole for a friend,\n    Rejoined the matron; but the rule you lay         }\n    Has led whole flocks, and leads them still astray,}\n    In weighty points, and full damnation's way.      }\n    For, did not Arius first, Socinus now,\n    The Son's eternal Godhead disavow?\n    And did not these by gospel texts alone\n    Condemn our doctrine, and maintain their own?\n    Have not all heretics the same pretence\n    To plead the scriptures in their own defence?\n    How did the Nicene council then decide\n    That strong debate? was it by scripture tried?\n    No, sure; to that the rebel would not yield;\n    Squadrons of texts he marshalled in the field:\n    That was but civil war, an equal set,\n    Where piles with piles, and eagles eagles met.[152]\n    With texts point-blank and plain he faced the foe,\n    And did not Satan tempt our Saviour so?\n    The good old bishops took a simpler way;\n    Each asked but what he heard his father say,\n    Or how he was instructed in his youth,\n    And by tradition's force upheld the truth.[153]\n      The Panther smiled at this;--And when, said she,\n    Were those first councils disallowed by me?\n    Or where did I at sure tradition strike,\n    Provided still it were apostolic?[154]\n      Friend, said the Hind, you quit your former ground,\n    Where all your faith you did on scripture found:\n    Now 'tis tradition joined with holy writ;\n    But thus your memory betrays your wit.\n      No, said the Panther; for in that I view,\n    When your tradition's forged, and when 'tis true.\n    I set them by the rule, and, as they square,}\n    Or deviate from undoubted doctrine there,   }\n    This oral fiction, that old faith declare.--}\n      _Hind._ The council steered, it seems, a different course;\n    They tried the scripture by tradition's force:\n    But you tradition by the scripture try;     }\n    Pursued by sects, from this to that you fly,}\n    Nor dare on one foundation to rely.         }\n    The word is then deposed, and in this view,\n    You rule the scripture, not the scripture you.\n    Thus said the dame, and, smiling, thus pursued:\n    I see, tradition then is disallowed,\n    When not evinced by scripture to be true,\n    And scripture, as interpreted by you.\n    But here you tread upon unfaithful ground,\n    Unless you could infallibly expound;\n    Which you reject as odious popery,\n    And throw that doctrine back with scorn on me.\n    Suppose we on things traditive divide,\n    And both appeal to scripture to decide;\n    By various texts we both uphold our claim,\n    Nay, often, ground our titles on the same:\n    After long labour lost, and time's expence,\n    Both grant the words, and quarrel for the sense.\n    Thus all disputes for ever must depend;\n    For no dumb rule can controversies end.\n    Thus, when you said,--Tradition must be tried\n    By sacred writ, whose sense yourselves decide,\n    You said no more, but that yourselves must be\n    The judges of the scripture sense, not we.\n    Against our church-tradition you declare,\n    And yet your clerks would sit in Moses' chair;\n    At least 'tis proved against your argument,\n    The rule is far from plain, where all dissent.--\n      If not by scriptures, how can we be sure,\n    Replied the Panther, what tradition's pure?\n    For you may palm upon us new for old;\n    All, as they say, that glitters, is not gold.\n      How but by following her, replied the dame,\n    To whom derived from sire to son they came;\n    Where every age does on another move,\n    And trusts no farther than the next above;\n    Where all the rounds like Jacob's ladder rise,\n    The lowest hid in earth, the topmost in the skies?\n      Sternly the savage did her answer mark,\n    Her glowing eye-balls glittering in the dark,\n    And said but this:--Since lucre was your trade,\n    Succeeding times such dreadful gaps have made,\n    'Tis dangerous climbing: To your sons and you\n    I leave the ladder, and its omen too.[155]\n      _Hind._ The Panther's breath was ever famed for sweet;\n    But from the Wolf such wishes oft I meet.\n    You learned this language from the Blatant Beast,[156]\n    Or rather did not speak, but were possessed.\n    As for your answer, 'tis but barely urged:\n    You must evince tradition to be forged;\n    Produce plain proofs; unblemished authors use\n    As ancient as those ages they accuse;\n    Till when, 'tis not sufficient to defame;\n    An old possession stands, till elder quits the claim.\n    Then for our interest, which is named alone\n    To load with envy, we retort your own;\n    For, when traditions in your faces fly,\n    Resolving not to yield, you must decry.\n    As when the cause goes hard, the guilty man\n    Excepts, and thins his jury all he can;\n    So when you stand of other aid bereft,\n    You to the twelve apostles would be left.\n    Your friend the Wolf did with more craft provide\n    To set those toys, traditions, quite aside;[157]\n    And fathers too, unless when, reason spent,\n    He cites them but sometimes for ornament.\n    But, madam Panther, you, though more sincere,\n    Are not so wise as your adulterer;\n    The private spirit is a better blind,\n    Than all the dodging tricks your authors find.\n    For they, who left the scripture to the crowd,}\n    Each for his own peculiar judge allowed;      }\n    The way to please them was to make them proud.}\n    Thus with full sails they ran upon the shelf;\n    Who could suspect a cozenage from himself?\n    On his own reason safer 'tis to stand,\n    Than be deceived and damned at second-hand.\n    But you, who fathers and traditions take,\n    And garble some, and some you quite forsake,\n    Pretending church-authority to fix,\n    And yet some grains of private spirit mix,\n    Are, like a mule, made up of different seed,\n    And that's the reason why you never breed;\n    At least, not propagate your kind abroad,\n    For home dissenters are by statutes awed.\n    And yet they grow upon you every day,            }\n    While you, to speak the best, are at a stay,     }\n    For sects, that are extremes, abhor a middle way:}\n    Like tricks of state, to stop a raging flood,}\n    Or mollify a mad-brained senate's mood;      }\n    Of all expedients never one was good.        }\n    Well may they argue, nor can you deny,\n    If we must fix on church authority,\n    Best on the best, the fountain, not the flood;\n    That must be better still, if this be good.\n    Shall she command, who has herself rebelled?\n    Is antichrist by antichrist expelled?\n    Did we a lawful tyranny displace,\n    To set aloft a bastard of the race?\n    Why all these wars to win the book, if we }\n    Must not interpret for ourselves, but she?}\n    Either be wholly slaves, or wholly free.  }\n    For purging fires traditions must not fight;\n    But they must prove episcopacy's right.[158]\n    Thus, those led horses are from service freed;\n    You never mount them but in time of need.\n    Like mercenaries, hired for home defence,\n    They will not serve against their native prince.\n    Against domestic foes of hierarchy\n    These are drawn forth, to make fanatics fly;\n    But, when they see their countrymen at hand,       }\n    Marching against them under church-command,        }\n    Straight they forsake their colours, and disband.--}\n      Thus she; nor could the Panther well enlarge\n    With weak defence against so strong a charge;\n    But said:--For what did Christ his word provide,\n    If still his church must want a living guide?\n    And if all-saving doctrines are not there,\n    Or sacred penmen could not make them clear,\n    From after-ages we should hope in vain\n    For truths which men inspired could not explain.--\n      Before the word was written, said the Hind,\n    Our Saviour preached his faith to human kind:\n    From his apostles the first age received\n    Eternal truth, and what they taught believed.\n    Thus, by tradition faith was planted first,\n    Succeeding flocks succeeding pastors nursed.\n    This was the way our wise Redeemer chose,      }\n    Who sure could all things for the best dispose,}\n    To fence his fold from their encroaching foes. }\n    He could have writ himself, but well foresaw\n    The event would be like that of Moses' law;\n    Some difference would arise, some doubts remain,\n    Like those which yet the jarring Jews maintain.\n    No written laws can be so plain, so pure,\n    But wit may gloss, and malice may obscure;\n    Not those indited by his first command,\n    A prophet graved the text, an angel held his hand.\n    Thus faith was ere the written word appeared,\n    And men believed not what they read, but heard.\n    But since the apostles could not be confined\n    To these, or those, but severally designed\n    Their large commission round the world to blow,\n    To spread their faith, they spread their labours too.\n    Yet still their absent flock their pains did share;\n    They hearkened still, for love produces care.\n    And as mistakes arose, or discords fell,\n    Or bold seducers taught them to rebel,\n    As charity grew cold, or faction hot,\n    Or long neglect their lessons had forgot,\n    For all their wants they wisely did provide,\n    And preaching by epistles was supplied;\n    So, great physicians cannot all attend,\n    But some they visit, and to some they send.\n    Yet all those letters were not writ to all;\n    Nor first intended but occasional,\n    Their absent sermons; nor, if they contain\n    All needful doctrines, are those doctrines plain.\n    Clearness by frequent preaching must be wrought\n    They writ but seldom, but they daily taught;\n    And what one saint has said of holy Paul,\n    \"He darkly writ,\" is true applied to all.\n    For this obscurity could heaven provide   }\n    More prudently than by a living guide,    }\n    As doubts arose, the difference to decide?}\n    A guide was therefore needful, therefore made;\n    And, if appointed, sure to be obeyed.\n    Thus, with due reverence to the apostles' writ,\n    By which my sons are taught, to which submit,\n    I think, those truths, their sacred works contain,\n    The church alone can certainly explain;\n    That following ages, leaning on the past,\n    May rest upon the primitive at last.\n    Nor would I thence the word no rule infer,\n    But none without the church-interpreter;\n    Because, as I have urged before, 'tis mute,\n    And is itself the subject of dispute.\n    But what the apostles their successors taught,   }\n    They to the next, from them to us is brought,    }\n    The undoubted sense which is in scripture sought.}\n    From hence the church is armed, when errors rise,    }\n    To stop their entrance, and prevent surprise;        }\n    And, safe entrenched within, her foes without defies.}\n    By these all festering sores her councils heal,}\n    Which time or has disclosed, or shall reveal;  }\n    For discord cannot end without a last appeal.  }\n    Nor can a council national decide,          }\n    But with subordination to her guide:        }\n    (I wish the cause were on that issue tried.)}\n    Much less the scripture; for suppose debate\n    Betwixt pretenders to a fair estate,\n    Bequeathed by some legator's last intent;[159]\n    (Such is our dying Saviour's testament:)\n    The will is proved, is opened, and is read,\n    The doubtful heirs their differing titles plead;\n    All vouch the words their interest to maintain,\n    And each pretends by those his cause is plain.\n    Shall then the testament award the right?\n    No, that's the Hungary for which they fight;\n    The field of battle, subject of debate;\n    The thing contended for, the fair estate.\n    The sense is intricate, 'tis only clear\n    What vowels and what consonants are there.\n    Therefore 'tis plain, its meaning must be tried\n    Before some judge appointed to decide.--\n      Suppose, the fair apostate said, I grant,\n    The faithful flock some living guide should want,\n    Your arguments an endless chace pursue: }\n    Produce this vaunted leader to our view,}\n    This mighty Moses of the chosen crew.-- }\n      The dame, who saw her fainting foe retired,\n    With force renewed, to victory aspired;\n    And, looking upward to her kindred sky,            }\n    As once our Saviour owned his Deity,               }\n    Pronounced his words--\"She whom ye seek am I.\"[160]}\n    Nor less amazed this voice the Panther heard,\n    Than were those Jews to hear a God declared.\n    Then thus the matron modestly renewed:\n    Let all your prophets and their sects be viewed,\n    And see to which of them yourselves think fit\n    The conduct of your conscience to submit;\n    Each proselyte would vote his doctor best,\n    With absolute exclusion to the rest:\n    Thus would your Polish diet disagree,\n    And end, as it began, in anarchy;\n    Yourself the fairest for election stand,\n    Because you seem crown-general of the land;\n    But soon against your superstitious lawn\n    Some presbyterian sabre would be drawn;[161]\n    In your established laws of sovereignty  }\n    The rest some fundamental flaw would see,}\n    And call rebellion gospel-liberty.       }\n    To church-decrees your articles require\n    Submission mollified, if not entire.[162]\n    Homage denied, to censures you proceed;\n    But when Curtana[163] will not do the deed,\n    You lay that pointless clergy-weapon by,\n    And to the laws, your sword of justice, fly.\n    Now this your sects the more unkindly take,\n    (Those prying varlets hit the blots you make,)\n    Because some ancient friends of yours declare,\n    Your only rule of faith the scriptures are,\n    Interpreted by men of judgment sound,\n    Which every sect will for themselves expound;\n    Nor think less reverence to their doctors due\n    For sound interpretation, than to you.\n    If then, by able heads, are understood\n    Your brother prophets, who reformed abroad;\n    Those able heads expound a wiser way,\n    That their own sheep their shepherd should obey.\n    But if you mean yourselves are only sound, }\n    That doctrine turns the reformation round, }\n    And all the rest are false reformers found;}\n    Because in sundry points you stand alone,     }\n    Not in communion joined with any one;         }\n    And therefore must be all the church, or none.}\n    Then, till you have agreed whose judge is best,\n    Against this forced submission they protest;\n    While sound and sound a different sense explains,\n    Both play at hardhead till they break their brains;\n    And from their chairs each other's force defy,\n    While unregarded thunders vainly fly.\n    I pass the rest, because your church alone\n    Of all usurpers best could fill the throne.\n    But neither you, nor any sect beside,         }\n    For this high office can be qualified,        }\n    With necessary gifts required in such a guide.}\n    For that, which must direct the whole, must be}\n    Bound in one bond of faith and unity;         }\n    But all your several churches disagree.       }\n    The consubstantiating church[164] and priest\n    Refuse communion to the Calvinist;\n    The French reformed from preaching you restrain,   }\n    Because you judge their ordination vain;[165]      }\n    And so they judge of yours, but donors must ordain.}\n    In short, in doctrine, or in discipline,\n    Not one reformed can with another join;\n    But all from each, as from damnation, fly:\n    No union they pretend, but in non-popery.\n    Nor, should their members in a synod meet,\n    Could any church presume to mount the seat,\n    Above the rest, their discords to decide;\n    None would obey, but each would be the guide;\n    And face to face dissensions would increase,\n    For only distance now preserves the peace.\n    All in their turns accusers, and accused;\n    Babel was never half so much confused;\n    What one can plead, the rest can plead as well;}\n    For amongst equals lies no last appeal,        }\n    And all confess themselves are fallible.       }\n    Now, since you grant some necessary guide,\n    All who can err are justly laid aside;\n    Because a trust so sacred to confer   }\n    Shows want of such a sure interpreter;}\n    And how can he be needful who can err?}\n    Then, granting that unerring guide we want,\n    That such there is you stand obliged to grant;\n    Our Saviour else were wanting to supply\n    Our needs, and obviate that necessity.\n    It then remains, that church can only be\n    The guide, which owns unfailing certainty;\n    Or else you slip your hold, and change your side,\n    Relapsing from a necessary guide.\n    But this annexed condition of the crown,                      }\n    Immunity from errors, you disown;                             }\n    Here then you shrink, and lay your weak pretensions down.[166]}\n    For petty royalties you raise debate;                }\n    But this unfailing universal state                   }\n    You shun; nor dare succeed to such a glorious weight;}\n    And for that cause those promises detest,\n    With which our Saviour did his church invest;\n    But strive to evade, and fear to find them true,\n    As conscious they were never meant to you;\n    All which the mother-church asserts her own,\n    And with unrivalled claim ascends the throne.\n    So, when of old the Almighty Father sate\n    In council, to redeem our ruined state,\n    Millions of millions, at a distance round,            }\n    Silent the sacred consistory crowned,                 }\n    To hear what mercy, mixt with justice, could propound;}\n    All prompt, with eager pity, to fulfil\n    The full extent of their Creator's will:\n    But when the stern conditions were declared,\n    A mournful whisper through the host was heard,\n    And the whole hierarchy, with heads hung down,\n    Submissively declined the ponderous proffer'd crown.\n    Then, not till then, the Eternal Son from high\n    Rose in the strength of all the Deity;\n    Stood forth to accept the terms, and underwent  }\n    A weight which all the frame of heaven had bent,}\n    Nor he himself could bear, but as Omnipotent.   }\n    Now, to remove the least remaining doubt,\n    That even the blear-eyed sects may find her out,\n    Behold what heavenly rays adorn her brows,           }\n    What from his wardrobe her beloved allows,           }\n    To deck the wedding-day of his unspotted spouse![167]}\n    Behold what marks of majesty she brings,\n    Richer than ancient heirs of eastern kings!\n    Her right hand holds the sceptre and the keys,\n    To show whom she commands, and who obeys;\n    With these to bind, or set the sinner free,\n    With that to assert spiritual royalty.\n      One in herself, not rent by schism, but sound,\n    Entire, one solid shining diamond;\n    Not sparkles shattered into sects like you:\n    One is the church, and must be to be true;\n    One central principle of unity;     }\n    As undivided, so from errors free;  }\n    As one in faith, so one in sanctity.}\n    Thus she, and none but she, the insulting rage\n    Of heretics opposed from age to age;\n    Still when the giant-brood invades her throne,       }\n    She stoops from heaven, and meets them half way down,}\n    And with paternal thunder vindicates her crown.      }\n    But like Egyptian sorcerers you stand,           }\n    And vainly lift aloft your magic wand,           }\n    To sweep away the swarms of vermin from the land;}\n    You could, like them, with like infernal force,\n    Produce the plague, but not arrest the course.\n    But when the boils and blotches, with disgrace\n    And public scandal, sat upon the face,\n    Themselves attacked, the Magi strove no more,             }\n    They saw God's finger, and their fate deplore;            }\n    Themselves they could not cure of the dishonest sore.[168]}\n    Thus one, thus pure, behold her largely spread,\n    Like the fair ocean from her mother-bed;\n    From east to west triumphantly she rides,\n    All shores are watered by her wealthy tides.\n    The gospel-sound, diffused from pole to pole,\n    Where winds can carry, and where waves can roll,\n    The self-same doctrine of the sacred page\n    Conveyed to every clime, in every age.\n      Here let my sorrow give my satire place,\n    To raise new blushes on my British race.\n    Our sailing ships like common-sewers we use,     }\n    And through our distant colonies diffuse         }\n    The draught of dungeons, and the stench of stews;}\n    Whom, when their home-bred honesty is lost,\n    We disembogue on some far Indian coast,\n    Thieves, pandars, palliards,[169] sins of every sort;\n    Those are the manufactures we export,\n    And these the missioners our zeal has made;     }\n    For, with my country's pardon, be it said,      }\n    Religion is the least of all our trade.         }\n      Yet some improve their traffic more than we;}\n    For they on gain, their only god, rely,       }\n    And set a public price on piety.              }\n    ndustrious of the needle and the chart,\n    They run full sail to their Japonian mart;\n    Preventing fear, and, prodigal of fame,            }\n    Sell all of Christian to the very name,[170]       }\n    Nor leave enough of that to hide their naked shame.}\n      Thus, of three marks, which in the creed we view,\n    Not one of all can be applied to you;\n    Much less the fourth. In vain, alas! you seek\n    The ambitious title of apostolic:[171]\n    God-like descent! 'tis well your blood can be\n    Proved noble in the third or fourth degree;\n    For all of ancient that you had before,    }\n    I mean what is not borrowed from our store,}\n    Was error fulminated o'er and o'er;        }\n    Old heresies condemned in ages past,\n    By care and time recovered from the blast.[172]\n      'Tis said with ease, but never can be proved,\n    The church her old foundations has removed,\n    And built new doctrines on unstable sands:\n    Judge that, ye winds and rains! you proved her, yet she stands.\n    Those ancient doctrines charged on her for new,\n    Show, when, and how, and from what hands they grew.\n    We claim no power, when heresies grow bold,\n    To coin new faith, but still declare the old.\n    How else could that obscene disease be purged,\n    When controverted texts are vainly urged?\n    To prove tradition new, there's somewhat more\n    Required, than saying, 'twas not used before.\n    Those monumental arms are never stirred,\n    Till schism or heresy call down Goliah's sword.\n      Thus, what you call corruptions, are, in truth,\n    The first plantations of the gospel's youth;\n    Old standard faith; but cast your eyes again,         }\n    And view those errors which new sects maintain,       }\n    Or which of old disturbed the church's peaceful reign;}\n    And we can point each period of the time,\n    When they began, and who begot the crime;\n    Can calculate how long the eclipse endured,\n    Who interposed, what digits were obscured:\n    Of all which are already passed away,\n    We know the rise, the progress, and decay.\n      Despair at our foundations then to strike,\n    Till you can prove your faith apostolic;\n    A limpid stream drawn from the native source;\n    Succession lawful in a lineal course.\n    Prove any church, opposed to this our head,\n    So one, so pure, so unconfinedly spread,\n    Under one chief of the spiritual state,\n    The members all combined, and all subordinate;\n    Show such a seamless coat, from schism so free,\n    In no communion joined with heresy;--\n    If such a one you find, let truth prevail;       }\n    Till when, your weights will in the balance fail;}\n    A church unprincipled kicks up the scale.        }\n    But if you cannot think, (nor sure you can\n    Suppose in God what were unjust in man,)\n    That He, the fountain of eternal grace,    }\n    Should suffer falsehood for so long a space}\n    To banish truth, and to usurp her place;   }\n    That seven successive ages should be lost,\n    And preach damnation at their proper cost;[173]\n    That all your erring ancestors should die,\n    Drowned in the abyss of deep idolatry;\n    If piety forbid such thoughts to rise,\n    Awake, and open your unwilling eyes:\n    God hath left nothing for each age undone,             }\n    From this to that wherein he sent his Son;             }\n    Then think but well of him, and half your work is done.}\n    See how his church, adorned with every grace,       }\n    With open arms, a kind forgiving face,              }\n    Stands ready to prevent her long-lost son's embrace!}\n    Not more did Joseph o'er his brethren weep,\n    Nor less himself could from discovery keep,\n    When in the crowd of suppliants they were seen,\n    And in their crew his best-loved Benjamin.\n    That pious Joseph in the church behold,            }\n    To feed your famine, and refuse your gold;         }\n    The Joseph you exiled, the Joseph whom you sold.[174]}\n      Thus, while with heavenly charity she spoke,\n    A streaming blaze the silent shadows broke;\n    Shot from the skies a cheerful azure light;            }\n    The birds obscene to forests winged their flight,      }\n    And gaping graves received the wandering guilty sprite.}\n      Such were the pleasing triumphs of the sky,\n    For James his late nocturnal victory;\n    The pledge of his almighty Patron's love,\n    The fireworks which his angels made above.[175]\n    I saw myself the lambent easy light[176]\n    Gild the brown horror, and dispel the night;\n    The messenger with speed the tidings bore;      }\n    News, which three labouring nations did restore;}\n    But heaven's own Nuntius was arrived before.    }\n      By this, the Hind had reached her lonely cell,\n    And vapours rose, and dews unwholesome fell;\n    When she, by frequent observation wise,      }\n    As one who long on heaven had fixed her eyes,}\n    Discerned a change of weather in the skies.  }\n    The western borders were with crimson spread,\n    The moon descending looked all flaming red;\n    She thought good manners bound her to invite\n    The stranger dame to be her guest that night.\n    'Tis true, coarse diet, and a short repast,  }\n    She said, were weak inducements to the taste }\n    Of one so nicely bred, and so unused to fast;}\n    But what plain fare her cottage could afford,\n    A hearty welcome at a homely board,\n    Was freely hers; and, to supply the rest,\n    An honest meaning, and an open breast;\n    Last, with content of mind, the poor man's wealth,\n    A grace-cup to their common patron's[177] health.\n    This she desired her to accept, and stay,\n    For fear she might be wildered in her way,\n    Because she wanted an unerring guide,\n    And then the dew-drops on her silken hide\n    Her tender constitution did declare,             }\n    Too lady-like a long fatigue to bear,            }\n    And rough inclemencies of raw nocturnal air.[178]}\n    But most she feared, that, travelling so late,}\n    Some evil-minded beasts might lie in wait,    }\n    And without witness wreak their hidden hate.  }\n      The Panther, though she lent a listening ear,\n    Had more of lion in her than to fear;\n    Yet wisely weighing, since she had to deal\n    With many foes their numbers might prevail,\n    Returned her all the thanks she could afford,\n    And took her friendly hostess at her word;\n    Who, entering first her lowly roof, a shed    }\n    With hoary moss and winding ivy spread,       }\n    Honest enough to hide an humble hermit's head,}\n    Thus graciously bespoke her welcome guest:          }\n    So might these walls, with your fair presence blest,}\n    Become your dwelling-place of everlasting rest;     }\n    Not for a night, or quick revolving year,\n    Welcome an owner, not a sojourner.\n    This peaceful seat my poverty secures;\n    War seldom enters but where wealth allures:\n    Nor yet despise it; for this poor abode,\n    Has oft received, and yet receives a God;\n    A God, victorious of a Stygian race,\n    Here laid his sacred limbs, and sanctified the place.\n    This mean retreat did mighty Pan[179] contain;}\n    Be emulous of him, and pomp disdain,          }\n    And dare not to debase your soul to gain.[180]}\n      The silent stranger stood amazed to see\n    Contempt of wealth, and wilful poverty;\n    And, though ill habits are not soon controuled,\n    Awhile suspended her desire of gold.\n    But civilly drew in her sharpened paws,           }\n    Not violating hospitable laws,                    }\n    And pacified her tail, and licked her frothy jaws.}\n      The Hind did first her country cates provide;\n    Then couched herself securely by her side.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 140: Alluding to the Popish Plot. See Note I.]\n\n[Footnote 141: James II. then Duke of York, whom Shaftesbury and his\nparty involved in the odium of the plot.]\n\n[Footnote 142: Plunket, the titular primate of Ireland, Whitebread,\nprovincial of the Jesuits, and several other Catholic priests, suffered\nfor the alleged plot. Derrick most absurdly supposes the passage to\nrefer to the period of the Civil War.]\n\n[Footnote 143: _Quarry_ signifies, properly, \"dead game ready to be cut\nup by the huntsman,\" which the French still call _faire la cur\u00e9e_. But\nit is often taken, as in this passage, for the game in general. Vermin\ncomprehends such wild animals as are not game, foxes, polecats, and the\nlike.]\n\n[Footnote 144: Note II.]\n\n[Footnote 145: The test-oath, against popery, in which\ntransubstantiation is formally disavowed. See Note III.]\n\n[Footnote 146: There was a dispute among naturalists, whether sight was\naccomplished _per emissionem vel per receptionem specierum_.]\n\n[Footnote 147: _Dolus versatur in generalibus_, was an axiom of the\nschools.]\n\n[Footnote 148: Note IV.]\n\n[Footnote 149: The Catholics interpret our Saviour's promise, \"that he\nwould be with the disciples to the end of the world,\" as applicable to\ntheir own church exclusively.]\n\n[Footnote 150: Note V.]\n\n[Footnote 151: By the doctrine of consubstantiation.]\n\n[Footnote 152: Alluding to Lucan's description of the Roman civil war.]\n\n[Footnote 153: Note VI.]\n\n[Footnote 154: See Note XIV. Part I. page 156.]\n\n[Footnote 155: The gallows.]\n\n[Footnote 156: By the Blatant Beast, we are generally to understand\nslander; see Spenser's Legend of Courtesy. But it is here taken for the\nWolf, or Presbyterian clergy, whose violent declamations against the\nchurch of Rome filled up many sermons.]\n\n[Footnote 157: The Presbyterian church utterly rejects traditions, and\nappeals to the scripture as the sole rule of faith.]\n\n[Footnote 158: Note VII.]\n\n[Footnote 159: It is probable, that from this passage Swift took the\nidea of comparing the scripture to a testament in his \"Tale of a Tub.\"]\n\n[Footnote 160: By this asseveration the author seems to infer, that,\nbecause the church of Rome avers her own infallibility, she is\ntherefore infallible.]\n\n[Footnote 161: In a Polish Diet, where unanimity was necessary, the\nmode adopted of ensuring it was for the majority to hew to pieces the\nfirst individual who expressed his dissent by the fatal _veto_.]\n\n[Footnote 162: \"The church, according to the articles of faith, hath\npower to decree rites and ceremonies, and authority in controversies of\nfaith; and yet it is not lawful for the church to ordain any thing that\nis contrary to God's word written, neither may it so expound one place\nof scripture, that it be repugnant to another.\" Article xx.]\n\n[Footnote 163: This romantic name is given to the sword of mercy; which\nwants a point, and is said to have been that of Edward the Confessor.\nIt is borne at the coronation. The sword of Ogier the Dane, famous in\nromance, the work of Galand, who made Joyeuse and Durandal, was also\ncalled Curtana.]\n\n[Footnote 164: The Lutherans.]\n\n[Footnote 165: The Huguenot preachers, being Calvinists, had received\nclassical, and not episcopal ordination: hence, unless re-ordained,\nthey were not admitted to preach in the established church of England.]\n\n[Footnote 166: Note VIII.]\n\n[Footnote 167: Note IX.]\n\n[Footnote 168: The magicians imitated Moses in producing the frogs\nwhich infested Egypt; but they could not relieve from that, or any of\nthe other plagues. By that of boils and blains they were afflicted\nthemselves, like the other Egyptians. \"And the magicians could not\nstand before Moses because of the boils, for the boils were upon the\nmagicians, and upon all the Egyptians.\" _Exod._ ix. 11.]\n\n[Footnote 169: Debauchees.]\n\n[Footnote 170: Note X.]\n\n[Footnote 171: Note XI.]\n\n[Footnote 172: Alluding to the doctrines of Wiccliff and the Lollards,\ncondemned as heresies in their own times, but revived by the reformers.]\n\n[Footnote 173: About seven hundred years elapsed between the departure\nof the church of Rome from the simplicity of the primitive Christians,\nand the dawn of the Reformation.]\n\n[Footnote 174: Note XII.]\n\n[Footnote 175: Note XIII.]\n\n[Footnote 176: _Poeta loquitur._]\n\n[Footnote 177: King James.]\n\n[Footnote 178: Note XIV.]\n\n[Footnote 179: Our Saviour.]\n\n[Footnote 180:\n\n    _Ut ventum ad sedes: H\u0153c, inquit, limina victor\n    Alcides subiit; h\u0153c illum regia cepit.\n    Aude, hospes, contemnere opes, et te quoque dignum\n    Finge deo; rebusque veni non asper egenis._\n\n    \u00c6neid. Lib. VIII.\n]\n\n\n\n\nNOTES\n\nON\n\nTHE HIND AND THE PANTHER.\n\nPART II.\n\n\nNote I.\n\n    _Dame, said the Panther, times are mended well,\n    Since late among the Philistines you fell.\n    The toils were pitched, a spacious tract of ground,\n    With expert huntsmen, was encompassed round;\n    The enclosure narrowed; the sagacious power\n    Of hounds and death drew nearer every hour._--P. 161.\n\nIn these spirited lines, Dryden describes the dangers in which the\nEnglish Catholics were involved by the Popish Plot, which rendered them\nso obnoxious for two years, that even Charles himself, much as he was\ninclined to favour them, durst not attempt to prevent the most severe\nmeasures from being adopted towards them. It is somewhat curious, that\nthe very same metaphor of hounds and huntsmen is employed by one of\nthe most warm advocates for the plot. \"Had this plot been a forged\ncontrivance of their own, (_i.e._ the Papists,) they would at the very\nfirst discovery of it have had half a dozen, or half a score, crafty\nfellows, ready to have attested all the same things; whereas, on the\ncontrary, notwithstanding we are now on a burning scent, we were fain\ntill here of late to pick out, by little and little, all upon a cold\nscent, and that stained too by the tricks and malice of our enemies.\nSo that had we not had some such good huntsmen as the Right Noble Earl\nof Shaftesbury, to manage the chase for us, our hounds must needs have\nbeen baffled, and the game lost.\"--_Appeal from the Country to the\nCity._ State Tracts, p. 407.\n\n\nNote II.\n\n    _As I remember, said the sober Hind,\n    Those toils were for your own dear self designed,\n    As well as me; and with the self-same throw,        }\n    To catch the quarry and the vermin too,             }\n    (Forgive the slanderous tongues that called you so.)}\n    Howe'er you take it now, the common cry\n    Then ran you down for your rank loyalty._--P. 162.\n\nThe country party, during the 1679, and the succeeding years, were as\nmuch incensed against the divines of the high church of England as\nagainst the Papists. The furious pamphlet, quoted in the last note,\ndivides the enemies of this country into four classes; officers,\ncourtiers, over-hot churchmen, and papists. \"Over-hot churchmen,\" it\ncontinues, \"are bribed to wish well to popery, by the hopes, if not of\na cardinal's cap, yet at least by a command over some abbey, priory,\nor other ecclesiastical preferment whereof the Romish church hath so\ngreat plenty. These are the men, who exclaim against our parliament's\nproceedings, in relation to the plot, as too violent, calling these\ntimes by no other name than that of _forty_ or _forty-one_;[181]\nwhen, to amuse as well his sacred majesty as his good people, they\nagain threaten us with another _forty-eight_; and all this is done to\nvindicate underhand the Catholic party, by throwing a suspicion on\nthe fanatics. These are the gentlemen who so magnify the principles\nof Bishop Laud, and so much extol the writings of that same late\nspirited prelate Dr Heylin, who hath made more Papists, by his books\nthan Christians by his sermons. These are those episcopal Tantivies,\nwho can make even the very scriptures pimp for the court, who out of\n_Urim and Thummim_ can extort a sermon, to prove the not paying of\ntithes and taxes to be the sin against the Holy Ghost; and had rather\nsee the kingdom run down with blood, than part with the least hem of a\nsanctified frock, which they themselves made holy.\"--Appeal, &c. _State\nTracts_, p. 403. In a very violent tract, written expressly against\nthe influence of the clergy,[182] they are charged with being the\nprincipal instruments of the court in corrupting elections. \"I find,\"\nsays the author, when talking of the approaching general election,\n\"all persons very forward to countenance this public work, except the\nhigh-flown ritualists and ceremony-mongers of the clergy, who, being in\nthe conspiracy against the people, lay themselves out to accommodate\ntheir masters with the veriest villains that can be picked up in all\nthe country, that so we may fall into the hands again of as treacherous\nand lewd a parliament, as the wisdom of God and folly of man has most\nmiraculously dissolved. To which end they traduce all worthy men for\nfanatics, schismatics, or favourers of them. Nay, do but pitch upon\na gentleman, who believes it his duty to serve his God, his king,\nand country, faithfully, they cry him down as a person dangerous and\ndisaffected to the government; thinking thereby to scare the people\nfrom the freedom of their choice, and then impose their hair-brained\njourneymen and half-witted fops upon them.\" In Shadwell's Whig play,\ncalled \"The Lancashire Witches,\" he has introduced an high-flying\nchaplain, as the expression then run, and an Irish priest, who are\ndescribed as very ready to accommodate each other in all religious\ntenets, since they agree in disbelieving the popish plot, and in\nbelieving that ascribed to the fanatics. These, out of a thousand\ninstances, may serve to show, how closely the country party in the time\nof Charles II. were disposed to identify the interests of Rome, and of\nthe high church of England. Dryden is therefore well authorised to say,\nthat both communions were aimed at by that cabal, which pushed on the\ninvestigation of the supposed plot.\n\n\nNote III.\n\n    _The test, it seems, at last has loosed your tongue._--P. 162.\n\nIf there was any ambiguity in the church of England's doctrine\nconcerning the eucharist, it was fully explained by the memorable\nTest Act, passed in 1678, during the heat of the Popish Plot, by\nwhich all persons holding public offices were required, under pain\nof disqualification, to disown the doctrine of transubstantiation,\nin the most explicit terms, as also that of image worship. This bill\nwas pressed forwards with great violence by the country party. \"I\nwould not,\" said one of their orators, \"have a popishman, or a popish\nwoman, remain here; not a popish dog, or a popish bitch; not so much\nas a popish cat, to pur and mew about the king.\" Many of the church of\nEngland party opposed this test, from an idea that it was prejudicial\nto the interests of the crown.\n\n\nNote IV.\n\n    _I then affirm, that this unfailing guide\n    In pope and general councils must reside;\n    Both lawful, both combined; what one decrees\n    By numerous votes, the other ratifies;\n    On this undoubted sense the church relies._--P. 164.\n\nDryden does not plead the cause of infallibility so high as to\ndeclare it lodged in the pope alone; but inclines to the milder and\nmore moderate opinion, which vests it in the church and pope jointly.\nThis was the shape in which the doctrine was stated in the pamphlets\ngenerally dispersed from the king's printing-press about this time;\nwhether because James really held the opinion of the Ultramontane, or\nGallican church, in this point, or that he thought the more moderate\nstatement was most likely to be acceptable to new converts. In a\ndialogue betwixt a Missioner and a Plain Man, printed along with\nthe Rosary, in a very small form, and apparently designed for very\nextensive circulation, the question is thus stated:\n\n\"_Plain Man._ How shall I know what the church teaches, and by what\nmeans may I come to know her infallible doctrine?\n\n\"_Missioner._ In those cases, she speaks to us by her supreme\ncourts of judicature, her general councils, which, being the legal\nrepresentatives of her whole body, she is secured from erring in them\nas to all things which appertain to faith.\"\n\n\nNote V.\n\n    _But mark how sandy is your own pretence,\n    Who, setting councils, pope, and church aside,\n    Are every man his own presuming guide\n    The sacred books, you say, are full and plain,\n    And every needful point of truth contain;\n    All who can read interpreters may be._--P. 165.\n\nThis ultimate appeal to the scriptures against the authority of the\nchurch, as it is what the church of Rome has most to dread, is most\ncombated by her followers. Dryden, like a good courtier, adopts here,\nas well as elsewhere, the arguments which converted his master, Charles\nII. \"We declare,\" says the king in his first paper, \"to believe one\nCatholic and apostolic church; and it is not left to every phantastical\nman's head to believe as he pleases, but to the church, to whom Christ\nleft the power upon earth, to govern us in matters of faith, who made\nthese creeds for our directions. It were a very irrational thing\nto make laws for a country, and leave it to the inhabitants to be\ninterpreters and judges of those laws: For then every man will be his\nown judge; and, by consequence, no such thing as either right or wrong.\nCan we therefore suppose, that God Almighty would leave us at those\nuncertainties, as to give us a rule to go by, and leave every man to be\nhis own judge? I do ask any ingenuous man, Whether it be not the same\nthing to follow our own phancy, or to interpret the scripture by it?\nI would have any man shew me, where the power of deciding matters of\nfaith is given to every particular man. Christ left his power to his\nchurch, even to forgive sins in heaven; and left his Spirit with them,\nwhich they exercised after his resurrection; first by his apostles in\ntheir creed, and many years after by the council at Nice, where that\ncreed was made that is called by that name; and by the power which they\nhad received from Christ, they were the judges even of the scripture\nitself many years after the apostles, which books were canonical, and\nwhich were not.\" _Papers found in King Charles's strong box._\n\n\nNote VI.\n\n    _The good old bishops took a simpler way;\n    Each asked but what he heard his father say,\n    Or how he was instructed in his youth,\n    And by tradition's force upheld the truth._--P. 167.\n\nDryden had previously attacked the rule of faith, by private judgment\nof the Holy Scriptures. His assumption is, that the scriptures\nhaving been often misunderstood and abused by heretics of various\ndescriptions, there must be some more infallible guide left us by God\nas the rule of faith. Instead of trusting, therefore, to individual\njudgment founded on the scripture, he urges, that the infallibility\nof faith depends upon oral tradition, handed down, as his communion\npretends, by father to son, from the times of the primitive church till\nthis very day. It is upon this foundation that the church of Rome rests\nher claim to infallibility, as the immediate representative of the\napostles and primitive church.\n\n\nNote VII.\n\n    _For purging fires traditions must not fight;\n    But they must prove episcopacy's right._--P. 170.\n\nThe doctrine of purgatory, and prayers for the dead, is founded on\na passage in the book of Tobit. The Apocrypha not being absolutely\nrejected by the church of England, but admitted for \"example of life\nand instruction of manners,\" though not of canonical authority, part\nof this curious and romantic history is read in the course of the\ncalendar. The domestic circumstance of the dog gave unreasonable\nscandal to the Puritans, from which the following is a good-humoured\nvindication. \"Give me leave for once to intercede for that poor dog,\nbecause he is a dog of good example, for he was faithful, and loved his\nmaster; besides, that he never troubles the church on Sundays, when\npeople have their best clothes on; only on a week-day, when scrupulous\nbrethren are always absent, the poor cur makes bold to follow his\nmaster.\" But although the church of England did not receive the\ntraditive belief, founded upon the aforesaid passage concerning prayer\nfor the dead, the dissenters accused her of liberal reference to\ntradition in the disputes concerning the office of bishop, the nature\nof which is in the New Testament left somewhat dubious.\n\n\nNote VIII.\n\n    _But this annexed condition of the crown,\n    Immunity from errors, you disown;\n    Here then you shrink, and lay your weak pretensions down._ P. 176.\n\nMuch of the preceding argument, and this conclusion, is founded upon\nthe following passage in the second paper found in King Charles's\nstrong box. \"It is a sad thing to consider what a world of heresies are\ncrept into this nation. Every man thinks himself as competent a judge\nof the scriptures as the very apostles themselves; and 'tis no wonder\nthat it should be so, since that part of the nation which looks most\nlike a church, dares not bring the true arguments against the other\nsects, for fear they should be turned against themselves, and confuted\nby their own arguments. The church of England, as 'tis called, would\nfain have it thought, that they are the judges in matters spiritual,\nand yet dare not positively say, that there is no appeal from them;\nfor either they must say, that they are infallible, which they cannot\npretend to, or confess, that what they decide in matters of conscience\nis no further to be followed, than as it agrees with every man's\nprivate judgment.\"\n\nTo this the divines of England answered, that they indeed asserted\nchurch authority, but without pretending to infallibility; and that\nwhile the church decided upon points of faith, she was to be directed\nand guided by the scriptures, just as the judges of a temporal tribunal\nare to frame their decisions, not from any innate or infallible\nauthority of their own, but in conformity with the laws of the realm.\n\n\nNote IX.\n\n    _Behold, what heavenly rays adorn her brows,\n    What from his wardrobe her beloved allows,\n    To deck the wedding-day of his unspotted spouse!_--P. 177.\n\nIn this and the following lines Dryden sets forth his adopted\nmother-church in all the glowing attributes of majesty and authority.\nThe lines are extremely beautiful, and their policy is obvious, from\nthe following passage in a pretended letter from Father Petre to Father\nLa Chaise. The letter bears every mark indeed of forgery; but it is\nequally an illustration of Dryden, whether the policy contained in it\nwas attributed by the Protestants to the Catholics as part of their\nscheme, or was really avowed as such by themselves. \"Many English\nheretics resort often to our sermons; and I have often recommended to\nour fathers to preach now in the beginning as little as they can of the\ncontroversy, because that provokes; but to represent to them the beauty\nand antiquity of the Catholic religion, that they may be convinced that\nall that has been said and preached to them, and their own reflections\nconcerning it, have been all scandal.\"--_Somers' Tracts_, p. 253. The\nunity of the Catholic church was also chiefly insisted on during the\ncontroversy:\n\n    One in herself, not rent by schism, but sound,\n    Entire; one solid, shining diamond,\n    Not sparkles shattered into sects like you;\n    One is the church, and must be to be true.\n\nIt seems to have escaped Dryden, that all the various sects which\nhave existed, and do now exist, in the Christian world, may, in some\nmeasure, be said to be sparkles shattered from his \"solid diamond;\"\nsince at one time all Christendom belonged to the Roman church. Thus\nthe disunion of the various sects of Protestants is no more an argument\nagainst the church of England than it is against the church of Rome,\nor the Christian faith in general. All communions insist on the same\nprivilege; and when the church of Rome denounced the Protestants as\nheretics, like Coriolanus going into exile, they returned the sentence\nagainst her who gave it. If it is urged, that, notwithstanding these\nvarious defections, the Roman church retained the most extended\ncommunion, this plea would place the truth of religious opinions upon\nthe hazardous basis of numbers, which Mahometans might plead more\nsuccessfully than any Christian church, in proportion as their faith is\nmore widely extended. These arguments of the unity and extent of the\nchurch are thus expressed in a missionary tract already quoted, where\nthe _Plain Man_ thus addresses his English parson: \"Either shew me, by\nmore plain and positive texts of scripture than what the Missioner has\nhere brought, that God Almighty has promised to preserve his church\nfrom essential errors, such as are idolatry, superstition, &c.; or\nelse shew me a church visible in all ages spread over the face of\nthe whole world, secured from such errors, and at unity in itself. A\nchurch, that has had all along kings for nursing fathers, and queens\nfor nursing mothers; a church, to which all nations have flowed, and\nwhich is authorised to teach them infallibly all those truths which\nwere delivered to the saints without mixtures of error, which destroy\nsanctity; I say, either shew me, from plain texts of scripture, that\nChrist's church was not to be my infallible guide; or shew me such a\nchurch of Christ as these promises require, distinct from that of the\nRoman, and from which she has either separated, or been cut off.\"\n\n\nNote X.\n\n    _Industrious of the needle and the chart,\n    They run full sail to their Japonian mart;\n    Preventing fear, and prodigal of fame,\n    Sell all of Christian to the very name._--P. 179.\n\nThe author has, a little above, used an argument, much to the honour\nof the Catholic church--her unceasing diligence in labouring for the\nconversion of the heathen; a task, in which her missionaries have\nlaboured with unwearied assiduity, encountering fatigue, danger, and\nmartyrdom itself, in winning souls to the faith. It has been justly\nobjected, that the spiritual instruction of their converts is but\nslight and superficial; yet still their missionary zeal forms a strong\ncontrast to the indifference of the reformed churches in this duty.\nNothing of the kind has ever been attempted on a great or national\nscale by the church of England, which gives Catholics room to upbraid\nher clergy with their unambitious sloth in declining the dignity of\nbecoming bishops _in partibus infidelium_. The poet goes on to state\nthe scandalous materials with which it has been the universal custom\nof Britain to supply the population of her colonies; the very dregs\nand outcasts of humanity being the only recruits whom she destines to\nestablish the future marts for her commodities. The success of such\nmissionaries among the savage tribes, who have the misfortune to be\nplaced in their vicinity, may be easily guessed:\n\n    Deliberate and undeceived,\n    The wild men's vices they received,\n    And gave them back their own. _Wordsworth._\n\nOn the other hand, the care of the Catholic missionaries was by no\nmeans limited to the spiritual concerns of those heathen among whom\nthey laboured: they extended them to their temporal concerns, and\nsometimes unfortunately occasioned grievous civil dissensions, and\nmuch bloodshed. Something of this kind took place in Japan; where the\nChristians, having raised a rebellion against the heathens, (for the\nbeaten party, as Dryden says, are always rebels to the victors,) were\nexterminated, root and branch. This excited such an utter hatred of\nCatholic priests, and their religion, that they were prohibited, under\nthe deepest denunciations of death and confiscation, from landing\nin Japan. Nevertheless, the severity of this law did not prevent\nthe Hollanders from sharing in the gainful traffic of the island,\nwhich they gained permission to do, by declaring, that they were not\nChristians, (only meaning, we hope, that they were not Catholics,) but\nDutchmen; and it was currently believed, that, in corroboration of\ntheir assertion, they were required to trample upon the crucifix, the\nobject of adoration to those whom the Japanese had formerly known under\nthe name of Christians.\n\n\nNote XI.\n\n    _Thus of three marks which in the creed we view,\n    Not one of all can be applied to you,\n    Much less the fourth; in vain, alas! you seek\n    The ambitious title of apostolic._--P. 179.\n\nThe poet is enumerating the marks of the Catholic church, according\nto the Nicene creed, which he makes out to be Unity, Truth, Sanctity,\nand Apostolic Derivation, all of which he denies to the church of\nEngland. The qualities of truth and sanctity are implied under the word\n_Catholic_.\n\n\nNote XII.\n\n    _That pious Joseph in the church behold,\n    To feed your famine, and refuse your gold;\n    The Joseph you exiled, the Joseph whom you sold._--P. 182.\n\nThe English Benedictine monks executed a renunciation of the abbey\nlands, belonging to the order before the Reformation, in order to\nsatisfy the minds of the possessors, and reconcile them to the\nre-establishment of the ancient religion, by guaranteeing the stability\nof their property. There appeared, however, to the proprietors of\nthese lands, little generosity in this renunciation, in case the monks\nwere to remain in a condition of inability to support their pretended\nclaim; and, on the other hand, some reason to suspect its validity,\nshould they ever be strong enough to plead their title. The king's\ndeclaration of indulgence contained a promise upon this head, which\nappeared equally ominous: He declared, that he would maintain his\nloving subjects in their properties and possessions, \"as well of church\nand abbey lands as of any other.\" The only effect of this clause was to\nmake men enquire, whether popery was so near being established as to\nmake such a promise necessary; and if so, how far the promise itself\nwas to be relied upon, in opposition to the doctrine of resumption,\nwhich had always been enforced by the Roman see, even when these church\nlands fell into the hands of persons of their own persuasion, unless\nthey were dedicated to pious uses. Nor were there wanting persons\nto remind the proprietors of such lands, that the canons declared\nthat even the pope had no authority to confirm the alienation of the\nproperty of the church; that the general council of Trent had solemnly\nanathematized all who detained church lands; that the _Monasticon\nAnglicanum_ was carefully preserved in the Vatican as a rule for\nthe intended resumption; and that the reigning pope had obstinately\nrefused to confirm any such alienations by his bulls, though the doing\nso at this crisis might have removed a great obstacle to the growth\nof Popery in England.--See, in the _State Tracts_, a piece called\n\"Abbey Lands not assured to Roman Catholics,\" Vol. 1. p. 326; and more\nespecially a tract, by some ascribed to Burnet, and by others to Sir\nWilliam Coventry, entitled, \"A Letter written to Dr Burnet, giving some\naccount of Cardinal Pole's secret powers; from which it appears, that\nit never was intended to confirm the Alienation that was made of the\nAbbey Lands. To which are added, Two Breves that Cardinal Pole brought\nover, and some other of his Letters that were never before printed,\n1685.\"\n\n\nNote XIII.\n\n    _Such were the pleasing triumphs of the sky,\n    For James his late nocturnal victory;\n    The pledge of his almighty Patron's love,\n    The fireworks which his angels made above._--P. 182.\n\nThe aurora borealis was an uncommon spectacle in England during the\n17th century. Its occasional appearance, however, gave foundation\nto those tales of armies fighting in the air, and similar phenomena\nwith which the credulity of the vulgar was amused. The author seems\nto allude to some extraordinary display of the aurora borealis on the\nevening of the battle of Sedgemuir, which was chiefly fought by night.\nI do not find the circumstance noticed elsewhere. Dryden attests it by\nhis personal evidence.\n\n\nNote XIV.\n\n    _And then the dew-drops on her silken hide\n    Her tender constitution did declare,\n    Too lady-like a long fatigue to bear,\n    And rough inclemencies of raw nocturnal air._--P. 183.\n\nThis seems to be a sarcasm of the same kind with the following: \"But,\"\nsays the zealous Protestant of the mother church, \"if you repeal\nthe test, you take away the bulwark that defends the church; for if\nthat were once demolished, the enemy would rush in and possess all;\nand it is a delicate innocent church that cannot be safe but in a\nfortified place.\"--\"I must confess, it is a great argument of her\nmodesty to own herself weak and unable to subsist without the support\nof parliamentary laws, to hang, draw, or quarter her opposers, and\nwithout a coercive power in herself to fine and excommunicate all\nrecusants and nonconformists.\"[183] One would wish to ask this Catholic\nadvocate for universal toleration, if he had ever heard of a court in\nPopish countries for the prevention of heresy, generally called the\nInquisition?\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 181: The great civil war broke out in 1641-2, and the king\nwas dethroned in 1648.]\n\n[Footnote 182: \"The Freeholder's Choice, or a Letter of Advice\nconcerning Elections.\"]\n\n[Footnote 183: New Test of the Church of England's Loyalty.]\n\n\n\n\nTHE\n\nHIND AND THE PANTHER.\n\nA POEM.\n\nPART THIRD.\n\n\n\n\nTHE\n\nHIND AND THE PANTHER.\n\nPART THIRD.\n\n\n    Much malice, mingled with a little wit,\n    Perhaps may censure this mysterious writ;\n    Because the muse has peopled Caledon                 }\n    With panthers, bears, and wolves, and beasts unknown,}\n    As if we were not stocked with monsters of our own.  }\n    Let \u00c6sop answer, who has set to view\n    Such kinds as Greece and Phrygia never knew;\n    And mother Hubbard, in her homely dress,\n    Has sharply blamed a British lioness;\n    That queen, whose feast the factious rabble keep,\n    Exposed obscenely naked, and asleep.[184]\n    Led by those great examples, may not I\n    The wonted organs of their words supply?\n    If men transact like brutes, 'tis equal then\n    For brutes to claim the privilege of men.\n      Others our Hind of folly will indite,\n    To entertain a dangerous guest by night.\n    Let those remember, that she cannot die,\n    Till rolling time is lost in round eternity;\n    Nor need she fear the Panther, though untamed,\n    Because the Lion's peace was now proclaimed;[185]\n    The wary savage would not give offence,\n    To forfeit the protection of her prince;\n    But watched the time her vengeance to complete,\n    When all her furry sons in frequent senate met;[186]\n    Meanwhile she quenched her fury at the flood,\n    And with a lenten sallad cooled her blood.\n    Their commons, though but coarse, were nothing scant,\n    Nor did their minds an equal banquet want.\n      For now the Hind, whose noble nature strove\n    To express her plain simplicity of love,\n    Did all the honours of her house so well,\n    No sharp debates disturbed the friendly meal.\n    She turned the talk, avoiding that extreme,\n    To common dangers past, a sadly-pleasing theme;\n    Remembering every storm which tossed the state,      }\n    When both were objects of the public hate,           }\n    And dropt a tear betwixt for her own childrens' fate.}\n      Nor failed she then a full review to make\n    Of what the Panther suffered for her sake;\n    Her lost esteem, her truth, her loyal care,\n    Her faith unshaken to an exiled heir,\n    Her strength to endure, her courage to defy,\n    Her choice of honourable infamy.[187]\n    On these, prolixly thankful, she enlarged;\n    Then with acknowledgment herself she charged;\n    For friendship, of itself an holy tie,\n    Is made more sacred by adversity.\n    Now should they part, malicious tongues would say,\n    They met like chance companions on the way,\n    Whom mutual fear of robbers had possessed;\n    While danger lasted, kindness was professed;\n    But, that once o'er, the short-lived union ends,\n    The road divides, and there divide the friends.\n      The Panther nodded, when her speech was done,\n    And thanked her coldly in a hollow tone;\n    But said, her gratitude had gone too far\n    For common offices of Christian care.\n    If to the lawful heir she had been true,\n    She paid but C\u00e6sar what was C\u00e6sar's due.\n    I might, she added, with like praise describe\n    Your suffering sons, and so return your bribe:\n    But incense from my hands is poorly prized;\n    For gifts are scorned where givers are despised.\n    I served a turn, and then was cast away;                       }\n    You, like the gaudy fly, your wings display,                   }\n    And sip the sweets, and bask in your great patron's day.--[188]}\n      This heard, the matron was not slow to find\n    What sort of malady had seized her mind;\n    Disdain, with gnawing envy, fell despite,\n    And cankered malice, stood in open sight;\n    Ambition, interest, pride without controul,\n    And jealousy, the jaundice of the soul;\n    Revenge, the bloody minister of ill,\n    With all the lean tormentors of the will.\n    'Twas easy now to guess from whence arose\n    Her new-made union with her ancient foes;\n    Her forced civilities, her faint embrace,\n    Affected kindness, with an altered face;\n    Yet durst she not too deeply probe the wound,\n    As hoping still the nobler parts were sound;\n    But strove with anodynes to assuage the smart,\n    And mildly thus her medicine did impart.\n      Complaints of lovers help to ease their pain;\n    It shows a rest of kindness to complain;\n    A friendship loth to quit its former hold,\n    And conscious merit, may be justly bold;\n    But much more just your jealousy would shew,\n    If others' good were injury to you:\n    Witness, ye heavens, how I rejoice to see\n    Rewarded worth and rising loyalty!\n    Your warrior offspring, that upheld the crown,\n    The scarlet honour of your peaceful gown,\n    Are the most pleasing objects I can find,\n    Charms to my sight, and cordials to my mind:\n    When virtue spooms[189] before a prosperous gale,\n    My heaving wishes help to fill the sail;\n    And if my prayers for all the brave were heard,\n    C\u00e6sar should still have such, and such should still reward.\n      The laboured earth your pains have sowed and tilled,\n    'Tis just you reap the product of the field:\n    Yours be the harvest; 'tis the beggar's gain,\n    To glean the fallings of the loaded wain.\n    Such scattered ears as are not worth your care,}\n    Your charity, for alms, may safely spare,      }\n    For alms are but the vehicles of prayer.       }\n    My daily bread is literally implored;\n    I have no barns nor granaries to hoard.\n    If C\u00e6sar to his own his hand extends,                   }\n    Say which of yours his charity offends;                 }\n    You know, he largely gives to more than are his friends.}\n    Are you defrauded, when he feeds the poor?\n    Our mite decreases nothing of your store.\n    I am but few, and by your fare you see\n    My crying sins are not of luxury.\n    Some juster motive sure your mind withdraws,   }\n    And makes you break our friendship's holy laws;}\n    For barefaced envy is too base a cause.        }\n    Show more occasion for your discontent;\n    Your love, the Wolf, would help you to invent:\n    Some German quarrel, or, as times go now,\n    Some French,[190] where force is uppermost, will do.\n    When at the fountain's head, as merit ought\n    To claim the place, you take a swilling draught,\n    How easy 'tis an envious eye to throw,\n    And tax the sheep for troubling streams below;\n    Or call her, when no farther cause you find,\n    An enemy professed of all your kind!\n    But, then, perhaps, the wicked world would think,\n    The Wolf designed to eat as well as drink.--\n      This last allusion galled the Panther more,\n    Because, indeed, it rubbed upon the sore;\n    Yet seemed she not to wince, though shrewdly pained,\n    But thus her passive character maintained.\n      I never grudged, whate'er my foes report,\n    Your flaunting fortune in the Lion's court.\n    You have your day, or you are much belied,\n    But I am always on the suffering side;\n    You know my doctrine, and I need not say,\n    I will not, but I cannot disobey.\n    Their malice too a sore suspicion brings,\n    For, though they dare not bark, they snarl at kings.\n    On this firm principle I ever stood;             }\n    He of my sons who fails to make it good,         }\n    By one rebellious act renounces to my blood.[191]}\n      Ah, said the Hind, how many sons have you,\n    Who call you mother, whom you never knew!\n    But most of them, who that relation plead,\n    Are such ungracious youths as wish you dead.\n    They gape at rich revenues which you hold,\n    And fain would nibble at your grandame gold;\n    Enquire into your years, and laugh to find\n    Your crazy temper shows you much declined.\n    Were you not dim and doated, you might see}\n    A pack of cheats that claim a pedigree,   }\n    No more of kin to you, than you to me.    }\n    Do you not know, that, for a little coin,\n    Heralds can foist a name into the line?\n    They ask you blessing but for what you have,   }\n    But, once possessed of what with care you save,}\n    The wanton boys would piss upon your grave.    }\n      Your sons of latitude, that court your grace,}\n    Though most resembling you in form and face,   }\n    Are far the worst of your pretended race;      }\n    And, but I blush your honesty to blot,\n    Pray God you prove them lawfully begot!\n    For, in some Popish libels I have read,\n    The Wolf has been too busy in your bed;[192]\n    At least their hinder parts, the belly-piece,\n    The paunch, and all that Scorpio claims,[193] are his.\n    Nor blame them for intruding in your line;\n    Fat bishoprics are still of right divine.\n    Think you, your new French proselytes are come,\n    To starve abroad, because they starved at home?\n    Your benefices twinkled from afar,\n    They found the new Messiah by the star;\n    Those Swisses fight on any side for pay,\n    And 'tis the living that conforms, not they.\n    Mark with what management their tribes divide;      }\n    Some stick to you, and some to t'other side,        }\n    That many churches may for many mouths provide.[194]}\n    More vacant pulpits would more converts make;\n    All would have latitude enough to take:\n    The rest unbeneficed your sects maintain;}\n    For ordinations, without cures, are vain,}\n    And chamber practice is a silent gain.   }\n    Your sons of breadth at home are much like these;\n    Their soft and yielding metals run with ease;\n    They melt, and take the figure of the mould,\n    But harden and preserve it best in gold.--\n      Your Delphic sword, the Panther then replied,\n    Is double-edged, and cuts on either side.\n    Some sons of mine, who bear upon their shield\n    Three steeples argent in a sable field,\n    Have sharply taxed your converts, who, unfed,\n    Have followed you for miracles of bread;[195]\n    Such, who themselves of no religion are,\n    Allured with gain, for any will declare.\n    Bare lies, with bold assertions, they can face;\n    But dint of argument is out of place.\n    The grim logician puts them in a fright;\n    'Tis easier far to flourish than to fight.[196]\n    Thus, our eighth Henry's marriage they defame;}\n    They say, the schism of beds began the game,  }\n    Divorcing from the church to wed the dame;    }\n    Though largely proved, and by himself professed,\n    That conscience, conscience would not let him rest,--[197]\n    I mean, not till possessed of her he loved,\n    And old, uncharming Catherine was removed.\n    For sundry years before he did complain,\n    And told his ghostly confessor his pain.\n    With the same impudence, without a ground, }\n    They say, that, look the reformation round,}\n    No treatise of humility is found.[198]     }\n    But if none were, the gospel does not want;   }\n    Our Saviour preached it, and I hope you grant,}\n    The sermon on the mount was protestant.--     }\n      No doubt, replied the Hind, as sure as all}\n    The writings of Saint Peter and Saint Paul; }\n    On that decision let it stand, or fall.     }\n    Now for my converts, who, you say, unfed,\n    Have followed me for miracles of bread.\n    Judge not by hearsay, but observe at least,\n    If since their change their loaves have been increased.\n    The Lion buys no converts; if he did,\n    Beasts would be sold as fast as he could bid.\n    Tax those of interest, who conform for gain,\n    Or stay the market of another reign:\n    Your broad-way sons[199] would never be too nice\n    To close with Calvin, if he paid their price;\n    But, raised three steeples higher, would change their note,\n    And quit the cassock for the canting-coat.\n    Now, if you damn this censure, as too bold,\n    Judge by yourselves, and think not others sold.\n      Meantime, my sons accused, by fame's report,\n    Pay small attendance at the Lion's court,\n    Nor rise with early crowds, nor flatter late;\n    For silently they beg, who daily wait.\n    Preferment is bestowed, that comes unsought;\n    Attendance is a bribe, and then 'tis bought.\n    How they should speed, their fortune is untried;\n    For not to ask, is not to be denied.\n    For what they have, their God and king they bless,\n    And hope they should not murmur, had they less.\n    But if reduced subsistence to implore,\n    In common prudence they would pass your door;\n    Unpitied Hudibras, your champion friend,[200]\n    Has shown how far your charities extend.\n    This lasting verse shall on his tomb be read,\n    \"He shamed you living, and upbraids you dead.\"\n      With odious atheist names you load your foes;}\n    Your liberal clergy why did I expose?          }\n    It never fails in charities like those.[201]   }\n    In climes where true religion is professed,\n    That imputation were no laughing jest;\n    But _imprimatur_, with a chaplain's name,\n    Is here sufficient licence to defame.[202]\n    What wonder is't that black detraction thrives?}\n    The homicide of names is less than lives;      }\n    And yet the perjured murderer survives.--      }\n      This said, she paused a little, and suppressed\n    The boiling indignation of her breast.\n    She knew the virtue of her blade, nor would\n    Pollute her satire with ignoble blood;\n    Her panting foe she saw before her eye,\n    And back she drew the shining weapon dry.\n    So when the generous Lion has in sight\n    His equal match, he rouses for the fight;\n    But when his foe lies prostrate on the plain,\n    He sheaths his paws, uncurls his angry mane,\n    And, pleased with bloodless honours of the day,\n    Walks over, and disdains the inglorious prey.\n    So James, if great with less we may compare,\n    Arrests his rolling thunder-bolts in air;\n    And grants ungrateful friends a lengthened space,\n    To implore the remnants of long-suffering grace.\n      This breathing-time the matron took; and then\n    Resumed the thread of her discourse again.--\n    Be vengeance wholly left to powers divine,\n    And let heaven judge betwixt your sons and mine:\n    If joys hereafter must be purchased here\n    With loss of all that mortals hold so dear,\n    Then welcome infamy and public shame,\n    And last, a long farewell to worldly fame![203]\n    'Tis said with ease, but, oh, how hardly tried}\n    By haughty souls to human honour tied!        }\n    O sharp convulsive pangs of agonizing pride!  }\n    Down then, thou rebel, never more to rise!            }\n    And what thou didst, and dost, so dearly prize,       }\n    That fame, that darling fame, make that thy sacrifice.}\n    'Tis nothing thou hast given; then add thy tears\n    For a long race of unrepenting years:\n    'Tis nothing yet, yet all thou hast to give:\n    Then add those may-be years thou hast to live:\n    Yet nothing still: then poor and naked come,           }\n    Thy father will receive his unthrift home,             }\n    And thy blest Saviour's blood discharge the mighty sum.}\n      Thus, she pursued, I discipline a son,\n    Whose unchecked fury to revenge would run;\n    He champs the bit, impatient of his loss,\n    And starts aside, and flounders at the cross.\n    Instruct him better, gracious God, to know,\n    As thine is vengeance, so forgiveness too;\n    That, suffering from ill tongues, he bears no more\n    Than what his sovereign bears, and what his Saviour bore.\n      It now remains for you to school your child,[204]\n    And ask why God's anointed he reviled;\n    A king and princess dead! did Shimei worse?\n    The curser's punishment should fright the curse;\n    Your son was warned, and wisely gave it o'er,\n    But he, who counselled him, has paid the score;[205]\n    The heavy malice could no higher tend,\n    But woe to him on whom the weights descend.\n    So to permitted ills the demon flies;\n    His rage is aimed at him who rules the skies:\n    Constrained to quit his cause, no succour found,\n    The foe discharges every tire around,\n    In clouds of smoke abandoning the fight,\n    But his own thundering peals proclaim his flight.\n      In Henry's change his charge as ill succeeds;}\n    To that long story little answer needs;        }\n    Confront but Henry's words with Henry's deeds. }\n    Were space allowed, with ease it might be proved,\n    What springs his blessed reformation moved.\n    The dire effects appeared in open sight,          }\n    Which from the cause he calls a distant flight,   }\n    And yet no larger leap than from the sun to light.}\n      Now last your sons a double p\u00e6an sound,\n    A treatise of humility is found.\n    'Tis found, but better it had ne'er been sought,\n    Than thus in Protestant procession brought.\n    The famed original through Spain is known,         }\n    Rodriguez' work, my celebrated son,                }\n    Which yours, by ill-translating, made his own;[206]}\n    Concealed its author, and usurped the name,\n    The basest and ignoblest theft of fame.\n    My altars kindled first that living coal;\n    Restore, or practise better what you stole;\n    That virtue could this humble verse inspire,\n    'Tis all the restitution I require.--\n      Glad was the Panther that the charge was closed,\n    And none of all her favourite sons exposed;\n    for laws of arms permit each injured man,\n    To make himself a saver where he can.\n    Perhaps the plundered merchant cannot tell\n    The names of pirates in whose hands he fell;\n    But at the den of thieves he justly flies,\n    And every Algerine is lawful prize;\n    No private person in the foe's estate\n    Can plead exemption from the public fate.\n    Yet Christian laws allow not such redress;\n    Then let the greater supersede the less.\n    But let the abettors of the Panther's crime\n    Learn to make fairer wars another time.\n    Some characters may sure be found to write }\n    Among her sons; for 'tis no common sight,  }\n    A spotted dam, and all her offspring white.}\n      The savage, though she saw her plea controuled,\n    Yet would not wholly seem to quit her hold,\n    But offered fairly to compound the strife,\n    And judge conversion by the convert's life.\n    'Tis true, she said, I think it somewhat strange,\n    So few should follow profitable change;\n    For present joys are more to flesh and blood,\n    Than a dull prospect of a distant good.\n    'Twas well alluded by a son of mine,\n    (I hope to quote him is not to purloin,)\n    Two magnets, heaven and earth, allure to bliss;\n    The larger loadstone that, the nearer this:\n    The weak attraction of the greater fails;\n    We nod a while, but neighbourhood prevails;\n    But when the greater proves the nearer too,\n    I wonder more your converts come so slow.\n    Methinks in those who firm with me remain,\n    It shows a nobler principle than gain.--\n      Your inference would be strong, the Hind replied,\n    If yours were in effect the suffering side;\n    Your clergy's sons their own in peace possess,\n    Nor are their prospects in reversion less.\n    My proselytes are struck with awful dread,\n    Your bloody comet-laws hang blazing o'er their head;\n    The respite they enjoy but only lent,\n    The best they have to hope, protracted punishment.[207]\n    Be judge yourself, if interest may prevail,\n    Which motives, yours or mine, will turn the scale.\n    While pride and pomp allure, and plenteous ease,}\n    That is, till man's predominant passions cease, }\n    Admire no longer at my slow increase.           }\n      By education most have been misled;\n    So they believe, because they so were bred.\n    The priest continues what the nurse began,\n    And thus the child imposes on the man.\n    The rest I named before, nor need repeat;\n    But interest is the most prevailing cheat,\n    The sly seducer both of age and youth;\n    They study that, and think they study truth.\n    When interest fortifies an argument,            }\n    Weak reason serves to gain the will's assent;   }\n    For souls, already warped, receive an easy bent.}\n    Add long prescription of established laws,\n    And pique of honour to maintain a cause,\n    And shame of change, and fear of future ill,\n    And zeal, the blind conductor of the will;\n    And chief, among the still-mistaking crowd,   }\n    The fame of teachers obstinate and proud,     }\n    And, more than all, the private judge allowed;}\n    Disdain of fathers which the dance began,   }\n    And last, uncertain whose the narrower span,}\n    The clown unread, and half-read gentleman.--}\n      To this the Panther, with a scornful smile;--\n    Yet still you travel with unwearied toil,\n    And range around the realm without controul,}\n    Among my sons for proselytes to prowl;      }\n    And here and there you snap some silly soul.}\n    You hinted fears of future change in state;\n    Pray heaven you did not prophesy your fate!\n    Perhaps, you think your time of triumph near,        }\n    But may mistake the season of the year;              }\n    The Swallow's fortune gives you cause to fear.--[208]}\n      For charity, replied the matron, tell\n    What sad mischance those pretty birds befel.--\n      Nay, no mischance, the savage dame replied,     }\n    But want of wit in their unerring guide,          }\n    And eager haste, and gaudy hopes, and giddy pride.}\n    Yet, wishing timely warning may prevail,\n    Make you the moral, and I'll tell the tale.\n      The Swallow, privileged above the rest\n    Of all the birds, as man's familiar guest,\n    Pursues the sun, in summer brisk and bold,\n    But wisely shuns the persecuting cold;\n    Is well to chancels and to chimnies known,\n    Though 'tis not thought she feeds on smoke alone.\n    From hence she has been held of heavenly line,\n    Endued with particles of soul divine.\n    This merry chorister had long possessed\n    Her summer-seat, and feathered well her nest;\n    Till frowning skies began to change their cheer,\n    And time turned up the wrong side of the year;\n    The shading trees began the ground to strow\n    With yellow leaves, and bitter blasts to blow.\n    Sad auguries of winter thence she drew,\n    Which by instinct, or prophecy, she knew;\n    When prudence warned her to remove betimes,\n    And seek a better heaven, and warmer climes.\n      Her sons were summoned on a steeple's height,\n    And, called in common council, vote a flight.\n    The day was named, the next that should be fair;             }\n    All to the general rendezvous repair,                        }\n    They try their fluttering wings, and trust themselves in air.}\n    But whether upward to the moon they go,             }\n    Or dream the winter out in caves below,             }\n    Or hawk at flies elsewhere, concerns us not to know.}\n    Southwards you may be sure they bent their flight,}\n    And harboured in a hollow rock at night;          }\n    Next morn they rose, and set up every sail;\n    The wind was fair, but blew a mackrel gale;\n    The sickly young sat shivering on the shore,\n    Abhorred salt-water never seen before.\n    And prayed their tender mothers to delay\n    The passage, and expect a fairer day.\n      With these the Martin readily concurred,\n    A church bigot, and church-believing bird;\n    Of little body, but of lofty mind,       }\n    Round bellied, for a dignity designed,   }\n    And much a dunce, as Martins are by kind;}\n    Yet often quoted canon-laws, and code,   }\n    And fathers which he never understood;   }\n    But little learning needs in noble blood.}\n    For, sooth to say, the Swallow brought him in,\n    Her household chaplain, and her next of kin;\n    In superstition silly to excess,\n    And casting schemes by planetary guess;\n    In fine, short-winged, unfit himself to fly,\n    His fear foretold foul weather in the sky.\n    Besides, a Raven from a withered oak,[209]\n    Left of their lodging, was observed to croak.\n    That omen liked him not; so his advice       }\n    Was present safety, bought at any price;     }\n    A seeming pious care, that covered cowardice.}\n    To strengthen this, he told a boding dream,\n    Of rising waters, and a troubled stream,\n    Sure signs of anguish, dangers, and distress,\n    With something more, not lawful to express:\n    By which he slily seemed to intimate\n    Some secret revelation of their fate.\n    For he concluded, once upon a time,\n    He found a leaf inscribed with sacred rhyme,\n    Whose antique characters did well denote\n    The Sibyl's hand of the Cum\u00e6an grot;\n    The mad divineress had plainly writ,\n    A time should come, but many ages yet,\n    In which, sinister destinies ordain,                      }\n    A dame should drown with all her feathered train,         }\n    And seas from thence be called the Chelidonian main.[210] }\n    At this, some shook for fear; the more devout\n    Arose, and blessed themselves from head to foot.\n      'Tis true, some stagers of the wiser sort\n    Made all these idle wonderments their sport;\n    They said, their only danger was delay,              }\n    And he, who heard what every fool could say,         }\n    Would never fix his thought, but trim his time away. }\n    The passage yet was good; the wind, 'tis true, }\n    Was somewhat high, but that was nothing new,   }\n    No more than usual equinoxes blew.             }\n    The sun, already from the Scales declined,            }\n    Gave little hopes of better days behind,              }\n    But change from bad to worse, of weather and of wind. }\n    Nor need they fear the dampness of the sky       }\n    Should flag their wings, and hinder them to fly, }\n    'Twas only water thrown on sails too dry.        }\n    But, least of all, philosophy presumes\n    Of truth in dreams, from melancholy fumes;\n    Perhaps the Martin, housed in holy ground,\n    Might think of ghosts, that walk their midnight round,\n    Till grosser atoms, tumbling in the stream\n    Of fancy, madly met, and clubbed into a dream:\n    As little weight his vain presages bear,\n    Of ill effect to such alone who fear;\n    Most prophecies are of a piece with these,\n    Each Nostradamus can foretel with ease:\n    Not naming persons, and confounding times,\n    One casual truth supports a thousand lying rhymes.\n      The advice was true; but fear had seized the most,\n    And all good counsel is on cowards lost.\n    The question crudely put to shun delay,\n    'Twas carried by the major part to stay.\n      His point thus gained, Sir Martin dated thence\n    His power, and from a priest became a prince.\n    He ordered all things with a busy care,  }\n    And cells and refectories did prepare,   }\n    And large provisions laid of winter fare;}\n    But, now and then, let fall a word or two,      }\n    Of hope, that heaven some miracle might show,   }\n    And for their sakes, the sun should backward go;}\n    Against the laws of nature upward climb,\n    And, mounted on the Ram, renew the prime;\n    For which two proofs in sacred story lay,\n    Of Ahaz' dial, and of Joshua's day.\n    In expectation of such times as these,\n    A chapel housed them, truly called of ease;\n    For Martin much devotion did not ask;\n    They prayed sometimes, and that was all their task.\n      It happened, as beyond the reach of wit\n    Blind prophecies may have a lucky hit,\n    That this accomplished, or at least in part,\n    Gave great repute to their new Merlin's art.\n    Some Swifts,[211] the giants of the Swallow kind,}\n    Large limbed, stout-hearted, but of stupid mind, }\n    (For Swisses, or for Gibeonites designed,        }\n    These lubbers, peeping through a broken pane,\n    To suck fresh air, surveyed the neighbouring plain,\n    And saw, but scarcely could believe their eyes,\n    New blossoms flourish, and new flowers arise;\n    As God had been abroad, and, walking there,\n    Had left his footsteps, and reformed the year.\n    The sunny hills from far were seen to glow             }\n    With glittering beams, and in the meads below          }\n    The burnished brooks appeared with liquid gold to flow.}\n    At last they heard the foolish Cuckow sing,\n    Whose note proclaimed the holiday of spring.\n      No longer doubting, all prepare to fly,\n    And repossess their patrimonial sky.\n    The priest before them did his wings display;}\n    And that good omens might attend their way,  }\n    As luck would have it, 'twas St Martin's day.}\n      Who but the Swallow now triumphs alone?\n    The canopy of heaven is all her own;\n    Her youthful offspring to their haunts repair,\n    And glide along in glades, and skim in air,\n    And dip for insects in the purling springs,\n    And stoop on rivers to refresh their wings.\n    Their mothers think a fair provision made,\n    That every son can live upon his trade,\n    And, now the careful charge is off their hands,\n    Look out for husbands, and new nuptial bands.\n    The youthful widow longs to be supplied; }\n    But first the lover is by lawyers tied,  }\n    To settle jointure-chimnies on the bride.}\n    So thick they couple in so short a space,\n    That Martin's marriage-offerings rise apace.\n    Their ancient houses, running to decay,\n    Are furbished up, and cemented with clay:\n    They teem already; store of eggs are laid,\n    And brooding mothers call Lucina's aid.\n    Fame spreads the news, and foreign fowls appear,}\n    In flocks, to greet the new returning year,     }\n    To bless the founder, and partake the cheer.    }\n      And now 'twas time, so fast their numbers rise,\n    To plant abroad and people colonies.\n    The youth drawn forth, as Martin had desired,\n    (For so their cruel destiny required,)\n    Were sent far off on an ill-fated day;\n    The rest would needs conduct them on their way,\n    And Martin went, because he feared alone to stay.\n      So long they flew with inconsiderate haste,\n    That now their afternoon began to waste;\n    And, what was ominous, that very morn\n    The sun was entered into Capricorn;\n    Which, by their bad astronomer's account,\n    That week the Virgin balance should remount.\n    An infant moon eclipsed him in his way,\n    And hid the small remainders of his day.\n    The crowd, amazed, pursued no certain mark,\n    But birds met birds, and jostled in the dark.[212]\n    Few mind the public, in a panic fright,\n    And fear increased the horror of the night.\n    Night came, but unattended with repose;\n    Alone she came, no sleep their eyes to close;\n    Alone, and black she came; no friendly stars arose.\n      What should they do, beset with dangers round,\n    No neighbouring dorp,[213] no lodging to be found,\n    But bleaky plains, and bare, unhospitable ground?\n    The latter brood, who just began to fly,\n    Sick-feathered, and unpractised in the sky,\n    For succour to their helpless mother call:\n    She spread her wings; some few beneath them crawl;\n    She spread them wider yet, but could not cover all.\n    To augment their woes, the winds began to move,\n    Debate in air for empty fields above,\n    Till Boreas got the skies, and poured amain\n    His rattling hailstones, mixed with snow and rain.\n      The joyless morning late arose, and found        }\n    A dreadful desolation reign around,                }\n    Some buried in the snow, some frozen to the ground.}\n    The rest were struggling still with death, and lay\n    The Crows and Ravens rights an undefended prey:\n    Excepting Martin's race; for they and he\n    Had gained the shelter of a hollow tree;\n    But, soon discovered by a sturdy clown,          }\n    He headed all the rabble of a town,              }\n    And finished them with bats, or polled them down.}\n    Martin himself was caught alive, and tried     }\n    For treasonous crimes, because the laws provide}\n    No Martin there in winter shall abide.         }\n    High on an oak, which never leaf shall bear,\n    He breathed his last, exposed to open air;\n    And there his corpse unblessed is hanging still,\n    To show the change of winds with his prophetic bill.--[214]\n      The patience of the Hind did almost fail,\n    For well she marked the malice of the tale;\n    Which ribbald art their church to Luther owes;     }\n    In malice it began, by malice grows;               }\n    He sowed the serpent's teeth, an iron harvest rose.}\n    But most in Martin's character and fate,\n    She saw her slandered sons, the Panther's hate,\n    The people's rage, the persecuting state:[215]\n    Then said, I take the advice in friendly part;\n    You clear your conscience, or at least your heart.\n    Perhaps you failed in your foreseeing skill,\n    For Swallows are unlucky birds to kill:\n    As for my sons, the family is blessed,\n    Whose every child is equal to the rest;\n    No church reformed can boast a blameless line,\n    Such Martins build in yours, and more than mine;\n    Or else an old fanatic author lies,\n    Who summed their scandals up by centuries.[216]\n    But through your parable I plainly see\n    The bloody laws, the crowd's barbarity;\n    The sunshine, that offends the purblind sight,\n    Had some their wishes, it would soon be night.[217]\n    Mistake me not; the charge concerns not you;\n    Your sons are malecontents, but yet are true,\n    As far as non-resistance makes them so;\n    But that's a word of neutral sense, you know,\n    A passive term, which no relief will bring,\n    But trims betwixt a rebel and a king.--\n      Rest well assured, the Pardelis replied,                 }\n    My sons would all support the regal side,                  }\n    Though heaven forbid the cause by battle should be tried.--}\n    The matron answered with a loud Amen,\n    And thus pursued her arguments again:--\n    If, as you say, and as I hope no less,          }\n    Your sons will practise what yourselves profess,}\n    What angry power prevents our present peace?    }\n    The Lion, studious of our common good,\n    Desires (and kings' desires are ill withstood)\n    To join our nations in a lasting love;          }\n    The bars betwixt are easy to remove,            }\n    For sanguinary laws were never made above.[217a]}\n    If you condemn that prince of tyranny,\n    Whose mandate forced your Gallic friends to fly,[218]\n    Make not a worse example of your own,        }\n    Or cease to rail at causeless rigour shown,  }\n    And let the guiltless person throw the stone.}\n    His blunted sword your suffering brotherhood\n    Have seldom felt; he stops it short of blood:\n    But you have ground the persecuting knife,\n    And set it to a razor-edge on life.\n    Cursed be the wit, which cruelty refines,                }\n    Or to his father's rod the scorpion joins!               }\n    Your finger is more gross than the great monarch's loins.}\n    But you, perhaps, remove that bloody note,\n    And stick it on the first reformers' coat.\n    Oh let their crime in long oblivion sleep;\n    'Twas theirs indeed to make, 'tis yours to keep!\n    Unjust, or just, is all the question now;\n    'Tis plain, that, not repealing, you allow.\n      To name the Test would put you in a rage;\n    You charge not that on any former age,\n    But smile to think how innocent you stand,\n    Armed by a weapon put into your hand.\n    Yet still remember, that you wield a sword,\n    Forged by your foes against your sovereign lord;\n    Designed to hew the imperial cedar down,\n    Defraud succession, and dis-heir the crown.[219]\n    To abhor the makers, and their laws approve,\n    Is to hate traitors, and the treason love.\n    What means it else, which now your children say,\n    We made it not, nor will we take away?\n      Suppose some great oppressor had, by slight}\n    Of law, disseised your brother of his right, }\n    Your common sire surrendering in a fright;   }\n    Would you to that unrighteous title stand,\n    Left by the villain's will to heir the land?\n    More just was Judas, who his Saviour sold;          }\n    The sacrilegious bribe he could not hold,           }\n    Nor hang in peace, before he rendered back the gold.}\n    What more could you have done, than now you do,\n    Had Oates and Bedlow and their plot been true?\n    Some specious reasons for those wrongs were found;}\n    The dire magicians threw their mists around,      }\n    And wise men walked as on enchanted ground.       }\n    But now when time has made the imposture plain,            }\n    (Late though he followed truth, and limping held her train,}\n    What new delusion charms your cheated eyes again?          }\n    The painted harlot might a while bewitch,\n    But why the hag uncased, and all obscene with itch?[220]\n      The first reformers were a modest race;\n    Our peers possessed in peace their native place,\n    And when rebellious arms o'erturned the state,\n    They suffered only in the common fate;\n    But now the sovereign mounts the regal chair,\n    And mitred seats are full, yet David's bench is bare.[221]\n    Your answer is, they were not dispossest;\n    They need but rub their mettle on the Test\n    To prove their ore;--'twere well if gold alone\n    Were touched and tried on your discerning stone;\n    But that unfaithful test unfound will pass\n    The dross of Atheists, and sectarian brass;\n    As if the experiment were made to hold\n    For base production, and reject the gold.\n    Thus men ungodded may to places rise,\n    And sects may be preferred without disguise;\n    No danger to the church or state from these,\n    The Papist only has his writ of ease.\n    No gainful office gives him the pretence\n    To grind the subject, or defraud the prince.\n    Wrong conscience, or no conscience, may deserve\n    To thrive, but ours alone is privileged to starve.\n    Still thank yourselves, you cry; your noble race\n    We banish not, but they forsake the place;\n    Our doors are open:--true, but ere they come,\n    You toss your 'censing test, and fume the room;\n    As if 'twere Toby's rival to expel,\n    And fright the fiend who could not bear the smell.[222]\n      To this the Panther sharply had replied,}\n    But having gained a verdict on her side,  }\n    She wisely gave the loser leave to chide; }\n    Well satisfied to have the _but and peace_,[223]}\n    And for the plaintiff's cause she cared the less,    }\n    Because she sued _in forma pauperis_;           }\n    Yet thought it decent something should be said,\n    For secret guilt by silence is betrayed;\n    So neither granted all, nor much denied,\n    But answered with a yawning kind of pride:\n      Methinks such terms of proffered peace you bring,\n    As once \u00c6neas to the Italian king:[224]\n    By long possession all the land is mine;    }\n    You strangers come with your intruding line,}\n    To share my sceptre, which you call to join.}\n    You plead like him an ancient pedigree,\n    And claim a peaceful seat by fate's decree.\n    In ready pomp your sacrificer stands,\n    To unite the Trojan and the Latin bands;\n    And, that the league more firmly may be tied,\n    Demand the fair Lavinia for your bride.\n    Thus plausibly you veil the intended wrong,\n    But still you bring your exiled gods along;\n    And will endeavour, in succeeding space,\n    Those household puppets on our hearths to place.\n    Perhaps some barbarous laws have been preferred;\n    I spake against the Test, but was not heard.\n    These to rescind, and peerage to restore,    }\n    My gracious sovereign would my vote implore; }\n    I owe him much, but owe my conscience more.--}\n      Conscience is then your plea, replied the dame,\n    Which, well-informed, will ever be the same.\n    But yours is much of the camelion hue,\n    To change the dye with every distant view.\n    When first the Lion sat with awful sway,\n    Your conscience taught your duty to obey:[225]\n    He might have had your statutes and your Test;\n    No conscience but of subjects was professed.\n    He found your temper, and no farther tried,\n    But on that broken reed, your church, relied.\n    In vain the sects essayed their utmost art,             }\n    With offered treasure to espouse their part;            }\n    Their treasures were a bribe too mean to move his heart.}\n    But when, by long experience, you had proved,\n    How far he could forgive, how well he loved;\n    (A goodness that excelled his godlike race,\n    And only short of heaven's unbounded grace;\n    A flood of mercy that o'erflowed our isle,\n    Calm in the rise, and fruitful as the Nile,)\n    Forgetting whence your Egypt was supplied,\n    You thought your sovereign bound to send the tide;\n    Nor upward looked on that immortal spring,\n    But vainly deemed, he durst not be a king.\n    Then Conscience, unrestrained by fear, began\n    To stretch her limits, and extend the span;\n    Did his indulgence as her gift dispose,\n    And made a wise alliance with her foes.[226]\n    Can Conscience own the associating name,     }\n    And raise no blushes to conceal her shame?   }\n    For sure she has been thought a bashful dame.}\n    But if the cause by battle should be tried,}\n    You grant she must espouse the regal side; }\n    O Proteus conscience, never to be tied!    }\n    What Ph\u0153bus from the Tripod shall disclose,\n    Which are, in last resort, your friends or foes?\n    Homer, who learned the language of the sky,\n    The seeming Gordian knot would soon untie;\n    Immortal powers the term of Conscience know,[227]\n    But Interest is her name with men below.--\n      Conscience or Interest be't, or both in one,\n    (The Panther answered in a surly tone;)\n    The first commands me to maintain the crown,\n    The last forbids to throw my barriers down.\n    Our penal laws no sons of yours admit,\n    Our Test excludes your tribe from benefit.\n    These are my banks your ocean to withstand,\n    Which, proudly rising, overlooks the land,\n    And, once let in, with unresisted sway,\n    Would sweep the pastors and their flocks away.\n    Think not my judgment leads me to comply\n    With laws unjust, but hard necessity:\n    Imperious need, which cannot be withstood,\n    Makes ill authentic, for a greater good.\n    Possess your soul with patience, and attend;\n    A more auspicious planet may ascend;[228]\n    Good fortune may present some happier time,\n    With means to cancel my unwilling crime;\n    (Unwilling, witness all ye powers above!)\n    To mend my errors, and redeem your love:\n    That little space you safely may allow;\n    Your all-dispensing power protects you now.[229]\n      Hold, said the Hind, 'tis needless to explain;\n    You would postpone me to another reign;\n    Till when, you are content to be unjust:\n    Your part is to possess, and mine to trust;\n    A fair exchange proposed, of future chance\n    For present profit and inheritance.\n    Few words will serve to finish our dispute;\n    Who will not now repeal, would persecute.\n    To ripen green revenge your hopes attend,\n    Wishing that happier planet would ascend.[230]\n    For shame, let Conscience be your plea no more;}\n    To will hereafter, proves she might before;    }\n    But she's a bawd to gain, and holds the door.  }\n      Your care about your banks infers a fear[231]\n    Of threatening floods and inundations near;\n    If so, a just reprise would only be\n    Of what the land usurped upon the sea;\n    And all your jealousies but serve to show,\n    Your ground is, like your neighbour-nation, low.\n    To intrench in what you grant unrighteous laws,\n    Is to distrust the justice of your cause;\n    And argues, that the true religion lies\n    In those weak adversaries you despise.\n    Tyrannic force is that which least you fear;\n    The sound is frightful in a Christian's ear:\n    Avert it, heaven! nor let that plague be sent\n    To us from the dispeopled continent.\n      But piety commands me to refrain;\n    Those prayers are needless in this monarch's reign.\n    Behold how he protects your friends oppressed,      }\n    Receives the banished, succours the distressed![232]}\n    Behold, for you may read an honest open breast.     }\n    He stands in day-light, and disdains to hide}\n    An act, to which by honour he is tied,      }\n    A generous, laudable, and kingly pride.     }\n    Your Test he would repeal, his peers restore;\n    This when he says he means, he means no more.\n      Well, said the Panther, I believe him just,   }\n    And yet----                                     }\n    --And yet, 'tis but because you must;           }\n    You would be trusted, but you would not trust.--}\n    The Hind thus briefly; and disdained to enlarge\n    On power of kings, and their superior charge,\n    As heaven's trustees before the people's choice;   }\n    Though sure the Panther did not much rejoice       }\n    To hear those echoes given of her once loyal voice.}\n      The matron wooed her kindness to the last,\n    But could not win; her hour of grace was past.\n    Whom, thus persisting, when she could not bring\n    To leave the Wolf, and to believe her king,\n    She gave her up, and fairly wished her joy\n    Of her late treaty with her new ally:\n    Which well she hoped would more successful prove,\n    Than was the Pigeon's and the Buzzard's love.\n    The Panther asked, what concord there could be\n    Betwixt two kinds whose natures disagree?\n    The dame replied: 'Tis sung in every street,\n    The common chat of gossips when they meet;\n    But, since unheard by you, 'tis worth your while\n    To take a wholesome tale, though told in homely style.\n      A plain good man, whose name is understood,[233]\n    (So few deserve the name of plain and good,)\n    Of three fair lineal lordships stood possessed,\n    And lived, as reason was, upon the best.\n    Inured to hardships from his early youth,\n    Much had he done and suffered for his truth:\n    At land and sea, in many a doubtful fight,           }\n    Was never known a more adventurous knight,           }\n    Who oftener drew his sword, and always for the right.}\n      As fortune would, (his fortune came, though late,)\n    He took possession of his just estate;\n    Nor racked his tenants with increase of rent,\n    Nor lived too sparing, nor too largely spent,\n    But overlooked his hinds; their pay was just,\n    And ready, for he scorned to go on trust:\n    Slow to resolve, but in performance quick;\n    So true, that he was awkward at a trick.\n    For little souls on little shifts rely,       }\n    And cowards arts of mean expedients try;      }\n    The noble mind will dare do any thing but lie.}\n    False friends, his deadliest foes, could find no way,\n    But shows of honest bluntness, to betray;\n    That unsuspected plainness he believed;\n    He looked into himself, and was deceived.\n    Some lucky planet sure attends his birth,\n    Or heaven would make a miracle on earth;\n    For prosperous honesty is seldom seen\n    To bear so dead a weight, and yet to win.\n    It looks as fate with nature's law would strive,\n    To show plain-dealing once an age may thrive;\n    And, when so tough a frame she could not bend,\n    Exceeded her commission, to befriend.\n      This grateful man, as heaven increased his store,\n    Gave God again, and daily fed his poor.\n    His house with all convenience was purveyed;\n    The rest he found, but raised the fabric where he prayed;[234]\n    And in that sacred place his beauteous wife\n    Employed her happiest hours of holy life.\n      Nor did their alms extend to those alone,\n    Whom common faith more strictly made their own;\n    A sort of Doves[235] were housed too near their hall,\n    Who cross the proverb, and abound with gall.\n    Though some, 'tis true, are passively inclined,\n    The greater part degenerate from their kind;\n    Voracious birds, that hotly bill and breed,\n    And largely drink, because on salt they feed.\n    Small gain from them their bounteous owner draws;}\n    Yet, bound by promise, he supports their cause,  }\n    As corporations privileged by laws.              }\n      That house, which harbour to their kind affords,\n    Was built long since, God knows, for better birds;\n    But fluttering there, they nestle near the throne,}\n    And lodge in habitations not their own,           }\n    By their high crops and corny gizzards known.     }\n    Like Harpies, they could scent a plenteous board,\n    Then to be sure they never failed their lord:\n    The rest was form, and bare attendance paid;\n    They drunk, and eat, and grudgingly obeyed.\n    The more they fed, they ravened still the more;\n    They drained from Dan, and left Beersheba poor.\n    All this they had by law, and none repined;\n    The preference was but due to Levi's kind:\n    But when some lay-preferment fell by chance,\n    The Gourmands made it their inheritance.\n    When once possessed, they never quit their claim,\n    For then 'tis sanctified to heaven's high name;\n    And hallowed thus, they cannot give consent,\n    The gift should be profaned by worldly management.\n      Their flesh was never to the table served,\n    Though 'tis not thence inferred the birds were starved;\n    But that their master did not like the food,\n    As rank, and breeding melancholy blood.\n    Nor did it with his gracious nature suit,\n    E'en though they were not doves, to persecute:\n    Yet he refused, (nor could they take offence,)\n    Their glutton kind should teach him abstinence.\n    Nor consecrated grain their wheat he thought,\n    Which, new from treading, in their bills they brought;\n    But left his hinds each in his private power,\n    That those who like the bran might leave the flower.\n    He for himself, and not for others, chose,\n    Nor would he be imposed on, nor impose;\n    But in their faces his devotion paid,    }\n    And sacrifice with solemn rites was made,}\n    And sacred incense on his altars laid.   }\n      Besides these jolly birds, whose corpse impure\n    Repaid their commons with their salt manure,\n    Another farm he had behind his house,\n    Not overstocked, but barely for his use;\n    Wherein his poor domestic poultry fed,\n    And from his pious hands received their bread.[236]\n    Our pampered Pigeons, with malignant eyes,\n    Beheld these inmates, and their nurseries;\n    Though hard their fare, at evening, and at morn,\n    (A cruise of water and an ear of corn,)\n    Yet still they grudged that _modicum_, and thought\n    A sheaf in every single grain was brought.\n    Fain would they filch that little food away,\n    While unrestrained those happy gluttons prey;\n    And much they grieved to see so nigh their hall,\n    The bird that warned St Peter of his fall;[237]\n    That he should raise his mitred crest on high,\n    And clap his wings, and call his family\n    To sacred rites; and vex the Ethereal powers\n    With midnight mattins at uncivil hours;\n    Nay more, his quiet neighbours should molest,\n    Just in the sweetness of their morning rest.\n    Beast of a bird, supinely when he might\n    Lie snug and sleep, to rise before the light!\n    What if his dull forefathers used that cry,\n    Could he not let a bad example die?\n    The world was fallen into an easier way;\n    This age knew better than to fast and pray.\n    Good sense in sacred worship would appear,\n    So to begin, as they might end the year.\n    Such feats in former times had wrought the falls\n    Of crowing chanticleers in cloistered walls.\n    Expelled for this, and for their lands, they fled; }\n    And sister Partlet, with her hooded head,[238]     }\n    Was hooted hence, because she would not pray a-bed.}\n    The way to win the restiff world to God,\n    Was to lay by the disciplining rod,\n    Unnatural fasts, and foreign forms of prayer;\n    Religion frights us with a mein severe.\n    'Tis prudence to reform her into ease,\n    And put her in undress, to make her please;\n    A lively faith will bear aloft the mind,\n    And leave the luggage of good works behind.\n      Such doctrines in the Pigeon-house were taught;\n    You need not ask how wondrously they wrought;\n    But sure the common cry was all for these,\n    Whose life and precepts both encouraged ease.\n    Yet fearing those alluring baits might fail,\n    And holy deeds o'er all their arts prevail,\n    (For vice, though frontless, and of hardened face,\n    Is daunted at the sight of awful grace,)\n    An hideous figure of their foes they drew,            }\n    Nor lines, nor looks, nor shades, nor colours true;   }\n    And this grotesque design exposed to public view.[239]}\n    One would have thought it some Egyptian piece,}\n    With garden-gods, and barking deities,        }\n    More thick than Ptolemy has stuck the skies.  }\n    All so perverse a draught, so far unlike,\n    It was no libel where it meant to strike.\n    Yet still the daubing pleased, and great and small,\n    To view the monster, crowded Pigeon-hall.\n    There Chanticleer was drawn upon his knees,\n    Adorning shrines, and stocks of sainted trees;[240]\n    And by him, a mishapen, ugly race,\n    The curse of God was seen on every face:\n    No Holland emblem could that malice mend,[241]\n    But still the worse the look, the fitter for a fiend.\n      The master of the farm, displeased to find\n    So much of rancour in so mild a kind,\n    Enquired into the cause, and came to know,\n    The passive church had struck the foremost blow;\n    With groundless fears, and jealousies possest,      }\n    As if this troublesome intruding guest              }\n    Would drive the birds of Venus[242] from their nest.}\n    A deed his inborn equity abhorred;\n    But interest will not trust, though God should plight his word.\n      A law, the source of many future harms,\n    Had banished all the poultry from the farms;\n    With loss of life, if any should be found\n    To crow or peck on this forbidden ground.\n    That bloody statute chiefly was designed\n    For Chanticleer the white, of clergy kind;[243]\n    But after-malice did not long forget\n    The lay that wore the robe and coronet.[244]\n    For them, for their inferiors and allies,\n    Their foes a deadly Shibboleth devise;\n    By which unrighteously it was decreed,              }\n    That none to trust, or profit, should succeed,      }\n    Who would not swallow first a poisonous wicked weed;}\n    Or that, to which old Socrates was cursed,[245]\n    Or henbane juice to swell them till they burst.\n      The patron, as in reason, thought it hard          }\n    To see this inquisition in his yard,                 }\n    By which the sovereign was of subjects' use debarred.}\n    All gentle means he tried, which might withdraw\n    The effects of so unnatural a law;\n    But still the dove-house obstinately stood\n    Deaf to their own, and to their neighbours' good;\n    And which was worse, if any worse could be,\n    Repented of their boasted loyalty;\n    Now made the champions of a cruel cause,\n    And drunk with fumes of popular applause:\n    For those whom God to ruin has designed,\n    He fits for fate, and first destroys their mind.[246]\n      New doubts indeed they daily strove to raise,\n    Suggested dangers, interposed delays,\n    And emissary Pigeons had in store,\n    Such as the Meccan prophet used of yore,[247]\n    To whisper counsels in their patron's ear,\n    And veiled their false advice with zealous fear.\n    The master smiled to see them work in vain,\n    To wear him out, and make an idle reign:\n    He saw, but suffered their protractive arts,\n    And strove by mildness to reduce their hearts;\n    But they abused that grace to make allies,          }\n    And fondly closed with former enemies;              }\n    For fools are doubly fools, endeavouring to be wise.}\n      After a grave consult what course were best,\n    One, more mature in folly than the rest,\n    Stood up, and told them, with his head aside,\n    That desperate cures must be to desperate ills applied:\n    And therefore, since their main impending fear\n    Was from the increasing race of Chanticleer,\n    Some potent bird of prey they ought to find,\n    A foe professed to him, and all his kind:\n    Some hagard Hawk, who had her eyry nigh,\n    Well pounced to fasten, and well winged to fly;\n    One they might trust, their common wrongs to wreak.\n    The Musquet and the Coystrel were too weak,\n    Too fierce the Falcon; but, above the rest,\n    The noble Buzzard[248] ever pleased me best:\n    Of small renown, 'tis true; for, not to lie,\n    We call him but a Hawk by courtesy.\n    I know he hates the Pigeon-house and Farm,\n    And more, in time of war, has done us harm:\n    But all his hate on trivial points depends;\n    Give up our forms, and we shall soon be friends.\n    For Pigeons' flesh he seems not much to care;\n    Cram'd Chickens are a more delicious fare.\n    On this high potentate, without delay,\n    I wish you would confer the sovereign sway;\n    Petition him to accept the government,\n    And let a splendid embassy be sent.\n      This pithy speech prevailed, and all agreed,\n    Old enmities forgot, the Buzzard should succeed.\n      Their welcome suit was granted, soon as heard,    }\n    His lodgings furnished, and a train prepared,       }\n    With B's upon their breast, appointed for his guard.}\n    He came, and, crowned with great solemnity,\n    God save king Buzzard! was the general cry.\n      A portly prince, and goodly to the sight,\n    He seemed a son of Anach for his height:\n    Like those whom stature did to crowns prefer,\n    Black-browed, and bluff, like Homer's Jupiter;\n    Broad-backed, and brawny-built for love's delight,\n    A prophet formed to make a female proselyte;[249]\n    A theologue more by need than genial bent,\n    By breeding sharp, by nature confident.\n    Interest in all his actions was discerned;\n    More learned than honest, more a wit than learned;\n    Or forced by fear, or by his profit led,\n    Or both conjoined, his native clime he fled;\n    But brought the virtues of his heaven along,\n    A fair behaviour, and a fluent tongue.\n    And yet with all his arts he could not thrive,\n    The most unlucky parasite alive;\n    Loud praises to prepare his paths he sent,\n    And then himself pursued his compliment;\n    But by reverse of fortune chased away,\n    His gifts no longer than their author stay;\n    He shakes the dust against the ungrateful race,\n    And leaves the stench of ordures in the place.\n    Oft has he flattered and blasphemed the same;\n    For in his rage he spares no sovereign's name:\n    The hero and the tyrant change their style,\n    By the same measure that they frown or smile.[250]\n    When well received by hospitable foes,\n    The kindness he returns, is to expose;\n    For courtesies, though undeserved and great,        }\n    No gratitude in felon-minds beget;                  }\n    As tribute to his wit, the churl receives the treat.}\n    His praise of foes is venomously nice;            }\n    So touched, it turns a virtue to a vice;[251]     }\n    \"A Greek, and bountiful, forewarns us twice.\"[252]}\n    Seven sacraments he wisely does disown,\n    Because he knows confession stands for one;\n    Where sins to sacred silence are conveyed,\n    And not for fear, or love, to be betrayed:\n    But he, uncalled, his patron to controul,\n    Divulged the secret whispers of his soul;\n    Stood forth the accusing Satan of his crimes,\n    And offered to the Moloch of the times.[253]\n    Prompt to assail, and careless of defence,\n    Invulnerable in his impudence,\n    He dares the world; and, eager of a name,\n    He thrusts about, and jostles into fame.\n    Frontless, and satire-proof, he scowers the streets,\n    And runs an Indian-muck at all he meets.[254]\n    So fond of loud report, that, not to miss   }\n    Of being known, (his last and utmost bliss,)}\n    He rather would be known for what he is.    }\n      Such was, and is, the Captain of the Test,[255]}\n    Though half his virtues are not here expressed;  }\n    The modesty of fame conceals the rest.           }\n    The spleenful Pigeons never could create\n    A prince more proper to revenge their hate;\n    Indeed, more proper to revenge, than save;\n    A king, whom in his wrath the Almighty gave:\n    For all the grace the landlord had allowed,             }\n    But made the Buzzard and the Pigeons proud;             }\n    Gave time to fix their friends, and to seduce the crowd.}\n    They long their fellow-subjects to inthral,         }\n    Their patron's promise into question call,[256]     }\n    And vainly think he meant to make them lords of all.}\n      False fears their leaders failed not to suggest,\n    As if the Doves were to be dispossessed;\n    Nor sighs, nor groans, nor goggling eyes did want,\n    For now the Pigeons too had learned to cant.\n    The house of prayer is stocked with large increase;\n    Nor doors, nor windows, can contain the press,\n    For birds of every feather fill the abode;\n    E'en atheists out of envy own a God,\n    And, reeking from the stews, adulterers come,\n    Like Goths and Vandals to demolish Rome.\n    That conscience, which to all their crimes was mute,\n    Now calls aloud, and cries to persecute:\n    No rigour of the laws to be released,\n    And much the less, because it was their Lord's request;\n    They thought it great their sovereign to controul,\n    And named their pride, nobility of soul.\n      'Tis true, the Pigeons, and their prince elect,\n    Were short of power, their purpose to effect;\n    But with their quills did all the hurt they could,\n    And cuff'd the tender Chickens from their food:\n    And much the Buzzard in their cause did stir,  }\n    Though naming not the patron, to infer,        }\n    With all respect, he was a gross idolater.[257]}\n      But when the imperial owner did espy,\n    That thus they turned his grace to villainy,\n    Not suffering wrath to discompose his mind, }\n    He strove a temper for the extremes to find,}\n    So to be just, as he might still be kind;   }\n    Then, all maturely weighed, pronounced a doom\n    Of sacred strength for every age to come.[258]\n    By this the Doves their wealth and state possess,\n    No rights infringed, but license to oppress:\n    Such power have they as factious lawyers long\n    To crowns ascribed, that kings can do no wrong.\n    But since his own domestic birds have tried\n    The dire effects of their destructive pride,\n    He deems that proof a measure to the rest,         }\n    Concluding well within his kingly breast,          }\n    His fowls of nature too unjustly were opprest.[259]}\n    He therefore makes all birds of every sect     }\n    Free of his farm, with promise to respect      }\n    Their several kinds alike, and equally protect.}\n    His gracious edict the same franchise yields       }\n    To all the wild increase of woods and fields,      }\n    And who in rocks aloof, and who in steeples builds:}\n    To Crows the like impartial grace affords,\n    And Choughs and Daws, and such republic birds;\n    Secured with ample privilege to feed,\n    Each has his district, and his bounds decreed;\n    Combined in common interest with his own,\n    But not to pass the Pigeons' Rubicon.\n      Here ends the reign of this pretended Dove;}\n    All prophecies accomplished from above,      }\n    For Shiloh comes the sceptre to remove.      }\n    Reduced from her imperial high abode,\n    Like Dionysius to a private rod,[260]\n    The passive church, that with pretended grace}\n    Did her distinctive mark in duty place,      }\n    Now touched, reviles her Maker to his face.  }\n      What after happened is not hard to guess;            }\n    The small beginnings had a large increase,             }\n    And arts and wealth succeed the secret spoils of peace.}\n    'Tis said, the Doves repented, though too late,\n    Become the smiths of their own foolish fate:[261]\n    Nor did their owner hasten their ill hour,\n    But, sunk in credit, they decreased in power;\n    Like snows in warmth that mildly pass away,\n    Dissolving in the silence of decay.[262]\n      The Buzzard, not content with equal place,\n    Invites the feathered Nimrods of his race,\n    To hide the thinness of their flock from sight,\n    And all together make a seeming goodly flight:\n    But each have separate interests of their own;\n    Two Czars are one too many for a throne.\n    Nor can the usurper long abstain from food;\n    Already he has tasted Pigeon's blood,\n    And may be tempted to his former fare,[263]\n    When this indulgent lord shall late to heaven repair.\n    Bare benting times, and moulting months may come,\n    When, lagging late, they cannot reach their home;\n    Or rent in schism, (for so their fate decrees,)\n    Like the tumultuous college of the bees,\n    They fight their quarrel, by themselves opprest,\n    The tyrant smiles below, and waits the falling feast.--\n\n      Thus did the gentle Hind her fable end,\n    Nor would the Panther blame it, nor commend;\n    But, with affected yawnings at the close,\n    Seemed to require her natural repose;\n    For now the streaky light began to peep,\n    And setting stars admonished both to sleep.\n    The Dame withdrew, and, wishing to her guest\n    The peace of heaven, betook herself to rest:\n    Ten thousand angels on her slumbers wait,\n    With glorious visions of her future state.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 184: Note I.]\n\n[Footnote 185: The Declaration of Indulgence.]\n\n[Footnote 186: The Convocation.]\n\n[Footnote 187: The adherence of the church of England to the interests\nof James, while he was an exile at Brussels, and the Bill of Exclusion\nagainst him was in dependence, is here, as in other places, made the\nsubject of panegyric. Had the church joined with the sectaries, the\ndestruction of the Catholics, at the time of the plot, would have been\ninevitable.]\n\n[Footnote 188: The church of England complained, with great reason, of\nthe coldness which they experienced from James, in whose behalf they\nhad exerted themselves so successfully.]\n\n[Footnote 189: An old sea-term, signifying to run before the wind.]\n\n[Footnote 190: _Une querelle Allemande_ is the well-known French\nphrase for a quarrel picked without cause. The Hind insinuates, that\nthe Panther, conscious of superior force, meant to take such cause of\nquarrel at the English Catholics, as Louis had raked up against the\nHuguenots, which, therefore, might be styled rather a French than a\nGerman quarrel.]\n\n[Footnote 191: Note II.]\n\n[Footnote 192: Note III.]\n\n[Footnote 193: The different parts of the body were assigned to\ndifferent planets. The old almanacks have a naked figure in front,\nsurrounded by the usual planetary emblems, which dart their rays on the\nparts which they govern. What Scorpio claims, if not apparent from the\ncontext, may be there found.]\n\n[Footnote 194: Note IV.]\n\n[Footnote 195: Alluding to the charges brought against Dryden himself\nby Stillingfleet. See Note V.]\n\n[Footnote 196: Note VI.]\n\n[Footnote 197: Note VII.]\n\n[Footnote 198: This is our author's own averment in his \"Defence of the\nPapers of the Duchess of York.\" See Note VIII.]\n\n[Footnote 199: The latitudinarian, or moderate clergy above-mentioned,\nand particularly Stillingfleet.]\n\n[Footnote 200: Note IX.]\n\n[Footnote 201: Note X.]\n\n[Footnote 202: Stillingfleet's Vindication, which contains the\nimputations complained of by Dryden, bears this licence: \"_Imprimatur_,\nHenricus Maurice Rmo. P. D. Wilhelmo Archiep. Cant. a sacris. January\n10, 1686.\"]\n\n[Footnote 203: In these, and in the following beautiful lines, the\npoet, who had complained of Stillingfleet's having charged him with\natheism, expresses his resolution to submit to this reproach with\nChristian meekness, and without retaliation.]\n\n[Footnote 204: Stillingfleet. See Note XI.]\n\n[Footnote 205: Note XII.]\n\n[Footnote 206: See Introduction, p. 114; also Note VIII.]\n\n[Footnote 207: The penal laws, though suspended by the king's\nDeclaration of Indulgence, were not thereby abrogated.]\n\n[Footnote 208: Note XII.]\n\n[Footnote 209: ----_Sinistra cava pr\u00e6dixit ab ilice Cornix._]\n\n[Footnote 210: Alluding to the table of Icarus:\n\n    _Icarus Icariis nomina fecit aquis._\n\nChelidonian, from \u03c7\u03b5\u03bb\u03b9\u03b4\u1f7c\u03bd a _swallow_.]\n\n[Footnote 211: Otherwise called _martlets_. DRYDEN.]\n\n[Footnote 212: A parody on Lee's famous rant in \"\u0152dipus.\"\n\n    \"May there not be a glimpse, one starry spark,\n    But gods meet gods, and jostle in the dark.\"\n]\n\n[Footnote 213: An old Saxon word for a village.]\n\n[Footnote 214: It is a vulgar idea, that a dead swallow, suspended in\nthe air, intimates a change of wind, by turning its bill to the point\nfrom which it is to blow.]\n\n[Footnote 215: Note XIV.]\n\n[Footnote 216: Century White, See Note XV.]\n\n[Footnote 217: The Hind intimates, that, as the sunshine of Catholic\nprosperity, in the fable, depended upon the king's life, there existed\nthose among her enemies, who would fain have it shortened. But from\nthis insinuation she exempts the church of England, and only expresses\nher fears, that her passive principles would incline her to neutrality.]\n\n[Footnote 217a: Note C: Note XVI.]\n\n[Footnote 218: Louis XIV. whose revocation of the Edict of Nantes\nhas been so frequently alluded to. As that monarch did not proceed\nto the extremity of capital punishment against the Huguenots, Dryden\ncontends his edicts were more merciful than the penal laws, by which\nmass-priests are denounced as guilty of high treason.]\n\n[Footnote 219: Note XVII.]\n\n[Footnote 220: The poet alludes to the enchantress Duessa, who, when\ndisrobed by Prince Arthur, was changed from a beautiful woman into\n\n    A loathly wrinkled hag, ill-favoured, old,\n    Whose secret filth good manners biddeth not be told.\n\n    SPENSER'S _Fairy Queen_, Book I, canto 8.\n]\n\n[Footnote 221: Note XVIII.]\n\n[Footnote 222: The fiend in the Book of Tobit, who haunted Raguel's\ndaughter, is frighted away, by fumigation, by Tobias her bridegroom.\nThus, Milton:\n\n    ----Better pleased\n    Than Asmodeus with the fishy fume,\n    That drove him, though enamoured, from the spouse\n    Of Tobit's son, and with a vengeance sent\n    From Media post to Egypt, there fast bound.\n\n    _Par. Lost_, Book IV.\n]\n\n[Footnote 223: A proverbial expression, taken from our author's\nalteration of the \"Tempest.\" See Vol. III. p. 176.]\n\n[Footnote 224: \u00c6neid, lib. vii. 1. 213.]\n\n[Footnote 225: Note XIX.]\n\n[Footnote 226: Two pamphlets were published, urging the necessity of\nan alliance between the church of England and the Dissenters; and\nwarmly exhorting the latter not to be cajoled to serve the purposes\nof their joint enemies of Rome, by the pretended toleration which was\nheld out as a snare to them. One of these, called \"Reflections on the\nDeclaration of Indulgence,\" is ascribed to Burnet; the other, called\n\"Advice to Dissenters,\" is supposed to come from the masterly pen of\nHalifax.]\n\n[Footnote 227: \u039f\u03bd \u0392\u03c1\u03b9\u03b1\u03c1\u03b5\u03c9\u03bd \u03ba\u03b1\u03bb\u03ad\u03bf\u03c5\u03c3\u03b9 \u03b8\u03b5\u03bf\u03b9, \u03b1\u03bd\u03b4\u03c1\u03b5\u03c2 \u03b4\u03b5 \u03c4\u03b5\u03c0\u03b1\u03bd\u03c4\u03b5\u03c2 \u0391\u03b9\u03b3\u03b1\u03b1\u03b9\u03c9\u03bd.]\n\n[Footnote 228: Note XX.]\n\n[Footnote 229: The power claimed, and liberally exercised, by the king,\nof dispensing with the penal statutes.]\n\n[Footnote 230: That is, wishing the accession of the Prince of Orange,\nthen the presumptive heir of the crown.]\n\n[Footnote 231: Note XXI.]\n\n[Footnote 232: The refugee Huguenots. See Note XXII.]\n\n[Footnote 233: James II. See Note XXIII.]\n\n[Footnote 234: The Catholic chapel in Whitehall.]\n\n[Footnote 235: The clergy of the church of England, and those of London\nin particular. See Note XXIV.]\n\n[Footnote 236: The Catholic clergy, maintained by King James.]\n\n[Footnote 237: The cock is made an emblem of the regular clergy of\nRome, on account of their nocturnal devotions and mattins.]\n\n[Footnote 238: The Nuns.]\n\n[Footnote 239: Note XXV.]\n\n[Footnote 240: The worship of images, charged upon the Romish church by\nProtestants as idolatrous.]\n\n[Footnote 241: Note XXVI.]\n\n[Footnote 242: The Doves.]\n\n[Footnote 243: The laws imposing the penalty of high treason on priests\nsaying mass in England.]\n\n[Footnote 244: The Roman Catholic nobility, excluded from the House of\nPeers by the imposition of the test.]\n\n[Footnote 245: Hemlock.]\n\n[Footnote 246: _Quos Jupiter vult perdere, prius dementat._]\n\n[Footnote 247: The foolish fable of Mahomet accustoming a pigeon to\npick peas from his ear, to found his pretensions to inspiration, is\nwell known.]\n\n[Footnote 248: Gilbert Burnet, D. D. afterwards Bishop of Salisbury.\nSee Note XXVII.]\n\n[Footnote 249: Note XXVIII.]\n\n[Footnote 250: Note XXIX.]\n\n[Footnote 251: Note XXX.]\n\n[Footnote 252: ----_timeo Danaos et dona ferentes._ \u00c6neid, II. lib.]\n\n[Footnote 253: Note XXXI.]\n\n[Footnote 254: Note XXXII.]\n\n[Footnote 255: Note XXXIII.]\n\n[Footnote 256: The promise to maintain the church of England, made in\nJames's first proclamation after his accession; and which the church\nparty alleged he had now broken. Note XXXIV.]\n\n[Footnote 257: See note XXXIII.]\n\n[Footnote 258: Declaration of indulgence. Note XXXV.]\n\n[Footnote 259: Note XXXVI.]\n\n[Footnote 260: The tyrant of Syracuse, who, after being dethroned,\ntaught a school at Corinth.]\n\n[Footnote 261: _Quisque su\u00e6 fortun\u00e6 faber._ SALLUST.]\n\n[Footnote 262: Note XXXVII.]\n\n[Footnote 263: Note XXXVIII.]\n\n\n\n\nNOTES\n\nON\n\nTHE HIND AND THE PANTHER.\n\nPART III.\n\n\nNote I.\n\n    _And mother Hubbard, in her homely dress,\n    Has sharply blamed a British Lioness;\n    That queen, whose feast the factious rabble keep,\n    Exposed obscenely naked, and asleep._--P. 197.\n\nThe poet, in the beginning of this canto, anticipates the censure of\nthose who might blame him for introducing into his fables animals not\nnatives of Britain, where the scene was laid. He vindicates himself\nby the example of \u00c6sop and Spenser. The latter, in \"Mother Hubbard's\nTale,\" exhibits at length the various arts by which, in his time,\nobscure and infamous characters rose to eminence in church and state.\nThis is illustrated by the parable of an Ape and a Fox, who insinuate\nthemselves into various situations, and play the knaves in all. At\nlength,\n\n    Lo, where they spied, how, in a gloomy glade,\n    The Lion, sleeping, lay in secret shade;\n    His crown and sceptre lying him beside,\n    And having doft for heat his dreadful hide.\n\nThe adventurers possess themselves of the royal spoils, with which the\nApe is arrayed; who forthwith takes upon himself the dignity of the\nmonarch of the beasts, and, by the counsels of the Fox, commits every\nspecies of oppression, until Jove, incensed at the disorders which\nhis tyranny had introduced, sends Mercury to awaken the Lion from his\nslumber:\n\n    Arise! said Mercury, thou sluggish beast,\n    That here liest senseless, like the corpse deceast;\n    The whilst thy kingdom from thy head is rent,\n    And thy throne royal with dishonour blent.\n\nThe Lion rouses himself, hastens to court, and avenges himself of the\nusurpers.--There is no doubt, that, under this allegory, Spenser meant\nto represent the exorbitant power of Lord Burleigh; and he afterwards\ncomplains, that his verse occasioned his falling into a \"mighty peer's\ndispleasure.\" The Lion, therefore, whose negligence is upbraided by\nMercury, was Queen Elizabeth. Dryden calls her,\n\n    The queen, whose feast the factious rabble keep;\n\nbecause the tumultuous pope-burnings of 1680 and 1681 were solemnized\non Queen Elizabeth's night. The poet had probably, since his change\nof religion, laid aside much of the hereditary respect with which\nmost Englishmen regard Queen Bess; for, in the pamphlets of the\nRomanists, she is branded as \"a known bastard, who raised this prelatic\nprotestancy, called the church of England, as a prop to supply the\nweakness of her title.\"[264]\n\nSpenser's authority is only appealed to by Dryden as justifying the\nintroduction of lions and other foreign animals into a British fable.\nBut I observed in the introduction, that it also furnishes authority,\nat least example, for those aberrations from the character and\nattributes of his brute actors, with which the critics taxed Dryden;\nfor nothing in \"The Hind and the Panther\" can be more inconsistent with\nthe natural quality of such animals, than the circumstance of a lion,\nor any other creature, going to sleep without his skin, on account of\nthe sultry weather.\n\n\nNote II.\n\n    _You know my doctrine, and I need not say\n    I will not, but I cannot, disobey.\n    On this firm principle I ever stood;\n    He of my sons, who fails to make it good,\n    By one rebellious act renounces to my blood._--P. 202.\n\nThe memorable judgment and decree of the university of Oxford, passed\nin the Convocation 21st July, 1683, condemns, as heretical, all works\nwhich teach or infer the lawfulness of resistance to lawful governors,\neven when they become tyrants, or in case of persecution for religion,\nor infringement on the laws of the country, or, in short, in any case\nwhatever; and after the various authorities for these and other tenets\nhave been given and denounced as false, seditious, heretical, and\nimpious, the decree concludes with the following injunctions:\n\n\"Lastly, we command and strictly enjoin all and singular readers,\ntutors, catechists, and others, to whom the care and trust of\ninstitution of youth is committed, that they diligently instruct\nand ground their scholars in that most necessary doctrine, which in\na manner is the badge and character of the church of England, of\nsubmitting to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake, whether it be\nto the king as supreme, or unto governors, as unto them that are sent\nby him, for the punishment of evil doers, and for the praise of them\nthat do well: Teaching, that this submission and obedience is to be\nclear, absolute, and without exception of any state or order of men.\"\n\n\nNote III.\n\n    _Your sons of latitude, that court your grace,}\n    Though most resembling you in form and face,    }\n    Are far the worst of your pretended race.       }\n    And, but I blush your honesty to blot,\n    Pray God you prove them lawfully begot!\n    For in some Popish libels I have read,\n    The Wolf has been too busy in your bed._--P. 202.\n\nDuring the latter years of the reign of Charles the Second, the\ndissensions of the state began to creep into the church. By far the\ngreater part of the clergy, influenced by the ancient union of church\nand king, were steady in their adherence to the court interest. But\na party began to appear, who were distinguished from their brethren\nby the name of _Moderate Divines_, which they assumed to themselves,\nand by that of Latitudinarians, which the high churchmen conferred\nupon them. The chief amongst these were Tillotson, Stillingfleet,\nand Burnet. They distinguished themselves by a less violent ardour\nfor the ceremonies, and even the government, of the church; for all\nthose particulars, in short, by which she is distinguished from other\nProtestant congregations. Stillingfleet carried these condescensions\nso far, as to admit in his tract, called _Irenicum_, that, although\nthe original church was settled in a constitution of bishops, priests,\nand deacons, yet as the apostles made no positive law upon this\nsubject, it remained free to every Christian congregation to alter\nor to retain that form of church government. In conformity with this\nopinion, he, in conjunction with Tillotson and others, laid a plan\nfor an accommodation with the Presbyterians, in 1668; and, in order\nto this comprehension, he was willing to have made such sacrifices in\nthe point of ordination, &c. that the House of Commons took the alarm,\nand passed a vote, prohibiting even the introduction of a bill for\nsuch a purpose. As, on the one hand, the tenets of the moderate clergy\napproximated those of the Calvinists; so, on the other, their antipathy\nand opposition to the church of Rome was more deeply rooted, in\nproportion to the slighter value which they attached to the particulars\nin which that of England resembled her. It flowed naturally from this\nindulgence to the Dissenters, and detestation of the Romanists, that\nseveral of the moderate clergy participated deeply in the terrors\nexcited by the Roman Catholic plot, and looked with a favourable eye\non the bill which proposed to exclude the Duke of York from the throne\nas a professor of that obnoxious religion. Being thus, as it were, an\nopposition party, it cannot be supposed that the low church divines\nunited cordially with their high-flying brethren in renouncing the\nright of resisting oppression, or in professing passive obedience to\nthe royal will. They were of opinion, that there was a mutual compact\nbetween the king and subject, and that acts of tyranny, on the part\nof the former, absolved the latter from his allegiance. This was\nparticularly inculcated by the reverend Samuel Johnson (See Vol. IX. p.\n369.) in \"Julian the Apostate,\" and other writings which were condemned\nby the Oxford decree. As the dangers attending the church, from the\nmeasures of King James, became more obvious, and the alternative of\nresistance or destruction became an approaching crisis, the low church\nparty acquired numbers and strength from those who thought it better at\nonce to hold and assert the lawfulness of opposition to tyranny, than\nto make professions of obedience beyond the power of human endurance to\nmake good.\n\nThis party was of course deeply hated by the Catholics, and hence\nthe severity with which they are treated by Dryden, who objects to\nthem as the illegitimate offspring of the Panther by the Wolf, and\ntraces to their Presbyterian origin their indifference to the fasts\nand ascetic observances of the more rigid high-churchmen, and their\ncovert disposition to resist regal domination. Their adherence to\nthe English communion he ascribes only to the lucre of gain, and\nendeavours, if possible, to draw an odious distinction between them\nand the rest of the church. Stillingfleet, whom this motive could not\nescape, had already complained of Dryden's designing any particular\nclass of the clergy by a party name. \"From the common people, we come\nto churchmen, to see how he uses them. And he hath soon found out a\nfaction among them, whom he charges with juggling designs: but romantic\nheroes must be allowed to make armies of a field of thistles, and to\nencounter windmills for giants. He would fain be the instrument to\ndivide our clergy, and to fill them with suspicions of one another.\nAnd to this end he talks of men of latitudinarian stamp: for it goes\na great way towards the making divisions, to be able to fasten a name\nof distinction among brethren; this being to create jealousies of each\nother. But there is nothing should make them more careful to avoid such\nnames of distinction, than to observe how ready their common enemies\nare to make use of them, to create animosities by them; which hath made\nthis worthy gentleman to start this different character of churchmen\namong us; as though there were any who were not true to the principles\nof the church of England, as by law established: If he knows them, he\nis better acquainted with them than the answerer is; for he professes\nto know none such. But who then are these men of the latitudinarian\nstamp? To speak in his own language, they are a sort of ergoteerers,\nwho are for a _concedo_ rather than a _nego_. And now, I hope, they are\nall well explained; or, in other words of his, they are, saith he, for\ndrawing the nonconformists to their party, _i.e._ they are for having\nno nonconformists. And is this their crime? But they would take the\nheadship of the church out of the king's hands: How is that possible?\nThey would (by his own description) be glad to see differences\nlessened, and all that agree in the same doctrine to be one entire\nbody. But this is that which their enemies fear, and this politician\nhath too much discovered; for then such a party would be wanting, which\nmight be played upon the church of England, or be brought to join with\nothers against it. But how this should touch the king's supremacy, I\ncannot imagine. As for his desiring loyal subjects to consider this\nmatter, I hope they will, and the more for his desiring it; and assure\nthemselves, that they have no cause to apprehend any juggling designs\nof their brethren; who, I hope, will always show themselves to be loyal\nsubjects, and dutiful sons of the church of England.\"--_Vindication of\nthe Answer to some late Papers_, p. 104.\n\n\nNote IV.\n\n    _Think you, your new French proselytes are come\n    To starve abroad, because they starved at home?_\n\n           *       *       *       *       *\n\n    _Mark with what management their tribes divide,\n    Some stick to you, and some to t'other side,\n    That many churches may for many mouths provide._ P. 203.\n\nThe Huguenot clergy, who took refuge in England after the recal\nof the edict of Nantes, did not all adhere to the same Protestant\ncommunion. There had been long in London what was called the Walloon\nchurch, exclusively dedicated to this sort of worship. Many conformed\nto the church of England; and, having submitted to new ordination,\nsome of them obtained benefices: others joined in communion with the\nPresbyterians, and dissenters of various kinds. Dryden insinuates,\nthat had the church of England presented vacancies sufficient for the\nprovision of these foreign divines, she would probably have had the\nhonour of attracting them all within her pale. The reformed clergy\nof France were far from being at any time an united body. \"It might\nhave been expected,\" says Burnet, \"that those unhappy contests between\nLutherans, Calvinists, Arminians, and Anti-Arminians, with some minuter\ndisputes that have enflamed Geneva and Switzerland, should have been\nat least suspended while they had a common enemy to deal with, against\nwhom their whole force united was scarce able to stand. But these\nthings were carried on rather with more eagerness and sharpness than\never.\" _History of his Own Times_, Book IV.\n\n\nNote V.\n\n    _Some sons of mine, who bear upon their shield\n    Three steeples argent, in a sable field,\n    Have sharply taxed your converts, who, unfed,\n    Have followed you for miracles of bread._ P. 203.\n\nThe three steeples argent obviously alludes to the pluralities enjoyed,\nperhaps by Stillingfleet, and certainly by some of the divines of\nthe established church, who were not on that account less eager in\nopposing the intrusion of the Roman clergy, and stigmatising those who,\nat this crisis, thought proper to conform to the royal faith. These\nconverts were neither numerous nor respectable; and, whatever the Hind\nis pleased to allege in the text, posterity cannot but suspect the\ndisinterestedness of their motives. Obadiah Walker, and a very few of\nthe university of Oxford, embraced the Catholic faith, conforming at\nthe same time to the forms of the church of England, as if they wished\nto fulfil the old saying, of having two strings to one bow.--The Earls\nof Perth and Melfort, with one or two other Scottish nobles, took the\nsame step. Of the first, who must otherwise have failed in a contest\nwhich he had with the Duke of Queensberry, it was wittily said by\nHalifax, that \"his faith had made him whole.\" And, in general, as my\ncountrymen are not usually credited by their brethren of England for\nan extreme disregard to their own interest, the Scottish converts were\nsupposed to be peculiarly attracted to Rome by the miracle of the\nloaves and fishes.[265] But it may be said for these unfortunate peers,\nthat if they were dazzled by the momentary sunshine which gleamed on\nthe Catholic church, they scorned to desert her in the tempest which\nspeedily succeeded. Whereas, we shall do a kindness to Lord Sunderland,\nif we suppose that he became a convert to Popery, merely from views of\nimmediate interest, and not with the premeditated intention of blinding\nand betraying the monarch, who trusted him. Dryden must be supposed,\nhowever, chiefly interested in the vindication of his own motives for a\nchange of religion.\n\n\nNote VI.\n\n    _Such who themselves of no religion are,\n    Allured with gain, for any will declare;\n    Bare lies with bold assertions they can face,\n    But dint of argument is out of place;\n    The grim logician puts them in a fright,\n    'Tis easier far to flourish than to fight._ P. 203.\n\nDryden here puts into the mouth of the Panther some of the severe\nlanguage which Stillingfleet had held towards him in the ardour of\ncontroversy. He had, in direct allusion to our author, (for he quotes\nhis poetry,) expressed himself thus harshly:\n\n\"If I thought there were no such thing in the world as true religion,\nand that _the priests of all religions are alike_,[266] I might have\nbeen as nimble a convert, and as early a defender of the royal papers,\nas any one of these champions. For why should not one who believes no\nreligion, declare for any? But since I do verily believe, that not only\nthere is such a thing as true religion, but that it is only to be found\nin the books of the Holy Scripture, I have reason to inquire after the\nbest means of understanding such books, and thereby, if it may be, to\nput an end to the controversies of Christendom.\"[267]\n\n\"But our _grim logician_ proceeds from immediate and original to\nconcomitant causes, which he saith were revenge, ambition, and\ncovetousness. But the skill of logicians used to lie in proving; but\nthis is not our author's talent, for not a word is produced to that\npurpose. If bold sayings, and confident declarations, will do the\nbusiness, he is never unprovided; but if you expect any reason from\nhim, he begs your pardon. He finds how ill the character of a grim\nlogician suits with his inclination.\"[268] Again, \"But if I will not\nallow his affirmations for proofs for his part, he will act the grim\nlogician; no, and in truth it becomes him so ill, that he doth well to\ngive it over.\"[269] And in the beginning of his \"Vindication,\" alluding\nto a term used by the defender of the king's papers, Stillingfleet\nsays: \"But lest I be again thought to have a mind to flourish before I\noffer to pass, as the champion speaks in his proper language, I shall\napply myself to the matter before us.\"[270]\n\n\nNote VII.\n\n    _Thus our eighth Henry's marriage they defame;\n    Divorcing from the church to wed the dame:\n    Though largely proved, and by himself professed,\n    That conscience, conscience would not let him rest._\n\n           *       *       *       *       *\n\n    _For sundry years before he did complain,\n    And told his ghostly confessor his pain._ P. 204.\n\nThis is a continuation of the allusion to Stillingfleet's\n\"Vindication,\" who had attempted to place Henry VIII.'s divorce from\nCatherine of Arragon to the account of his majesty's tender conscience.\nA herculean task! but the readers may take it in the words of the Dean\nof St Paul's:\n\n\"And now this gentleman sets himself to _ergoteering_;[271] and looks\nand talks like any grim logician, of the causes which produced it,\nand the effects which it produced. 'The schism led the way to the\nReformation, for breaking the unity of Christ's church, which was the\nfoundation of it: but the immediate cause of this, which produced the\nseparation of Henry VIII. from the church of Rome, was the refusal of\nthe pope to grant him a divorce from his first wife, and to gratify\nhis desires in a dispensation for a second marriage.'\n\n\"_Ergo_: The first cause of the Reformation, was the satisfying an\ninordinate and brutal passion. But is he sure of this? If he be not,\nit is a horrible calumny upon our church, upon King Henry the Eighth,\nand the whole nation, as I shall presently show. No; he confesses\nhe cannot be sure of it: for, saith he, no man can carry it so high\nas the original cause with any certainty. And at the same time, he\nundertakes to demonstrate the immediate cause to be Henry the Eighth's\ninordinate and brutal passion; and afterwards affirms, as confidently\nas if he had demonstrated it, that our Reformation was erected on\nthe foundations of lust, sacrilege, and usurpation: Yet, saith he,\nthe king only knew whether it was conscience or love, or love alone,\nwhich moved him to sue for a divorce. Then, by his favour, the king\nonly could know what was the immediate cause of that which he calls\nthe schism. Well! but he offers at some probabilities, that lust was\nthe true cause. Is Ergoteering come to this already? 'But this we may\nsay, if Conscience had any part in it, she had taken a long nap of\nalmost twenty years together before she awakened.' Doth he think, that\nConscience doth not take a longer nap than this in some men, and yet\nthey pretend to have it truly awakened at last? What thinks he of late\nconverts? Cannot they be true, because conscience hath slept so long\nin them? Must we conclude in such cases, that some inordinate passion\ngives conscience a jog at last? 'So that it cannot be denied, he saith,\nthat an inordinate and brutal passion had a great share at least in\nthe production of the schism.' How! cannot be denied! I say from his\nown words it ought to be denied, for he confesses none could know but\nthe king himself; he never pretended that the king confessed it: How\nthen cannot it be denied? Yea, how dare any one affirm it? Especially\nwhen the king himself declared in a solemn assembly, in these words,\nsaith Hall, (as near, saith he, as I could carry them away,) speaking\nof the dissatisfaction of his conscience,--\"For this only cause, I\nprotest before God, and in the word of a prince, I have asked counsel\nof the greatest clerks in Christendom; and for this cause I have sent\nfor this legat, as a man indifferent, only to know the truth, and to\nsettle my conscience, and for none other cause, as God can judge.\" And\nboth then and afterwards, he declared, that his scruples began upon\nthe French ambassador's making a question about the legitimacy of the\nmarriage, when the match was proposed between the Duke of Orleans and\nhis daughter; and he affirms, that he moved it himself in confession to\nthe Bishop of Lincoln, and appeals to him concerning the truth of it in\nopen court.\"--_Vindication of the Answer to some late Papers_, p. 109.\n\n\nNote VIII.\n\n    _They say, that, look the Reformation round,\n    No treatise of humility is found;\n    But if none were, the gospel does not want,\n    Our Saviour preached it, and I hope you grant,\n    The sermon on the mount was Protestant._--P. 204.\n\nStillingfleet concludes his \"Vindication\" with this admonition\nto Dryden: \"I would desire him not to end with such a bare-faced\nassertion of a thing so well known to be false, viz. that there is\nnot one original treatise written by a Protestant, which hath handled\ndistinctly, and by itself, that Christian virtue of humility. Since\nwithin a few years (besides what hath been printed formerly) such\na book hath been published in London. But he doth well to bring it\noff with, 'at least that I have seen or heard of;' for such books\nhave not lain much in the way of his inquiries. Suppose we had not\nsuch particular books, we think the Holy Scripture gives the best\nrules and examples of humility of any book in the world; but I am\nafraid he should look on his case as desperate if I send him to the\nScripture, since he saith, 'Our divines do that as physicians do\nwith their patients whom they think uncurable, send them at last to\nTunbridge-waters, or to the air of Montpellier.\"\n\nDryden, in the Introduction, says, that the author of this work was\ncalled Duncombe; but he is charged with inaccuracy by Montague, who\nsays his name is Allen. It seems to be admitted, that his work is a\ntranslation from the Spanish. The real author may have been Thomas\nAllen, rector of Kettering, in Northamptonshire, and author of \"The\nPractice of a Holy Life, 8vo. 1716;\" in the list of books subjoined to\nwhich, I find \"The Virtue of Humility, recommended to be printed by\nthe late reverend and learned Dr Henry Hammond,\" which perhaps may be\nthe book in question. A sort of similarity of sound between Duncombe\nand Hammond may have led to Dryden's mistake. Alonzo Rodriguez, of the\nOrder of the Jesuits, wrote a book called \"_Exercicio de perfecion y\nvirtudes Christianas, Sevilla, 1609_,\" which seems to be the work from\nwhich the plagiary was taken.\n\n\nNote IX.\n\n    _Unpitied Hudibras, your champion friend,\n    Has shown how far your charities extend;\n    This lasting verse shall on his tomb be read,_\n    \"_He shamed you living, and upbraids you dead._\" P. 205.\n\nOur author, in the preceding lines, had employed himself in repelling\nthe charge of his having changed his religion for the sake of interest.\nHis loaves, he says, had not been increased by the change, nor had\nhis assiduity at court intimated any claim upon royal favour: and\nin reference to her neglect of literary merit, he charges on the\nchurch of England the fate of Butler, a brother poet. Of that truly\noriginal genius we only know, that his life was spent in dependence,\nand embittered by disappointment. But unless Dryden alludes to some\nincident now unknown, it is difficult to see how the church of England\ncould have rewarded his merit. Undoubtedly she owed much to his\nforcible satire against her lately triumphant rivals, the Presbyterians\nand Independents; but, unless Butler had been in orders, how could the\nchurch have recompensed his poetical talents? The author of the most\nwitty poem that ever was written had a much more natural and immediate\nclaim upon the munificence of the wittiest king and court that ever was\nin England; nor was his satire less serviceable to royalty than to the\nestablished religion. The blame of neglecting Butler lay therefore on\nCharles II. and his gay courtiers, who quoted \"Hudibras\" incessantly,\nand left the author to struggle with obscurity and indigence. The poet\nhimself has, in a fragment called \"Hudibras at Court,\" set forth both\nthe kind reception which Charles gave the poem, and his neglect of the\nauthor:\n\n    Now you must know, Sir Hudibras\n    With such perfections gifted was,\n    And so peculiar in his manner,\n    That all that saw him did him honour.\n    Among the rest, this prince was one,\n    Admired his conversation:\n    This prince, whose ready wit and parts\n    Conquered both men and women's hearts,\n    Was so o'ercome with Knight and Ralph,\n    That he could never claw it off;\n    He never eat, nor drank, nor slept,\n    But Hudibras still near him kept;\n    Nor would he go to church, or so,\n    But Hudibras must with him go;\n    Nor yet to visit concubine,\n    Or at a city feast to dine,\n    But Hudibras must still be there,\n    Or all the fat was in the fire.\n    Now after all, was it not hard,\n    That he should meet with no reward,\n    That fitted out this knight and squire,\n    This monarch did so much admire?\n    That he should never reimburse\n    The man for th' equipage, or horse,\n    Is sure a strange ungrateful thing,\n    In any body but a king.\n    But this good king, it seems, was told,\n    By some that were with him too bold,\n    If e'er you hope to gain your ends,\n    Caress your foes, and trust your friends.\n    Such were the doctrines that were taught,\n    Till this unthinking king was brought\n    To leave his friends to starve and die,\n    A poor reward for loyalty!\n\n\nNote X.\n\n    _With odious atheist names you load your foes;\n    Your liberal clergy why did I expose?\n    It never fails in charities like those._--P. 205.\n\nOur author here complains of the personal reflections which\nStillingfleet had cast upon him, particularly in the passage already\nquoted in Note VII., where he is expressly charged with disbelieving\nthe existence of \"such a thing as true religion.\" The second and third\nlines of the triplet are somewhat obscure. The meaning seems to be,\nthat Dryden, conscious of having given the first offence, which we\nshall presently see was the case, justifies his having done so, from\npersonal abuse being the never-failing resort of the liberal clergy.\nThe application of the neuter pronoun _it_ to the liberal clergy, is\nprobably in imitation of Virgil's satirical construction:\n\n    _Varium et mutabile semper f\u00e6mina._\n\nIt happened in this controversy, as in most others, that both parties,\nlaying out of consideration the provocation which they themselves had\ngiven, complained bitterly of the illiberality of their antagonists.\nStillingfleet expatiates on the unhandsome language contained in\nDryden's Defence, and the passages which he quotes are those which\ncontain the exposure of the liberal clergy mentioned in the text:\n\n\"Yet as if I had been the sole contriver or inventor of all, he\nbestows those civil and obliging epithets upon me, of _disingenuous_,\n_foul-mouthed_, and _shuffling_; one of a _virulent genius_, of\n_spiteful diligence_, and _irreverence to the royal family_; of\n_subtle calumny_, and _sly aspersion_; and he adds to these ornaments\nof speech, that I have a _cloven-foot_, and my name is _Legion_; and\nthat my Answer is an _infamous libel_, a _scurrilous saucy pamphlet_.\nIs this indeed the spirit of a new convert? Is this the meekness and\ntemper you intend to gain proselytes by, and to convert the nation?\nHe tells us in the beginning, that truth has a language peculiar to\nitself: I desire to be informed, whether these be any of the characters\nof it? And how the language of reproach and evil-speaking may be\ndistinguished from it? But zeal in a new convert is a terrible thing;\nfor it not only burns, but rages, like the eruptions of Mount \u00c6tna;\nit fills the air with noise and smoke, and throws out such a torrent\nof liquid fire, that there is no standing before it. The Answer alone\nwas too mean a sacrifice for such a Hector in controversy. All that\nstandeth in his way must fall at his feet. He calls me Legion, that\nhe may be sure to have number enough to overcome. But he is a great\nproficient indeed, if he be such an exorcist, to cast out a whole\nlegion already. But he hopes it may be done without fasting and\nprayer.\"--_Vindication of the Answer_, p. 1.\n\n\nNote XI.\n\n    _It now remains for you to school your child,\n    And ask why God's anointed he reviled;\n    A king and princess dead! Did Shimei worse?_ P. 207.\n\nThe Hind having shewn that her influence over Dryden was such as to\ninduce him to submit patiently, and without vengeance, to injury and\nreproach, now calls upon the Panther to exert her authority in turn\nover Stillingfleet, for his irreverend attack upon the royal papers\nin favour of the Catholic religion. Upon a careful perusal of the\nAnswers and Vindication of that great divine, it is impossible to find\nany grounds for the charge of his having _reviled_ Charles II. or the\nDuchess of York; on the contrary, their names are always mentioned with\ngreat respect, and the controversy is conducted strictly in conformity\nwith the following spirited advertisement prefixed to the Answer:\n\n\"If the papers, here answered, had not been so publicly dispersed\nthrough the nation, a due respect to the name they bear, would have\nkept the author from publishing any answer to them. But because they\nmay now fall into many hands, who, without some assistance, may not\nreadily resolve some difficulties started by them, he thought it not\nunbecoming his duty to God and the king, to give a clearer light to the\nthings contained in them. And it can be no reflection on the authority\nof a prince, for a private subject to examine a piece of coin as to its\njust value, though it bears his image and superscription upon it. In\nmatters that concern faith and salvation, we must prove all things, and\nhold fast that which is good.\"--_Advertisement to Answer to the Royal\nPapers._\n\nDryden, however, like the other Catholics, was pleased to interpret the\nimpugning and confuting the arguments used by the king and duchess,\ninto contempt and disrespect for their persons. It was this forced\nconstruction on which was founded the prosecution of Sharpe and of\nthe Bishop of London before the ecclesiastical commissioners. Sharpe\nhaving been defied to a polemical contest, by a paper handed into his\npulpit, took occasion to preach on the arguments contained in it;\nand mentioned, with some contempt, persons who could be influenced\nby such weak reasoning. This was interpreted as a reflection on the\nnew converts, and particularly on the king himself; and a mandate was\nissued to the Bishop of London, commanding that the obnoxious preacher\nshould be suspended. The issue of this matter has been noticed in the\nnotes on \"Absalom and Achitophel,\" Vol. IX. p. 302.\n\n\nNote XII.\n\n    _Your son was warned, and wisely gave it o'er;\n    But he, who counselled him, has paid the score._ P. 207.\n\nDryden here triumphs in the conquest he pretends to have gained over\nStillingfleet. In the beginning of the controversy, the Dean of St\nPaul's had spoken dubiously of the authenticity of the paper ascribed\nto the Duchess. In his Vindication, he fully admitted that point, and\ninsisted only upon the weakness of the reasons which she alleged for\nher conversion. This Dryden compares to a defeated vessel, bearing away\nunder the smoke of her last broadside.\n\nThe person, whom he states to have counselled Stillingfleet, is\nprobably Burnet; and the score which he paid, is the severe description\ngiven of him under the character of the Buzzard. Dryden always seems\nto have viewed the Answer to the Royal Papers as the work of more than\none hand. In his \"Defence,\" he affirms, that the answerer's \"name is\nLegion; but though the body be possessed with many evil spirits, it\nis but one of them that talks.\" In the introduction to the \"Hind and\nPanther,\" he says, he is informed both of the \"author and supervisors\nof this pamphlet.\" He conjectured, as was probably the truth, that a\ncontroversy of such importance, and which required to be managed with\nsuch peculiar delicacy, was not entrusted to a single individual.\nBesides Burnet, it is probable that Tillotson, Tennison, and Patrick,\nall of whom mingled in the polemical disputes of that period, were\nconsulted by Stillingfleet on this important occasion.\n\n\nNote XIII.\n\n    _Perhaps you think your time of triumph near,\n    But may mistake the season of the year;\n    The Swallow's fortune gives you cause to fear._--P. 210.\n\nThe general application of the fable of the Swallows to the short\ngleam of Catholic prosperity during the reign of James II. is\nsufficiently manifest. But it is probable, that a more close and\nintimate allusion was intended to an event which took place in 1686,\nwhen the whole nation was in confusion at the measures of King James,\nso that the alarm had extended even to the Catholics, who were the\nobjects of his favour. We are told, there was a general meeting of the\nleading Roman Catholics at the Savoy, to consult how this favourable\ncrisis might be most improved to the advantage of their cause. Father\nPetre had the chair; and at the very opening of the debates, it\nappeared, that the majority were more inclined to provide for their\nown security, than to come to extremities with the Protestants.\nNotwithstanding the King's zeal, power, and success, they were afraid\nto push the experiment any farther. The people were already alarmed,\nthe soldiers could not be depended upon, the very courtiers melted\nout of their grasp. All depended on a single life, which was already\non the decline; and if that life should last yet a few years longer,\nand continue as hitherto devoted to their interest and service,\nthey foresaw innumerable difficulties in their way, and anticipated\ndisappointments without end. Upon these considerations, therefore, some\nwere for a petition to the king, that he would only so far interpose\nin their favour, that their estates might be secured to them by act of\nparliament, with exemption from all employments, and liberty to worship\nGod in their own way, in their own houses. Others were for obtaining\nthe king's leave to sell their estates, and transport themselves and\ntheir effects to France. All but Father Petre were for a compromise\nof some sort or other; but he disdained whatever had a tendency to\nmoderation, and was for making the most of the voyage while the sea was\nsmooth, and the wind prosperous. All these several opinions, we are\nfarther told, were laid before the king, who was pleased to answer,\n\"That before their desires were made known to him, he had provided\na sure retreat and sanctuary for them in Ireland, in case all those\nendeavours which he was making for their security in England should be\nblasted, and which as yet gave him no reason to despair.\"[272]\n\nIt will hardly, I think, be disputed, that the fable of the Swallows\nabout to cross the seas refers to this consultation of the Catholics;\nand it is a strong instance of Dryden's prejudice against priests of\nall persuasions, that, in the character of the Martin, who persuaded\nthe Swallows to postpone the flight, he decidedly appears to have\ndesigned Petre, the king's confessor and prime adviser in state\nmatters, both spiritual and temporal. The name of Martin may contain\nan allusion to the parish of St Martin's, in which Whitehall, and the\nroyal chapel, are situated. But should this be thought fanciful, it\nis certain, that the portrait of this vain, presumptuous, ambitious,\nbigotted Jesuit, who was in keen pursuit of a cardinal's cap, is\nexactly that of the Martin:\n\n    A church begot, and church believing bird,\n    Of little body, but of lofty mind,\n    Round-bellied, for a dignity designed.\n\nTwo marked circumstances of resemblance conclude the inuendo,--his\nnoble birth, and superficial learning;\n\n    But little learning needs in noble blood.[273]\n\nIt may be doubted, whether the reverend father was highly pleased with\nthis sarcastic description, or whether he admitted readily the apology,\nthat the poet, speaking in the character of the heretical church, was\nobliged to use Protestant colouring.\n\nThe close correspondence of the fable with the real events may be\nfarther traced, and admit of yet more minute illustration:\n\n    The Raven, from the withered oak,\n    Left of their lodging,----\n\nmay be conjectured to mean Tennison, within whose parish Whitehall\nwas situated, and who stood in the front of battle during all the\nRoman Catholic controversy. As Petre is the Martin who persuaded the\nCatholics not to leave the kingdom, his preparations for maintaining\ntheir ground there are also noticed:\n\n    He ordered all things with a busy care,\n    And cells and refectories did prepare,\n    And large provisions laid of winter fare.\n\nThis alludes to the numerous schools and religious establishments which\nthe Jesuits prepared to establish throughout England.[274] The chapel\nwhich housed them is obviously the royal chapel, where the priests\nwere privileged to exercise their functions even during the subsistence\nof the penal laws. The transient gleam of sunshine which invited the\nSwallows forth from their retirement, is the Declaration of Indulgence,\nin consequence of which the Catholics assumed the open and general\nexercise of their religion. The Irish Catholics, with the sanguine\nTalbot at their head, may be the first who hailed the imaginary return\nof spring: they are painted as\n\n    ----Swifts, the giants of the Swallow kind,\n    Large limbed, stout hearted, but of stupid mind.\n\nI cannot help thinking, that our author, still speaking in the\ncharacter of the English church, describes himself as the \"foolish\nCuckow,\" whose premature annunciation of spring completed the Swallow's\ndelusion. Perhaps he intended to mitigate the scornful description of\nPetre, by talking of himself also as a Protestant would have talked of\nhim. The foreign priests and Catholic officers, whom hopes of promotion\nnow brought into England, are pointed out by the \"foreign fowl,\" who\ncame in flocks,\n\n    To bless the founder, and partake the cheer.\n\nThe fable concludes in a prophetic strain, by indicating the calamities\nwhich were likely to overwhelm the Catholics, as soon as the death of\nJames, or any similar event, should end their temporary prosperity. It\nis well known, how exactly the event corresponded to the prophecy; even\nthe circumstance of the rabble rising upon the Catholic priests was\nmost literally verified. In most of the sea-port towns, they watched\nthe coasts to prevent their escape; and when King James was taken at\nFeversham, the fishermen, by whom he was seized, were employed in what\nthey called by the cant phrase of \"priest-codding,\" that is, lying in\nwait for the fugitive priests.\n\n\nNote XIV.\n\n    _But most in Martin's character and fate,\n    She saw her slandered sons, the Panther's hate,\n    The people's rage, the persecuting state._--P. 217.\n\nThe conclusion of the fable naturally introduces a discussion of\nthe penal laws, which unquestionably were extremely severe towards\nCatholics. By the fourteenth of Queen Elizabeth, it was enacted, that\nwhoever, by bulls of the pope, should reconcile any one to Rome,\nshould, together with the person reconciled, be guilty of high treason;\nthat those, who relieved such reconcilers, should be liable in the\npenalties of a _premunire_, and those who concealed them in misprision\nof treason. A still more severe law passed in the twenty-eighth of the\nsame queen, upon discovery of Parry's conspiracy against her life, to\nwhich he had been stirred up by a book of Allen, or Parsons the Jesuit,\nwritten for the express purpose. It was thereby enacted, that all\nJesuits and Popish priests should depart the kingdom within forty days;\nand that those who should afterwards return into the kingdom, should be\nguilty of high treason; and all who relieved and maintained them, of\nfelony. There were other enactments of a similar nature made upon the\ndiscovery of the gun-powder plot. Samuel Johnson (I mean the divine)\ngives an odd justification of these laws, saying, that the priests are\nhanged, not as priests, but as traitors. But, as their being priests\nwas the sole reason for their being held traitors, it does not appear,\nthat the Protestant divine can avail himself of this distinction.\n\n\nNote XV.\n\n    _No church reformed can boast a blameless line,\n    Such Martins build in yours, and more than mine;\n    Or else an old fanatic author lies,\n    Who summed their scandals up by centuries._--P. 218.\n\nThe fanatic author is John White, commonly called Century White. He\nwas born in Pembrokeshire in 1590, was educated for the bar, and made\na considerable figure in his profession. As he was a rigid puritan, he\nwas chosen one of the trustees which that sect appointed to purchase\nimpropriations to be bestowed upon fanatic preachers. This design was\nchecked by Archbishop Laud; and White, among others, received a severe\ncensure in the Star-Chamber. In the Long Parliament, White was member\nfor Southwark, and distinguished himself by his vindictive severity\nagainst the bishops and Episcopal clergy, saying openly in a committee,\nhe hoped to live to see the day, when there should be neither bishop\nnor cathedral priest in England. He was very active in the ejectment\nof the clergy, by which upwards of eight thousand churchmen are said\nto have lost their cures in the course of four or five years. In order\nto encourage and justify these violent measures, he published his\nfamous treatise, entitled, \"The First Century of Scandalous Malignant\nPriests, made and admitted into benefices by the Prelates, London,\n1643;\" a tract which contains, as may be inferred from its name, an\nhundred instances of unworthiness, which had been either proved to\nhave existed among the clergy of the church of England, or had been\ninvented to throw a slander upon them. When this satire was shown to\nCharles I., it was proposed to answer it by a similar exposition of\nthe scandalous part of the puritanical teachers; but that monarch\nwould not consent to give countenance to a warfare in which neither\nparty could gain, and religion was sure to be a loser between them.\nSimilar considerations are said to have prevented White himself from\npublishing \"A Second Century,\" in continuation of his work. He wrote\nanother tract, entitled, \"The Looking Glass;\" in which he attempted to\nprove, that the sin against the Holy Ghost was the bearing arms for the\nking in the civil war. His own party bestow on White a high character\nfor religion and virtue; but the cavaliers alleged, that although he\nhad two wives of his own, a large proportion of matrimony, he did not\nforbear to visit three belonging to his neighbours in the White Friars.\nHe died in January 1644, and is said, in his last illness, to have\nbitterly lamented the active share which he had taken in ejecting so\nmany guiltless ministers, and their families. This, however, may be a\nfiction of the royalists; for the death-bed repentance of an enemy is\namongst the most common forgeries of party. White's body was attended\nto the grave by most of the members of Parliament, and the following\ndistich inscribed on his tomb:\n\n    \"Here lyeth a JOHN, a burning shining light,\n    His name, life, actions, all were WHITE.\"\n\n    _See Wood's Athen\u00e6 Oxonienses._\n\n\nNote XVI.\n\n    _The Lion, studious of our common good,\n    Desires (and kings' desires are ill withstood)\n    To join our nations in a lasting love;\n    The bars betwixt are easy to remove,\n    For sanguinary laws were never made above._--P. 218.\n\nWhen James II. ascended the throne, deceived by the general attachment\nof the church of England for his person, and the little jealousy which\nthey seemed to entertain of his religion, he conceived there would\nbe no great difficulty in procuring a reconciliation between the\nnational church and that of Rome. With this view he made a favourable\ndeclaration of his intentions to maintain the church of England as\nby law established, and certainly expected, that, in return, they\nwould consent to the repeal of the test act and penal laws;[275] and\nthis, it was conceived, might pave the way for uniting the churches.\nAn extraordinary pamphlet, already quoted, recommends such an union,\nfounded upon the mutual attachment of both communions to King James,\nupon their success in resisting the Bill of Exclusion, and their common\nhatred of the dissenters. \"This very stone, which was once rejected by\nthe architects, is now become the chief stone in the corner. We may\ntruly see in it the hand of God, and look upon it with admiration; and\nmay expect, if fears and jealousies hinder not, the greatest blessings\nwe can wish for. An union betwixt these two walls, which have been thus\nlong separated, and now in a fair way to be united and linked together\nby this corner stone; after which, how glorious a structure may we hope\nfor on such foundations!\" A plan is therefore laid down, containing\nthe following heads, of which it may be observed, that the very first\nis the abrogation of these penal laws, which Dryden states to be the\nprincipal bar between the alliance of the Hind and the Panther.\n\n\"First, that it may be provided, That those who are known to be\nfaithful friends to the king and kingdom's good, may equally with us\nenjoy those favours and blessings we may hope for under so great and\nso just a king, without being liable to the sanguinary penal laws, for\nholding opinions noways inconsistent with loyalty, and the peace and\nquiet of the nation; and that they may not be obliged, by oaths and\ntests, either to renounce their religion, which they know they cannot\ndo without sacrilege, or else to put themselves out of capacity of\nserving their king and country.\n\n\"Secondly, That, for healing our differences, it be appointed, that\nneither side, in their sermons, touch upon matters of controversy with\nanimating reflections; but that those discourses may wholly tend to\npeace and piety, religion and sound morality; and that, in all public\ncatechisms, the solid grounds and principles of religion may be solely\nexplicated and established, all reflecting animosities being laid aside.\n\n\"Thirdly, That some learned, devout, and sober persons, may be made\nchoice of on both sides, who may truly state matters of controversy\nbetwixt us; to the end, each one may know others pretensions, and the\ntenets they cannot abandon, without breaking the chain of apostolic\nfaith; which, if it be done, we shall, it may be, find that to be\ntrue, which the Papists often tell us, that the difference betwixt\nthem and us is not so great as many make it; nor their tenets so\npernicious, but if we saw them naked, we should, if not embrace them\nas truths, yet not condemn them as errors, much less as pernicious\ndoctrines. Yet if, notwithstanding all this, we cannot perfectly\nagree in some points, let us, however, endeavour to live together\nin the bonds of love and charity, as becomes good Christians and\nloyal subjects, and join together to oppugn those known maxims, and\npernicious errors, which destroy the essence of religion, loyalty, and\ngood government.\"--_Remonstrance, by way of Address, to the Church of\nEngland_, 1685.\n\n\nNote XVII.\n\n    _Yet still remember, that you wield a sword,\n    Forged by your foes against your sovereign lord;\n    Designed to hew the imperial cedar down,\n    Defraud succession, and dis-heir the crown._--P. 219.\n\nThe Test-act was passed in the year 1678, while the popish plot was\nin its vigour, and the Earl of Shaftesbury was urging every point\nagainst the Catholics, with his eyes uniformly fixed upon the Bill of\nExclusion as his crowning measure. It imposed on all who should sit\nin parliament, a declaration of their abhorrence of the doctrine of\ntransubstantiation. The Duke of York, with tears in his eyes, moved\nfor a proviso to exempt himself, protesting, that he cast himself upon\nthe House in the greatest concern he could have in the world; and that\nwhatever his religion might be, it should only be a private thing\nbetween God and his own soul. Notwithstanding this pathetic appeal,\nhe carried his point but by two votes. With seven other peers he\nprotested against the bill. Dryden therefore, and probably with great\njustice, represents this test as a part of his machinations against\nthe Duke of York, whose party was at that time, and afterwards, warmly\nespoused by the church of England. But though the Test-act was devised\nby a statesman whom they hated, and carried by a party whom they had\nopposed, the high-church clergy were not the less unwilling to part\nwith it when they found the advantages which it gave them against\nthe Papists in King James's reign. Hence they were loaded with the\nfollowing reproaches: \"My business is to set forth, in its own colours,\nthe extraordinary loyalty of those men, who obstinately maintain a\ntest contrived by the faction to usher in the Bill of Exclusion: And\nit is much admired, even by some of her own children, that the grave\nand matron-like church of England, which values herself so much for her\nantiquity, should be over-fond of a new point of faith, lately broached\nby a famous act of an infallible parliament, convened at Westminster,\nand guided by the holy spirit of Shaftesbury. But I doubt there are\nsome parliaments in the world which will not so easily admit this new\narticle into their creed, though the church of England labours so much\nto maintain it as a special evidence of her singular loyalty.\"--_New\nTest of the Church of England's Loyalty._\n\n\nNote XVIII.\n\n    _The first reformers were a modest race;\n    Our peers possessed in peace their native place,\n    And when rebellious arms o'erturned the state,\n    They suffered only in the common fate;\n    But now the sovereign mounts the regal chair,\n    And mitred seats are full, yet David's bench is bare._--P. 221.\n\nThis passage regards the situation of the Roman Catholic peers.\nNotwithstanding their religion, they had been allowed to retain their\nseats and votes in the House of Lords. So jealous were they, (as was\nbut natural,) of this privilege, that, in 1675, when Danby proposed a\ntest oath upon all holding state employments and benefices, the object\nof which was to acknowledge the doctrine of non-resistance, and disown\nall attempts at an alteration of government, the Roman Catholic peers,\nto the number of twenty, who had hitherto always voted with the crown,\nunited, on this occasion, with the opposition, and occasioned the loss\nof the bill. This North imputes to the art of Shaftesbury, who dinned\ninto their ears, \"that this test (by mentioning the maintenance of the\nProtestant religion, though that of the royal authority was chiefly\nproposed) tended to deprive them of their right of voting, which was\na birth-right so sacrosanct and radically inherent in the peerage,\nas not to be temerated on any account whatsoever.\" When the earl had\nheated the Catholic lords with this suggestion, he secured them to the\nopposition, by proposing, and carrying through, an order of the House,\nthat no bill should be received, tending to deprive any of the peerage\nof their right. But when the Test-act of 1678 was moved, which had,\nfor its direct purpose, that exclusion which that of 1675 was supposed\nonly to convey by implication, Shaftesbury laughed at the order which\nhe himself had proposed, saying, _leges posteriores priores abrogant_.\nAnd by this test, which required the renunciation of their religion\nas idolatrous, the Catholic peerage were effectually, and for ever,\nexcluded from their seats in the House of Lords. Dryden intimates, in\nthe following lines, that this test applied to the Papists alone, and\ncomplains heavily of this odious distinction, betwixt them and other\nnon-conformists.\n\n\nNote XIX.\n\n    _When first the Lion sat with awful sway,\n    Your conscience taught your duty to obey._--P. 223.\n\nJames II. and the established church set out on the highest terms of\ngood humour with each other. This, as the king afterwards assured\nthe dissenters, was owing to the professions made to him by some\nof the churchmen, whom he named, who had promised favour to the\nCatholics, provided he would abandon all idea of general toleration,\nand leave them their ancient authority over the fanatics. Moved, as\nhe said, by these promises, the Declaration in council, issued upon\nhis accession, had this remarkable clause: \"I know the principles of\nthe church of England are for monarchy, and the members of it have\nshewn themselves good and loyal subjects, therefore I shall always\ntake care to defend and support it.\" This explicit declaration gave\nthe greatest satisfaction to the kingdom in general, and particularly\nto the clergy. \"All the pulpits of England,\" says Burnet, \"were full\nof it, and of thanksgivings for it. It was magnified as a security\nfar greater than any that laws could give. The common phrase was,\n_We have now the word of a king, and a word never yet broken_. This\ngeneral feeling of gratitude led to a set of addresses, full of the\nmost extravagant expressions of loyalty and fidelity to so gracious\na sovereign. The churchmen led the way in these expressions of zeal;\nand the university of Oxford, in particular, promised to obey the king\nwithout limitations or restrictions.\" The king's promise was reckoned\nso solemn and inviolable, that those addresses were censured as guilty\nat least of ill-breeding, who mentioned in their papers the \"religion\n_established by law_;\" since that expression implied an obligation on\nthe king to maintain it, independently of his royal grace and favour.\nBut the scene speedily changed, as the king's intentions began to\ndisclose themselves. Then, as a Catholic pamphleteer expresses himself,\n\"My loyal gentlemen were so far out of the right bias, that, in lieu\nof taking off the tests and penal laws, which all people expected from\nthem in point of gratitude and good manners, they made a solemn address\nto his majesty, that none be employed who were not capacitated by the\nsaid laws and tests to bear offices civil and military.\"[276]\n\nIf James, had viewed with attention the incidents of the former reign,\nhe might have recollected, that, however devoted the clergy had then\nshown themselves to the crown, his brother's attempt at his present\nmeasure of a general indulgence had at once alarmed the whole church.\nThis sensibility, when the interest of the church is concerned, is\nseverely contrasted with the general indifference to the cause of\nfreedom, into which they relapsed when the indulgence was recalled, in\na party pamphlet of the year 1680-1. \"You may easily call to mind, a\nlate instance of the humanity and conscience of this race of men here\nin England: For when his majesty, not long since, attempted to follow\nhis own inclinations, and emitted a declaration of indulgence to tender\nconsciences, the whole _posse cleri_ seemed to be raised against him:\nEvery reader and Gibeonite of the church could then talk as saucily\nof their king, as they do now of the late honourable Parliament; nay,\nthey began to stand upon their terms, and delivered it out as orthodox\ndoctrine, that the king was to act according to law, and, therefore,\ncould not suspend a penal statute; that the subjects' obedience was\na legal obedience; and, therefore, if the king commanded any thing\ncontrary to law, the subject was not bound to obey; with so many other\nhonest positions, that men wondered in God how such knaves should come\nby them. But wherefore was all this wrath, and all this doctrine?\nmerely because his majesty was pleased for a time to remove the sore\nbacks of dissenters from under the ecclesiastical lash; the bloody\nexercise of which is never denied to holy church, but the magistrate is\nimmediately assaulted with the noise and clamour of Demetrius and his\ncraftsmen.\n\n\"But now, the tables being turned, the same mercenary tongues are\nagain all Sibthorp, and all Manwaring; not a bit of law, or conscience\neither, is now to be had for love or money; not any limits to be put to\nthe king's commands, or our obedience. It is a gospel truth with these\nmen, that all which we have is the king's; and if he should command our\nestates, our wives and children, yea, and our religion too, we ought to\nresign them up, submit, and be silent.\"--_The Freeholders' Choice, or,\nA Letter of Advice concerning Elections._\n\n\nNote XX.\n\n    _Possess your soul with patience, and attend;\n    A more auspicious planet may ascend;\n    Good fortune may present some happier time,\n    With means to cancel my unwilling crime._--P. 224.\n\nThe first expression in these lines seems to have been a favourite with\nDryden. In the Introduction to the Translation of Juvenal, he makes\nit his glory, \"that, being naturally vindicative, he had suffered in\nsilence, and _possessed his soul in quiet_.\"\n\nThe arguments used by the Panther in this passage seem to have more\nweight than her antagonist allows them. It was surely reasonable, that\nthe church of England should rest upon her penal statutes and test act,\nas the sole mode of preventing the encroachments of her rival during a\nCatholic reign, and at the same time that she should look forward with\npleasure to a future period, when such severe enactments might be no\nlonger necessary for her safety; a time, of which it has been our good\nfortune to witness the arrival.\n\nThe argument of the Panther, in this speech, is, with the simile of\nthe inundation, literally versified from an answer to Penn's pamphlet.\n\"The penal laws cannot prejudice the Papists in this king's reign,\nseeing he can connive at the non-execution of them, and the repeal\nof them now cannot benefit the Papists when he is gone; because, if\nthey do not behave themselves modestly, we can either re-establish\nthem, or enact others, which they will be as little fond of. But their\nabrogation at this time would infallibly prejudice us, and would prove\nto be the pulling up of the sluices, and the throwing down the dikes,\nwhich stem the deluge that is breaking in upon us, and which hinder\nthe threatening waves from overflowing us.\" _Some reflections on a\ndiscourse, entitled_, \"Good Advice to the Church of England.\"--_State\nTracts_, Vol. I. p. 368.\n\n\nNote XXI.\n\n    _Your care about your banks infers a fear\n    Of threatening floods and inundations near;\n    If so, a just reprise would only be\n    Of what the land usurped upon the sea._--P. 225.\n\nThis conveys a perilous insinuation, which perhaps it would, at the\ntime, have been prudent to suppress; since it goes the length of\npreparing a justification of the resumption of the power, authority,\nlands, and revenues, of the church of England, upon the footing of\ntheir having originally belonged to that of Rome. It cannot be supposed\nthat this hint could be passed over at the time, without a strong\nfeeling of a meditated revolution in church government and property.\n\n\nNote XXII.\n\n    _Behold how he protects your friends oppressed,\n    Receives the banished, succours the distressed!\n    Behold, for you may read an honest open breast._--P. 225.\n\nBurnet, in the \"History of his Own Times,\" gives the following account\nof the relief which James, either from inclination or policy, extended\nto the French Protestants, who were exiled by the recal of the edict of\nNantes.\n\n\"But now the session of Parliament drew on, and there was a great\nexpectation of the issue of it. For some weeks before it met, there\nwas such a number of refugees coming over every day, who set about a\nmost dismal recital of the persecution in France; and that in so many\ninstances that were crying and odious, that, though all endeavours were\nused to lessen the clamour this had raised, yet the king did not stick\nopenly to condemn it as both unchristian and unpolitic. He took pains\nto clear the Jesuits of it, and laid the blame of it chiefly on the\nking, on Madame de Maintenon, and the Archbishop of Paris. He spoke\noften of it with such vehemence, that there seemed to be an affectation\nin it. He did more: He was very kind to the refugees; he was liberal\nto many of them; he ordered a brief for a charitable collection over\nthe nation for them all; upon which great sums were sent in. They\nwere deposited in good hands, and well distributed. The king also\nordered them to be denizen'd, without paying fees, and gave them\ngreat immunities. So that, in all, there came over, first and last,\nbetween forty and fifty thousand of that nation. There was such real\nargument of the cruel and persecuting spirit of popery, wheresoever\nit prevailed, that few could resist this conviction; so that all men\nconfessed, that the French persecution came very seasonably to awaken\nthe nation, and open men's eyes in so critical a conjunction; for upon\nthis session of Parliament all did depend.\"--BURNET, Book IV.\n\n\nNote XXIII.\n\n    _A plain good man, whose name is understood,\n    (So few deserve the name of plain and good.)_--P. 226.\n\nThese, and the following lines, contain a character of James II. most\nexquisitely drawn, though, it must be owned, with a flattering pencil.\nBravery, economy, integrity, are the ingredients which Dryden has mixed\nfor his colours. Without attempting a character of this unfortunate\nmonarch, we may say a few words on each of the attributes ascribed to\nhim. Bravery he unquestionably possessed; but it was of that ordinary\nkind, which, though unshaken by mere personal danger, is unable to\nsustain its possessor in great and embarrassing political emergencies.\nThe economy of James, being one great engine by which he hoped to carry\non his projects, was so rigid as sometimes to border upon avarice. His\nupright integrity, the virtue upon which he chiefly prided himself, and\nwhich was the usual theme of courtly panegyric, frequently deviated\ninto obstinacy. When he had once resolved upon a measure, he often\nannounced his resolution with imprudence, and almost always pressed it\nwith an open disregard of consequences. No fault can be more fatal to\nan English king; because the stream of popular opinion, which would\nsubside if unopposed, becomes irresistible when the obstinacy of a\nmonarch persists in attempting to stem it.\n\n\nNote XXIV.\n\n    _A sort of Doves were housed too near their hall,\n    Who cross the proverb, and abound with gall._--P. 228.\n\nThe virulent and abusive character which our author here draws of the\nclergy, and particularly those of the metropolis, differs so much\nfrom his description of the church of England, in the person of the\nPanther, that we may conclude it was written after the publishing of\nthe Declaration of Indulgence, when the king had decidedly turned\nhis favour from the established church. Their quarrel was now\nirreconcileable, and at immediate issue; and Dryden therefore changes\nthe tone of conciliation, with which he had hitherto addressed the\nheretic church, into that of bitter and unrelenting satire. Dryden\ncalls them doves, in order to pave the way for terming them, as he\ndoes a little below, \"birds of Venus;\" as disowning the doctrine\nof celibacy. The popular opinion, that a dove has no gall, is well\nknown. In Scotland, this is averred to be owing to the dove which Noah\ndismissed from the ark having flown so long, that his gall broke; since\nwhich occurrence, none of the species have had any.\n\n\nNote XXV.\n\n    _An hideous figure of their foes they drew,\n    Nor lines, nor looks, nor shades, nor colours true;\n    And this grotesque design exposed to public view._--P. 231.\n\nThe Roman Catholic pamphlets of the time are filled with complaints,\nthat their principles were misrepresented by the Protestant divines;\nand that king-killing tenets, and others of a pernicious or absurd\nnature, were unjustly ascribed to them. A tract, which is written on\npurpose to explain their real doctrine, says, \"Is it not strange and\nsevere, that principles, and those pretended of faith too, should be\nimposed upon men which they themselves renounce and detest? If the\nTurks' Alcoran should, in like manner, be urged upon us, and we hanged\nup for Mahometans, all we could do or say, in such a case, would be,\nto die patiently, with protestations of our own innocence. And this\nis the posture of our condition; we abhor, we renounce, we abominate,\nsuch principles; we protest against them, and seal our protestations\nwith our dying breath. What shall we say, what can we do more? To\naccuse men as guilty in matters of faith, which they never owned, is\nthe same thing as to condemn them for matters of fact which they\nnever did.\"[277] Another author, speaking in the assumed character of\nthe established church, says, that the Catholic controvertists have\noften told us, that \"we behave ourselves like persons diffident of our\ncause, decline disputes on equal terms, and either misrepresent their\ntenets, as appears manifestly in their doctrines of justification\nand merit, satisfaction and indulgences; or else play the buffoons,\njoking, scoffing, and relating stories, which, if true, would not touch\nreligion.\"--_A Remonstrance, by way of Address_, &c.\n\n\nNote XXVI.\n\n    _No Holland emblem could that malice mend._--P. 231.\n\nEmblems, like puns, being the wit of a heavy people, the Dutch seem to\nhave been remarkable for them; of which, their old-fashioned prints,\nand figured pan-tiles, are existing evidence. Prior thus drolls upon\nthe passage in the text:\n\n\"_Bayes._ Oh! dear Sir, you are mighty obliging: but I must needs say\nat a fable, or an emblem, I think no man comes near me; indeed I have\nstudied it more than any man. Did you ever take notice, Mr Johnson,\nof a little thing that has taken mightily about town, a cat with a\ntop-knot?[278]\n\n_John._ Faith, Sir, 'tis mighty pretty; I saw it at the coffee-house.\n\n_Bayes._ 'Tis a trifle hardly worth owning. I was t'other day at\nWill's, throwing out something of that nature; and, i'gad, the hint was\ntaken, and out came that picture; indeed the poor fellow was so civil\nto present me with a dozen of 'em for my friends. I think I have one\nhere in my pocket; would you please to accept it, Mr Johnson?\n\n_John._ Really 'tis very ingenious.\n\n_Bayes._ Oh, Lord, nothing at all! I could design twenty of 'em in an\nhour, if I had but witty fellows about me to draw 'em. I was proffered\na pension to go into Holland and contrive their emblems; but, hang 'em,\nthey are dull rogues, and would spoil my invention.\"--_Hind and Panther\nTransprosed._\n\n\nNote XXVII.\n\n    _The noble Buzzard ever pleased me best._--P. 233.\n\nGilbert Burnet, well known as an historian, was born of a good family\nin Scotland, in 1643. He went through his studies with success; and,\nbeing ordained by the Bishop of Edinburgh, obtained the living of\nSalton, in East Lothian, in 1665. While in this living, he drew up a\nmemorial of the abuses of the Scotch bishops, and was instrumental in\nprocuring the induction of Presbyterian divines into vacant churches;\na step which he afterwards condemned as imprudent.[279] To measures so\nunfavourable for Episcopacy, Dryden seems to allude, in these lines:\n\n    I know he hates the Pigeon-house and Farm,\n    And more, in time of war, has done us harm;\n    But all his hate on trivial points depends,\n    Give up our forms, and we shall soon be friends.\n\nBurnet's opinion, or rather indifference, concerning forms, may be\nguessed at, from the applause with which he quotes a saying of Dr Henry\nMore; \"None of them are bad enough to make men bad, and I am sure\nnone of them are good enough to make men good.\" He was next created\nprofessor of divinity at Glasgow; but as his active temper led him\nto mingle much in political life, he speedily distinguished himself\nrather as a politician than a theologian. In 1672 he was made one of\nthe king's chaplains, and was in high favour both with Charles and his\nbrother. He enjoyed much of the countenance of the Duke of Lauderdale;\nbut a quarrel taking place between them, the duke represented Burnet's\nconduct in such terms, that he was deprived of his chaplainry, and\nforced to resign his professor's chair, and abandon Scotland. He\nhad an opportunity of revenging himself upon Lauderdale, as will be\nnoticed in a subsequent note. During the time of the Popish plot,\nhe again received a portion of the royal countenance. He was then\npreacher at the Rolls Chapel, under the patronage of Sir Harbottle\nGrimstone, master of the rolls, as also lecturer at St Clement's,\nand enjoyed a high degree of public consideration. Having, as he\nconceived, a fit opportunity to awaken the conscience of Charles, he\nventured upon sending him a letter, where he treated his personal\nvices, and the faults of his government, with great severity,[280]\nand by which he forfeited his favour for ever. This freedom, with his\nlow-church tenets, gave also offence to the Duke of York, who was,\nmoreover, offended with him for some interference in the affair of the\nExclusion, in which, if he did not go all the length of Shaftesbury, he\nrecommended the appointment of a prince-regent; a measure scarcely more\npalatable to the successor. At length, his regard for Lord Russell,\nand the share which he took in penning, or circulating, his dying\ndeclaration, drew upon him the full resentment of both brothers. To\nthis, a whimsical accident, in the choice of a text for the day of the\ngun-powder plot, happened to contribute. The preacher _chanced_ (for\nwe must believe what he assures us, _ex verbo sacerdotis_) to pitch on\nthese words: \"Save me from the _lion's_ mouth; thou hast delivered me\nfrom the horns of the _unicorn_.\" This was interpreted as referring to\nthe supporters of the royal arms; and Burnet was discharged, by the\nking's command, both from lecturing at St Clement's, and preaching\nat the Rolls Chapel. After this final breach with the court he went\nabroad, and, having travelled through France and Italy, settled in\nHolland at the court of the Prince of Orange. Here he did not fail,\nwith that ready insinuation which seems to have distinguished him,\nto make himself of consequence to the prince, and especially to the\nprincess, afterwards Queen Mary. From this place of refuge he sent\nforth several papers, in single sheets, relating to the controversy\nin England; and the clergy, who had formerly looked upon him with\nsome suspicion, began now to treat with great attention and respect a\nperson so capable of serving their cause. He was consulted upon every\nemergency; which confidence was no doubt owing partly to his situation\nnear the person of the Prince of Orange, the Protestant heir of the\ncrown. He stood forward as the champion of the church of England, in\nthe controversy with Parker concerning the Test.[281] In the \"History\nof his Own Times,\" the bishop talks with complacency of the sway which\ncircumstances had given him among the clergy, and of the important\nmatters which fell under his management; for, by express command of the\nPrince of Orange, he was admitted into all the secrets of the English\nintrigues. These insinuations of Burnet's importance, although they\nafterwards drew the ridicule of Pope, and the Tory wits of Queen Anne's\nreign, may, from the very satire of Dryden, be proved to have been well\nfounded. This acquired importance of Burnet is the alliance between\nthe Pigeon-house and Buzzard, which Dryden reprobates, believing, or\nwishing to make others believe, that Burnet held opinions unfavourable\nto Episcopacy. James considered this divine as so formidable an enemy,\nthat he wrote two very severe letters to his daughter against him,\nand proceeded so far as to insist that he should be forbidden the\ncourt; a circumstance which did not prevent his privately receiving\na double degree of countenance. A prosecution for high treason was\nnext commenced against Burnet, and a demand was made that he should\nbe delivered up; which the States evaded, by declaring that he was\nnaturalized, by marrying a Dutch lady. The court of England were then\nsupposed to have formed some plan, as they had attempted in the case\nof Peyton, of seizing, or perhaps assassinating him, and a reward of\nL. 3000 was offered for the service. Burnet, however, confident in the\nprotection of the prince and states of Holland, answered, replied,\nand retorted, and carried on almost an immediate controversy with\nhis sovereign, dated from the court of his son-in-law. This active\npolitician had a very important share in the Revolution, and reaped his\nreward, by being advanced to the see of Salisbury. He died on the 17th\nof March, 1714-15.\n\nHis writings, theological, political, and polemical, are very numerous;\nbut he is most remarkable as an historian. The \"History of the\nReformation,\" but more especially that of \"His Own Times,\" raises him\nto a high rank among our English historians.\n\n\nNote XXVIII.\n\n    _A portly prince, and goodly to the sight,\n    He seemed a son of Anach for his height;\n    Like those whom stature did to crowns prefer,\n    Black-browed, and bluff, like Homer's Jupiter;\n    Broad-backed, and brawny built, for love's delight,\n    A prophet formed to make a female proselyte._--P. 234.\n\nThe following song, which is preserved in the \"State Poems,\" gives a\nsimilar account of Burnet's personal appearance:\n\n_A new Ballad, called, The Brawny Bishop's Complaint._\n\nTo the Tune of--_Packington's Pound._\n\nI.\n\n    When B----t perceived the beautiful dames,\n    Who flocked to the chapel of hilly St James,\n    On their lovers the kindest looks did bestow,\n    And smiled not on him while he bellowed below;\n          To the princess he went,\n          With pious intent,\n    This dangerous ill in the church to prevent:\n    O, Madam! quoth he, our religion is lost,\n    If the ladies thus ogle the knights of the toast.\n\nII.\n\n    Your highness observes how I labour and sweat,\n    Their affections to raise, and new flames to beget;\n    And sure when I preach, all the world will agree,\n    That their ears and their eyes should be pointed on me:\n          But now I can't find,\n          One beauty so kind,\n    As my parts to regard, or my presence to mind;\n    Nay, I scarce have a sight of any one face,\n    But those of old Oxford, and ugly Arglas.\n\nIII.\n\n    These sorrowful matrons, with hearts full of truth,\n    Repent for the manifold sins of their youth;\n    The rest with their tattle my harmony spoil;\n    And Bur--ton, An--say, K--gston, and B--le,\n          Their minds entertain,\n          With thoughts so profane,\n    'Tis a-mercy to find that at church they contain;\n    Even Hen--ham's shapes their weak fancies entice,\n    And rather than me they will ogle the Vice.[282]\n\nIV.\n\n    These practices, madam, my preaching disgrace;\n    Shall laymen enjoy the just rights of my place?\n    Then all may lament my condition for hard,\n    To thresh in the pulpit without a reward.\n          Then pray condescend,\n          Such disorders to end,\n    And from the ripe vineyards such labourers send;\n    Or build up the seats, that the beauties may see\n    The face of no brawny pretender but me.\n\nV.\n\n    The princess, by rude importunities pressed,\n    Though she laughed at his reasons, allowed his request;\n    And now Britain's nymphs, in Protestant reign,\n    Are locked up at prayers like the virgins in Spain;\n          And all are undone,\n          As sure as a gun,\n    Whenever a woman is kept like a nun,\n    If any kind man from bondage will save her,\n    The lass, in gratitude, grants him the favour.\n\nThe jest of his being \"a prophet, formed to make a female proselyte,\"\nwas more cutting, as he had just acquired a right of naturalization\nin Holland, by marrying Mrs Mary Scott, a Dutch lady, but of Scottish\nextraction, being descended of the noble house of Buccleuch.\n\n\nNote XXIX.\n\n    _The hero and the tyrant change their style,\n    By the same measure that they frown or smile._--P. 235.\n\nIt must be owned, that, with all Bishop Burnet's good qualities, there\nare particulars in his history which give colour for this accusation.\nHis opinions were often hastily adopted, and of course sometimes\nawkwardly retracted, and his patrons were frequently changed. Thus, he\nvindicated the legality of divorce for barrenness on the part of the\nwife, and even that of polygamy, in his resolution of two important\ncases of conscience. These were intended to pave the way for Charles\ndivorcing his barren wife Catherine, or marrying another; and so\nraising a family of his own to succeed him, instead of the Duke of\nYork. These opinions he formally retracted. Notwithstanding his zeal\nfor liberty, his first work is said by Swift to have been written in\ndefense of arbitrary power. Above all, his great intimacy with the\nDukes of Hamilton and Lauderdale, the King and the Duke of York, the\nPope and the Prince of Orange; in short, his having the address to\nattach himself for a time to almost every leading character, whom he\nhad an opportunity of approaching, gives us room to suspect, that\nif Burnet did not change his opinions, he had at least the art of\ndisguising such as could not be accommodated to those of his immediate\npatron. When the king demanded that Burnet should be delivered up by\nthe States, he threatened, in return, to justify himself, by giving an\naccount of the share he had in affairs for twenty years past; in which\nhe intimated, he might be driven to mention some particulars, which\nwould displease the king. This threat, as he had enjoyed a considerable\nshare of his confidence when Duke of York, may seem, in some degree, to\njustify Dryden's heavy charge against him, of availing himself of past\nconfidence to criminate former patrons. It is remarkable, also, that\neven while he was in the secret of all the intrigues of the Revolution,\nand must have considered it as a near attempt, he continued to assert\nthe doctrine of passive obedience; and in his letter to Middleton,\nin vindication of his conduct against the charge of high treason,\nthere is an affectation of excessive loyalty to the reigning monarch.\nAgainst these instances of dissimulation, forced upon him perhaps by\ncircumstances, but still unworthy and degrading, we may oppose many\nothers, in which, when his principles and interest were placed at\nissue, he refused to serve the latter at the expence of the former.\n\n\nNote XXX.\n\n    _His praise of foes is venomously nice;\n    So touched, it turns a virtue to a vice._--P. 235.\n\nThis applies to the sketches of characters introduced by Burnet in his\ncontroversial tracts. But long after the period when Dryden wrote, the\npublication of the History of his Own Times confirmed, to a certain\nextent, the censure here imposed. It is a general and just objection\nto the bishop's historical characters, that they are drawn up with\ntoo much severity, and that the keenness of party has induced him, in\nmany cases, to impose upon the reader a caricature for a resemblance.\nYet there appears to have been perfect good faith upon his own part;\nso that we may safely acquit him of any intention to exaggerate the\nfaults, or conceal the virtues, of his political enemies. He seems\nhimself to have been conscious of a disposition to look upon the dark\nside of humanity. \"I find,\" says he, \"that the long experience I have\nhad of the baseness, the malice, and the falsehood of mankind, has\ninclined me to be apt to think generally the worst of men, and of\nparties.\" Burnet therefore candidly puts the reader upon his guard\nagainst this predominant foible, and expressly warns him to receive\nwhat he advances with some grains of allowance.\n\nBut whatever was Burnet's private opinion of the conduct of others,\nand however much he might be misled by prejudice in drawing their\ncharacters, it should not be forgotten, that, in the moments of triumph\nwhich succeeded the Revolution, he not only resisted every temptation\nto revenge for personal injuries, but employed all his influence to\nrecommend mild and conciliating conduct to the successful party.\nSome, who had suffered under the severity of James's reign, were\nextremely indignant at what seemed to them to argue too much feeling\nfor their discomfited adversaries, and too little sympathy with their\nown past distresses. Samuel Johnson, in particular, reprobates the\nScottish bishop's exhortations to forgiveness and forgetfulness of\ninjuries. \"And, besides, we have Scotch doctors, to teach us the art\nof forgetfulness. Pray you have _gude_ memories, _gude_ memories; do\nnot remember bad things, (meaning the murders and oppressions of the\nlast reigns,) but keep your memories for _gude_ things, have _gude_\nmemories.\" To this mimicry of the bishop's dialect, in which, however,\nhe seems to have conveyed most wholesome and sound council, Johnson\nadds, that, during the sitting of King William's first parliament,\nwhile his complaints were before them, the bishop sent to him his\nadvice, \"Not to name persons.\" \"I gave, says he, an English reply\nto that message; 'Let him mind his business, I will mind mine.' His\nbookseller, Mr Chiswell, by whom I had the message, seemed loth to\ncarry him that blunt answer. Oh! said I, he has got the title of a Lord\nlately, I must qualify my answer: 'Let him _please_ to mind his own\nbusiness, I will mind mine.\"--This was very natural for one smarting\nunder sufferings, who complains, that \"while a certain traveller,\"\nmeaning Burnet, \"was making his court to the cardinals at Rome, he got\nsuch an almanack in his bones, (from scourging,) as to incapacitate him\nfrom learning this Scotch trick of a _gude_ memory.\"[283] But it is\nthe very character of moderate councils to be disgusting to those who\nhave been hurried beyond their patience by oppression; and Johnson's\ntestimony, though given with a contrary view, is highly honourable to\nthe bishop's prudence.\n\n\nNote XXXI.\n\n    _But he, uncalled, his patron to controul,\n    Divulged the secret whispers of his soul;\n    Stood forth the accusing Satan of his crimes,\n    And offered to the Moloch of the times._--P. 235.\n\nIn 1675, the House of Commons being resolved to assail the Duke of\nLauderdale, and knowing that Burnet, in whom he had once reposed\nmuch confidence, could bear witness to some dangerous designs and\nexpressions, appointed the doctor to attend and be examined. His own\naccount of this delicate transaction is as follows:\n\n\"In April 1675, a session of parliament was held, as preparatory to\none that was designed next winter, in which money was to be asked; but\nnone was now asked, it being only called to heal all breaches, and\nto beget a good understanding between the king and his people. The\nHouse of Commons fell upon Duke Lauderdale; and those who knew what\nhad passed between him and me, moved, that I should be examined before\na committee. I was brought before them. I told them how I had been\ncommanded out of town; but though that was illegal, yet since it had\nbeen let fall, it was not insisted on. I was next examined concerning\nhis design of arming the Irish Papists. I said, I, as well as others,\nhad heard him say, he wished the Presbyterians in Scotland would rebel,\nthat he might bring over the Irish Papists to cut their throats. I was\nnext examined concerning the design of bringing a Scottish army into\nEngland. I desired to be excused, as to what had passed in private\ndiscourse; to which I thought I was not bound to answer, unless it were\nhigh treason. They pressed me long, and I would give them no other\nanswer; so they all concluded, that I knew great matters; and reported\nthis specially to the House. Upon that I was sent for, and brought\nbefore the House. I stood upon it as I had done at the committee,\nthat I was not bound to answer; that nothing had passed that was high\ntreason; and as to all other things, I did not think myself bound to\ndiscover them. I said farther, I knew the Duke Lauderdale was apt to\nsay things in a heat, which he did not intend to do; and, since he had\nused myself so ill, I thought myself the more obliged not to say any\nthing that looked like revenge, for what I had met with from him. I was\nbrought four times to the bar; at last I was told, the House thought\nthey had a right to examine into every thing that concerned the safety\nof the nation, as well as into matters of treason; and they looked on\nme as bound to satisfy them, otherwise they would make me feel the\nweight of their heavy displeasure, as one that concealed what they\nthought was necessary to be known. Upon this I yielded, and gave an\naccount of the discourse formerly mentioned. They laid great weight on\nthis, and renewed their address against Duke Lauderdale.\n\n\"I was much blamed for what I had done. Some, to make it look the\nworse, added, that I had been his chaplain, which was false; and that\nI had been much obliged to him, though I had never received any real\nobligation from him, but had done him great services, for which I had\nbeen very unworthily requited: Yet the thing had an ill appearance, as\nthe disclosing of what had passed in confidence; though I make it a\ngreat question, how far even that ought to bind a man when the designs\nare very wicked, and the person continued still in the same post and\ncapacity of executing them. I have told the matter as it was, and must\nleave myself to the censure of the reader. My love to my country, and\nmy private friendship, carried me, perhaps, too far; especially since I\nhad declared much against clergymen's meddling in secular affairs, and\nyet had run myself so deep in them.\"--_History of his Own Times_, Vol.\nI. p. 375.\n\nThe discourse to which Burnet refers was of the following dangerous\ntendency, and took place in September 1673.\n\n\"_Duke._ If the king should need an army from Scotland, to tame those\nin England, might the Scots be depended upon?\n\n\"_Burnet._ Certainly not. The commons in the southern parts are all\nPresbyterians. The nobility thought they had been ill used, were\ngenerally discontented, and only waited for an opportunity to show it.\n\n\"_Duke._ I am of another mind. The hope of the spoil of England will\nbring them all in.\n\n\"_Burnet._ The king is ruined if he trusts to that; for even\nindifferent persons, who might otherwise have been ready enough to push\ntheir fortunes without any anxious enquiries into the grounds they went\nupon, will not now trust the king, since he has so lately said, he\nwould stick to his declaration,[284] and yet has so soon given it up.\n\n\"Duke. _Hinc ill\u00e6 lacrym\u00e6._ The king was forsaken in that matter, and\nnone sticks to him but Lord Clifford and myself.\"--_Ralph, with the\nAuthorities he quotes_, Vol. I. p. 275.\n\nJames II. afterwards revived the plan of maintaining a Scottish\nstanding army, to bridle his English subjects.\n\n\nNote XXXII.\n\n    _And runs an Indian muck at all he meets._--P. 235.\n\nTo run a-muck, is a phrase derived from a practice of the Malays. When\none of this nation has lost his whole substance by gaming, or sustained\nany other great and insupportable calamity, he intoxicates himself\nwith opium; and, having dishevelled his hair, rushes into the streets,\ncrying _Amocca_, or _Kill_, and stabbing every one whom he meets with\nhis creeze, until he is cut down, or shot, like a mad dog.\n\n\nNote XXXIII.\n\n    _Such was, and is, the Captain of the Test._--P. 236.\n\nBurnet may have been thus denominated, from having written the\nfollowing pamphlets, in the controversy respecting the Test, against\nParker, the apostate bishop of Oxford:\n\n\"An Enquiry into the Reasons for Abrogating the Test imposed on all\nMembers of Parliament, offered by Dr Samuel Parker, Bishop of Oxford.\"\n\n\"A Second Part of the Enquiry into the Reasons offered by Doctor Samuel\nParker, bishop of Oxford, for Abrogating the Test; or an Answer to his\nplea for Transubstantiation, and for Acquitting the Church of Rome of\nIdolatry.\"\n\n\"A Continuation of the Second Part of the Enquiry into the Reasons\noffered by Dr Samuel Parker, Bishop of Oxford, for Abrogating the Test\nrelating to the Idolatry of the Church of Rome.\"\n\nThese two last pamphlets were afterwards thrown together in one tract,\nentitled, \"A Discourse concerning Transubstantiation and Idolatry,\nbeing an Answer to the Bishop of Oxford's plea relating to these two\npoints.\"\n\nBurnet himself admits, that his papers, in this controversy with\nParker, were written with an acrimony of style which nothing but such\na time and such a man could excuse. His papers were so bitter, that\nnobody durst offer them to the bishop of Oxford, till the king himself\nsent them to him, in hopes to stimulate him to an answer.\n\nSeveral of these pieces seem to have been published after \"The Hind and\nthe Panther;\" but it must have been generally known at the time, that\nBurnet had placed himself in the front of this controversy.\n\n    And much the Buzzard in their cause did stir,\n    Though naming not the patron, to infer,\n    _With all respect_, he was a gross idolater.\n\nThe passage particularly referred to in these lines occurs in a tract,\nentitled, \"Reasons against repealing the Act of Parliament, concerning\nthe Test,\" which is the first of six papers published by Dr Burnet when\nin Holland, and reprinted at London in 1689. His words are these:\n\n\"IX. I am told some think it very indecent to have a test for our\nparliaments, in which the king's religion is accused of idolatry;\nbut if this reason is good in this particular, it will be full as\ngood against several of the articles of our church, and many of the\nhomilies. If the church and religion of this nation is so formed by\nlaw, that the king's religion is declared over and over again to be\nidolatrous, what help is there for it? It is no other than it was when\nhis majesty was crowned, and swore to maintain our laws.\n\n\"I hope none will be wanting in all possible respect to his sacred\nperson; and as we ought to be infinitely sorry to find him engaged in a\nreligion which we must believe idolatrous, so we are far from the ill\nmanners of reflecting on his person, or calling him an idolater: for\nas every man that reports a lie, is not for that to be called a liar;\nso that, though the ordering the intention, and the prejudice of a\nmis-persuasion, are such abatements, that we will not rashly take on us\nto call every man of the church of Rome an idolater; yet, on the other\nhand, we can never lay down our charge against the church of Rome as\nguilty of idolatry, unless at the same time we part with our religion.\"\n\nWe cannot suppose that Burnet was insensible to the poignancy of\nDryden's satire; for, although he attempts to treat the poem with\ncontempt, in the defence of his \"Reflections on Varillas' History,\"\nhis coarse and virulent character of the poet plainly shows his inward\nfeelings. \"I have been informed from England, that a gentleman, who\nis known both for poetry and other things, had spent three months in\ntranslating M. Varillas's History; but that, as soon as my Reflections\nappeared, he discontinued his labour, finding the credit of his author\nwas gone. Now, if he thinks it is recovered by his Answer, he will\nperhaps go on with his translation; and this may be, for aught I know,\nas good an entertainment for him as the conversation that he had set on\nbetween the Hinds and Panthers, and all the rest of animals, for whom\nM. Varillas may serve well enough for an author: and this history and\nthat poem are such extraordinary things of their kind, that it will\nbe but suitable to see the author of the worst poem, become likewise\nthe translator of the worst history, that the age has produced. If his\ngrace and his wit improve both proportionably, he will hardly find that\nhe has gained much by the change he has made, from having no religion\nto choose one of the worst. It is true, he had something to sink from,\nin matter of wit; but as for his morals, it is scarce possible for him\nto grow a worse man than he was. He has lately wreaked his malice on\nme for spoiling his three months' labour; but in it he has done me all\nthe honour that any man can receive from him, which is to be railed at\nby him. If I had ill-nature enough to prompt me to wish a very bad wish\nfor him, it should be, that he would go on and finish his translation.\nBy that it will appear, whether the English nation, which is the most\ncompetent judge in this matter, has, upon the seeing our debate,\npronounced in M. Varillas's favour, or in mine. It is true, Mr D. will\nsuffer a little by it; but at least it will serve to keep him in from\nother extravagancies; and if he gains little honour by this work, yet\nhe cannot lose so much by it, as he has done by his last employment.\"\n\n\nNote XXXIV.\n\n    _They long their fellow-subjects to enthral,\n    Their patron's promise into question call,\n    And vainly think he meant to make them lords of all._ P. 236.\n\nPart of the controversy which now raged, turned on the precise meaning\nof the king's promise, to maintain the church of England as by law\nestablished. The church party insisted, that the Declaration of\nIndulgence was a breach of this promise, as it suspended their legal\nsafeguards, the test and penal laws. The advocates for the toleration\nanswered, that the promise was conditional, and depended on the church\nconsenting to the abrogation of these laws. This was stated by Penn, in\nhis \"Good Advice;\" to which the following indignant answer is made by a\nchampion of the church, perhaps Burnet himself:\n\n\"And if there be no other way of giving the king an opportunity of\nkeeping his word with the church of England, in preserving her, and\nmaintaining our religion, but the repealing of the penal and test laws,\nas he intimates unto us, (Good Advice, p. 50.) we have not found the\nroyal faith so sacred and inviolable in other instances, as to rob\nourselves of a legal defence and protection, for to depend upon the\nprecarious one of a base promise, which his ghostly fathers, whensoever\nthey find it convenient, will tell him it was unlawful to make, and\nwhich he can have a dispensation for the breaking of, at what time\nhe pleaseth. Nor do we remember, that when he pledged his faith unto\nus, in so many promises, that the parting with our laws was declared\nto be the condition upon which he made, and undertook to perform\nthem. Neither can any have the confidence to allege it, without having\nrecourse to the Papal doctrine of mental reservation. Which being one\nof the principles of that order, under whose conduct he is, makes us\njustly afraid to rely upon his word without further security. However,\nwe do hereby see, with what little sincerity Mr Penn writes; and what\nsmall regard he hath to his majesty's honour, when he tells the church\nof England, that if she please, and like the terms of giving up the\npenal and test laws against Papists, that then the king will perform\nhis word with her; (Good Advice, p. 17.) but that otherwise, it is she\nwho breaks with him, and not he with her.\" (_Ibid._ p. 44.)\n\n\nNote XXXV.\n\n    _Then, all maturely weighed, pronounced a doom\n    Of sacred strength for every age to come.\n    By this the Doves their wealth and state possess,\n    No rights infringed, but license to oppress._--P. 237.\n\nThe declaration for liberty of conscience was a strange and\nincongruous, as well as most impolitic performance. It set out with\ndeclaring, that although the king heartily wished that all his\nsubjects were members of the Catholic church, (which they returned,\nby heartily wishing that he were a Protestant,) yet he abhorred all\nidea of constraining conscience; and therefore, _making no doubt of\nthe concurrence of Parliament_, declared, 1. That he would protect\nand maintain the bishops, &c. of the church of England, as by law\nestablished, in the free exercise of their religion, and quiet\nenjoyment of their possessions. 2. That all execution of penal laws\nagainst non-conformists be suspended. 3. That all his majesty's\nsubjects should be at liberty to serve God after their own way,\nin public and private, so nothing was preached against the royal\nauthority. 4. That the oaths of supremacy and allegiance, and the tests\nmade in the 25th and 30th years of Charles II., be discontinued. 5.\nThat all non-conformists be pardoned for former offences against the\npenal laws and test. 6. That abbey and church lands be assured to the\npossessors.\n\nSuch were the contents of this memorable Declaration, in which\na bigotted purpose was cloaked under professions of the highest\nliberality; and prevarication and falsehood were rendered more\ndisgusting, by being mingled with very unseasonable truth.\n\n\nNote XXXVI.\n\n    _Concluding well within his kingly breast,\n    His fowls of nature too unjustly were opprest;\n    He therefore makes all birds, of every sect,\n    Free of his farm._--P. 237.\n\nWhen the king had irreconcileably quarrelled with the church, he began\nto affect a great favour for the dissenters; and, as has been often\nhinted, endeavoured to represent the measure of universal toleration\nto be intended as much for the benefit of the Protestant dissenters as\nof the Catholics. He dwelt upon the rigour of the church courts, and\ndirected an inquiry to be made into all the vexatious suits which had\nbeen instituted against the dissenters, and the compositions which had\nbeen exacted from them, under pretence of enforcing the laws. In short,\nBurnet assures us, that the royal bed-chamber and drawing-room were as\nfull of stories to the prejudice of the clergy, as they used formerly\nto abound with declamations against the fanatics.\n\n\nNote XXXVII.\n\n    _'Tis said, the Doves repented, though too late,\n    Become the smiths of their own foolish fate;\n    Nor did their owner hasten their ill hour,\n    But, sunk in credit, they decreased in power;\n    Like snows in warmth that mildly pass away,\n    Dissolving in the silence of decay._--P. 238.\n\nIn the preceding lines, the poet had intimated the increase of trade\nand wealth; an effect of toleration, much dwelt upon in James's\nproclamation for liberty of conscience, and, indeed, the ostensible\ncause of its being issued. But Dryden, as every one else, further\naugured from the Declaration of Indulgence, under the circumstances of\nthe time, the speedy downfall of the church of England, though he is\nwilling to spare the king the odium of hastening what he represents as\nthe natural consequence of her own ambition and intolerance. A writer\nof his party is less scrupulous in expressing the king's intentions:\n\"So, on the whole matter, the loyal church of England must either\nchange her old principles of loyalty, and take example by her Catholic\nneighbours, how to behave herself towards a prince who is not of her\npersuasion, or she must give his majesty leave not to nourish a snake\nin his own bosom, but rather to withdraw his royal protection, which\nwas promised on account of her constant fidelity: For it is an approved\naxiom in philosophy, _Cessante causa, tollitur effectus_; and we have\na common saying of our own, _No longer_ _pipe, no longer dance_. And\nnow let us leave the holy mother church at liberty to consult what new\nmeasures of loyalty she ought to take for her own dear interest, and,\nfor aught I know, it may be worth her serious consideration.\"--_New\nTest of the Church of England's Loyalty._\n\n\nNote XXXVIII.\n\n    _But each have separate interests of their own;\n    Two Czars are one too many for a throne.\n    Nor can the usurper long abstain from food;\n    Already he has tasted Pigeon's blood,\n    And may be tempted to his former fare._--P. 239.\n\nDryden insinuates the improbability, that the high and low church\nparty would long continue in union, since the authority assumed by\nBurnet, their present advocate, was inconsistent with that of Sancroft\nthe primate, Compton bishop of London, and other leaders of the high\nchurch party among the clergy. He resumes the theme of Burnet's alleged\ndisinclination for episcopacy. In fact, although his lot cast him\ninto the church of England, the bishop of Sarum, in many parts of his\nwritings, expresses an unfavourable opinion of her clergy, whom in\none place he calls the most remiss of any in Europe. Even this harsh\nexpression is nothing to the following account of the controversy\nbetween the clergy and dissenters, as it stands in the MS. of his\nhistory; for it is greatly softened in the printed copy:\n\n\"Many books came out likewise against the church of England. This\nalarmed the bishops and clergy much; so that they set up to preach\nagainst rebellion, and the late times, in such a strain, that it was\nvisible they meant a parallel between these and the present time.\nAnd this produced at last that heat and rage into which the clergy\nhas run so far, that it is like to end very fatally. They, on their\npart, should have shewed more temper, and more of the spirit of the\ngospel; whereas, for the greatest part, they are the worst natured,\nthe fiercest, indiscreetest, and most persecuting sort of people that\nare in the nation. There is a sort of them do so aspire to preferment,\nthat there is nothing so mean and indecent that they will not do to\ncompass it; and when they have got into preferments, they take no care,\neither of themselves, or of the flocks committed to their charge, but\ndo generally neglect their parishes. If they are rich enough, they hire\nsome pitiful curate, at as low a price as they can, and turn all over\non him; or, if their income will not bear out that, they perform the\npublic offices in the slightest manner they can, but take no care of\ntheir people in the way of private instruction or admonition; and so do\nnothing to justify the character of pastors or watchmen, that feed the\nsouls of their people, or watch over them. And they allow themselves\nin many indecent liberties, of going to taverns and ale-houses, and\nof railing scurrilously against all that differ from them: and they\ncherish the profaneness of their people, if they but come to church,\nand rail with them against the dissenters; and are implacably set\non the ruin of all that separate from them, if the course of their\nlives were otherwise ever so good and unblameable. In a word, many\nof them are a reproach to Christianity and to their profession;\nand are now, perhaps, one of the most corrupt bodies of men in the\nnation.\"--_Somers' Tracts_, p. 116.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 264: A New Test of the Church of England's Loyalty.]\n\n[Footnote 265:\n\n    Blue bonnet lords, a numerous store,\n    Whose best example is, they're poor;\n    Merely drawn in by hope of gains,\n    And reap their scandal for their pains;\n    Half-starved at court with expectation,  }\n    Forced to return to their Scotch station,}\n    Despised and scorned by every nation.    }\n\n    _The New Converts._\n]\n\n[Footnote 266:\n\n    This put the heathen priesthood in a flame,\n    For priests of all religions are the same.\n\n    _Absalom and Achitophel_, Part I.\n]\n\n[Footnote 267: A Vindication of the Answer to some late Papers.]\n\n[Footnote 268: A Vindication of the Answer to some late Papers, p. 116.]\n\n[Footnote 269: _Ibidem_, p. 117.--Stillingfleet plays on this\nexpression of the _grim logician_, in allusion to a passage of our\nauthor's \"Defence of the Duchess of York's Paper;\" where he says, \"That\nthe kingdom of heaven is not only for the wise and learned,\" and that\n\"our Saviour's disciples were but poor fishermen; and we read but of\none of his apostles who was bred up at the feet of Gamaliel, and that\npoor people have souls to save, as precious in the sight of God as the\n_grim logician's_.\" Dryden retorts it upon him in the text.]\n\n[Footnote 270: A Vindication, &c. p. 1.]\n\n[Footnote 271: _Ergoteering_ was a phrase used by Dryden in his\n\"Defence of the Duchess's Paper,\" and which Stillingfleet harps upon\nthroughout his \"Vindication.\"]\n\n[Footnote 272: Ralph's History, Vol. I. p. 933.--Secret Consults, &c.\nof the Roman Party, p. 59.]\n\n[Footnote 273: \"One Petre, descended from a noble family; a man of no\nlearning, nor any way famed for his virtue, but who made up all in\nboldness and zeal, was the Jesuit of them all, that seemed animated\nwith the most courage.\"--BURNET.]\n\n[Footnote 274: \"We have,\" says one of the order, \"a good while begun\nto get footing in England. We teach humanity at Lincoln, Norwich, and\nYork. At Warwick, we have a public chapel secured from all injuries by\nthe king's soldiers; we have also bought some houses of the city of\nWiggorn, in the province of Lancaster. The Catholic cause very much\nincreaseth. In some Catholic churches, upon holidays, above 1500 are\nalways numbered present at the sermon. At London, likewise, things\nsucceed no worse. Every holiday, or preaching, people are so frequent,\nthat many of the chapels cannot contain them. Two of our fathers,\nDarmes and Berfall, do constantly say mass before the king and queen.\nFather Edmund Newill, before the queen-dowager, Father Alexander Regnes\nin the chapel of the ambassador aforesaid, others in other places. Many\nhouses are bought for the college in the Savoy, as they call it, nigh\nSomerset-house, London, the palace of the queen-dowager, to the value\nof about eighteen thousand florins; in making of which, after the form\nof a college, they labour very hard, that the schools may be opened\nbefore Easter.\" A Letter from a Jesuit at Liege. _Somers' Tracts_, p.\n248. About this letter, see Burnet's History, Vol. I. p. 711. The king\nalso granted the manor of York to Lawson, a priest, for thirty years,\nas a seminary for the education of youth in the Catholic faith; to the\ngreat displeasure of Sir John Reresby, the governor of the city, who\nhad fitted it up for his own residence. See his _Memoirs_, pp. 245,\n246.]\n\n[Footnote 275: So says the memorable \"Test of the Church of England's\nLoyalty.\"]\n\n[Footnote 276: New Test, &c.]\n\n[Footnote 277: Roman Catholic Principles, 1680.]\n\n[Footnote 278: There is a copy of this old caricature print in\nLuttrell's Collection.]\n\n[Footnote 279: History of his Own Times, Vol. I. p. 280.]\n\n[Footnote 280: See Burnet's Life, by his Son, p. 686.]\n\n[Footnote 281: See Dr Flexman's catalogue of his works, under the head\n\"Tracts, Political, Polemical, and Miscellaneous.\"]\n\n[Footnote 282: Mr B--ty, vice-chamberlain.]\n\n[Footnote 283: Notes on the Ph\u0153nix Pastoral Letter, _Johnson's Works_,\npp. 317, 318.]\n\n[Footnote 284: The Declaration of Indulgence. See Vol. IX. p. 447.]\n\n\n\n\nBRITANNIA REDIVIVA:\n\nA POEM\n\nON\n\nTHE BIRTH OF THE PRINCE,\n\n(BORN 10TH JUNE, 1688.)\n\n    _Di patrii indigetes, et Romule, Vestaque mater,\n    Qu\u00e6 Tuscum Tyberim et Romana palatia servas,\n    Hunc saltem everso puerum succurrere s\u00e6clo\n    Ne prohibete! satis jampridem sanguine nostro\n    Laomedonte\u00e6 luimus perjuria Troj\u00e6._\n\n    VIRG. GEORG. 1.\n\n\n\n\nBRITANNIA REDIVIVA.\n\n\nThe remarkable incident, which gave rise to the following poem, was\nhailed by the Catholics with the most unbounded joy. That party,\nwhose transient prosperity depended upon the declining life of James\nII., could hardly enjoy their present power, embittered as it was by\nthe reflection, that it must end with the reign of the king and the\nsuccession of the Princess of Orange. Many circumstances seemed to\nrender the hopes of the king having a male heir of his body extremely\nprecarious. His system was said to have been injured by early\ndissipation, and he was now advanced in life. The queen, also, had been\nin a bad state of health; had lost all her children soon after they\nwere born; and had now, for several years, ceased to have any. Amidst\nthese discouraging considerations, the queen's pregnancy was announced\nin 1687; and even before his birth, addressers and panegyrists in verse\nhailed the future prince, as a pledge for the maintenance of liberty of\nconscience, and the security of the royal line.[285]\n\nBut the Catholics were so transported with this unexpected happiness,\nthat they could not refrain from spreading an hundred follies, tending\nto connect the queen's pregnancy with the efficacy of the king's faith.\nSome said, that the queen's conception took place at the very time\nwhen her mother made a vow to the Lady of Loretto, that her daughter\nmight by her means have a son: Others attributed it to the queen's\npersonal influence with Saint Xavier: Others to the intercessions of\nthe Jesuits, among whom the king had enrolled himself: All ascribed\nso happy and unhoped an event to something more than mere natural\ncauses, and ventured to presage, that the joyful fruit of the queen's\nconception would prove a son, since otherwise, it was said, God would\nhave done his work by halves.[286] It is dangerous for a religious\nsect to cry, a miracle! for it is always echoed by their adversaries,\nshouting out, an imposture! The same circumstances which induced the\nCatholics to believe that this happy event was owing to a peculiar\ndivine interposition, led the nation to ascribe so unexpected and\nopportune an occurrence to artifice and imposition; and they were\nprepared to pronounce a birth spurious, which their adversaries had\nincautiously pushed to the verge of miraculous.\n\nOn the 10th of June, 1688, the prince was born, under circumstances\nwhich ought to have removed all suspicion of imposture. But these\nsuspicions were too deeply rooted in party prejudices and fears; and it\nbecame a distinguishing mark of a true Protestant, to hold for spurious\nthe birth of a prince, which took place in the presence of more people\nthan is either consistent with custom or decency.\n\nIn the mean while, public rejoicings, of the most splendid kind,\nwere solemnized at home and abroad;[287] and the poets flocked with\ntheir addresses of congratulation[288] on the birth of a Prince of\nWales, who was doomed shortly to be distinguished through the English\ndominions by the ignominious appellation of Pretender, and abroad, by\nthe dubious title of Chevalier de St George. It was peculiarly the part\nof our author, as poet-laureat, and a good Catholic, to solemnize an\nevent of so much importance to the king, and those of his religion, and\nto bear down, if possible, the popular prejudice by the exertion of his\npoetical powers. \"Britannia Rediviva\" was written, nine days after the\nevent celebrated, and published accordingly. It is licensed on the 19th\nof June.\n\nIn this poem, our author assumes the tone and feeling which we\nhave described as general among the Catholics, upon this happy and\nunexpected event. It is less an address of congratulation than a solemn\ndevotional hymn; and, even considered as such, abounds with expressions\nof awful gratitude, rather for a miraculous interposition of heaven\nand the blessed saints, than for a blessing conferred through the\nordinary course of nature. Dryden, who knew how to assume every style\nthat fitted the occasion, writes here in the character of a devout and\ngrateful Catholic, with much of the _unction_ which marks the hymns of\nthe Roman church. In English poetry, we have hardly another example of\nthe peculiar tone which the invocation of saints, and an enthusiastic\nfaith in the mystic doctrines of the Catholic faith, can give to\npoetry. To me, I confess, that communion seems to offer the same\nfacilities to the poet, which it has been long famous for affording\nto the painter; and the \"Britannia Rediviva,\" while it celebrates the\nmystic influence of the sacred festivals of the Paraclete and the\nTrinity, and introduces the warlike forms of St Michael and St George,\nhas often reminded me of one of the ancient altar pieces, which it is\nimpossible to regard without reverence, though presenting miracles\nwhich never happened, or saints who never existed. These subordinate\ndivinities are something upon which the imagination, dazzled and\noverwhelmed by the contemplation of a single Omnipotent Being, can\nfairly rest and expand itself. They approach nearer to humanity and\nto comprehension; yet are sufficiently removed from both, to have\nthe full effect of sublime obscurity. Dryden has undoubtedly reaped\nconsiderable advantage from religion in the present poem. It must,\nhowever, be owned, that the effect of these passages is much injured\nby the frequent allusion to the deities of classical mythology; and\nthat Dryden has ranked the gods and goddesses of ancient Rome with the\nsaints of her modern church, in the same indiscriminate order in which\nthey are classed in the Pantheon. We have the Giants' War immediately\npreceding the miracle wrought on the Shunamite's son; and the serpents\nof the infant Hercules are classed in the very sentence with the\ndragons of the Apocalypse. On one occasion he has stooped yet lower,\nand condescended to pun upon the child's being born on Trinity Sunday,\nas promising at least a _trine_ of infant princes.\n\nStill, however, the strain of the poem is, upon the whole, grave and\nexalted. Besides the general tone of \"Britannia Rediviva,\" there are\nmany passages in it deserving the reader's attention. The address\nto the queen, beginning, \"But you, propitious queen,\" has all the\nsmoothness with which Dryden could vary the masculine character of his\ngeneral poetry, when he addressed the female sex, and forms a marked\ncontrast to the more majestic tone of the rest of the piece. It may\nindeed be said of Dryden, as he himself says of Virgil, that though he\nis smooth where smoothness is required, yet he is so far from affecting\nthat general character, that he seems rather to disdain it.\n\nThe original edition of the \"Britannia Rediviva\" is in quarto, printed,\nas usual, for Tonson, with a motto from the first book of the Georgics,\nwhich is now restored. The concluding lines refer to the death of so\nmany Catholics by the perjured evidences of Oates and Bedlow:\n\n    ---- _satis jampridem sanguine nostro\n    Laomedonte\u00e6 luimus_ perjuria _Troj\u00e6._\n\nThe word _perjuria_, as well as _Puerum_, in the preceding passage,\nare marked by a difference of type; a mode of soliciting the attention\nof the reader to a pointed remark or inuendo, which was first used in\nCharles II.'s time, and seems to have been introduced by L'Estrange,\nwho carried it to a most extravagant degree, chequering his Observators\nwith all manner of characters, from the Roman to the Anglo-Saxon.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 285: The addresses of the grand juries of the counties of\nMonmouth, Stafford, Glocester, Yorkshire, &c. &c., all pressed forward\nupon this occasion, and are all positive that the blessed hope of the\nqueen's womb must necessarily prove a son, since the king seemed to\nhave very little occasion for more daughters. Edmund Arwaker is of the\nsame opinion, in his poem humbly dedicated to the queen, on occasion of\nher majesty's happy conception.]\n\n[Footnote 286: \"That which does us most harm with the lords and great\nmen, is the apprehension of a heretic successor: For as a lord told me\nlately, assure me of a Catholic successor, and I assure you I and my\nfamily will be so too. To this purpose the queen's happy delivery will\nbe of very great moment. Our zealous Catholics do already lay two to\none that it will be a prince. God does nothing by halves, and every\nday masses are said upon this very occasion.\"--_Letter from Father\nPetre to Father La Chaise._ This letter is a forgery, but it distinctly\nexpresses the hopes and apprehensions of both parties.]\n\n[Footnote 287: The most remarkable were celebrated at the Hague, by\nthe Marquis of Abbeville, his majesty's ambassador there. On one side\nof a triumphal arch were the figures of Truth and Justice, with this\ninscription: _Veritas et Justitia fulcimentum throni Patris et erunt\nmei_: On the other side were Religion and Liberty embracing, with\nthis motto, _Religio et Libertas amplexat\u00e6 erant_. On the portico was\npainted the conquest of the dragon by St George, and the delivery\nof St Margaret, explained to allude to the liberty of conscience\nprocured by James's abolition of the test and penal laws. These\ndecorations, remarkable for their import, and the place in which they\nwere exhibited, were accompanied with the discharge of fire-works, and\nother public rejoicings. There are particular accounts of the splendid\nrejoicings at Ratisbon and Paris, &c. &c. in the Gazettes of the\nperiod.]\n\n[Footnote 288: As for example, the poets of Isis, in a collection\ncalled \"_Stren\u00e6 Nataliti\u00e6 in Celsissimum principem.--Oxoni; E Theatro\nShedoniano, 1688_.\" Consisting of Latin, Greek, Arabic, and Turkish,\npastoral, heroic, and lyrical pieces, on this happy topic.\n\nThe following poems are in the Luttrell Collection:\n\n    \"_Votum pro Principe._\n\n    \"To the King, upon the Queen's being delivered of a Son; by John Baber,\n    Esq.\n\n    \"To the King, on ditto; by William Niven, late master of the music\n    school of Inverness, in Scotland.\" Surely the very _ultima_ Thule\n      of poetry.\n\n    \"A Congratulatory Poem on ditto, by Mrs Behn.\n\n    \"A Pindarique Ode on ditto, by Calib Calle.\"\n]\n\n\n\n\nBRITANNIA REDIVIVA.\n\n\n    Our vows are heard betimes, and heaven takes care\n    To grant, before we can conclude the prayer;\n    Preventing angels met it half the way,\n    And sent us back to praise, who came to pray.\n      Just on the day, when the high-mounted sun\n    Did farthest in its northern progress run,[289]\n    He bended forward, and even stretched the sphere\n    Beyond the limits of the lengthened year,\n    To view a brighter sun in Britain born;      }\n    That was the business of his longest morn;   }\n    The glorious object seen, 'twas time to turn.}\n      Departing spring could only stay to shed}\n    Her gloomy beauties on the genial bed,    }\n    But left the manly summer in her stead,   }\n    With timely fruit the longing land to cheer,\n    And to fulfil the promise of the year.\n    Betwixt two seasons comes the auspicious heir,\n    This age to blossom, and the next to bear.\n      Last solemn Sabbath[290] saw the church attend,\n    The Paraclete in fiery pomp descend;\n    But when his wonderous octave[291] rolled again,\n    He brought a royal infant in his train:\n    So great a blessing to so good a king,\n    None but the Eternal Comforter could bring.\n      Or did the mighty Trinity conspire,\n    As once in council to create our sire?\n    It seems as if they sent the new-born guest,\n    To wait on the procession of their feast;\n    And on their sacred anniverse decreed\n    To stamp their image on the promised seed.\n    Three realms united, and on one bestowed,\n    An emblem of their mystic union showed;\n    The Mighty Trine the triple empire shared,\n    As every person would have one to guard.\n      Hail, son of prayers! by holy violence\n    Drawn down from heaven;[292] but long be banished thence,\n    And late to thy paternal skies retire!\n    To mend our crimes, whole ages would require;\n    To change the inveterate habit of our sins,\n    And finish what thy godlike sire begins.\n    Kind heaven, to make us Englishmen again,\n    No less can give us than a patriarch's reign.\n      The sacred cradle to your charge receive,\n    Ye seraphs, and by turns the guard relieve;\n    Thy father's angel, and thy father join,\n    To keep possession, and secure the line;\n    But long defer the honours of thy fate;\n    Great may they be like his, like his be late,\n    That James this running century may view,\n    And give this son an auspice to the new.\n      Our wants exact at least that moderate stay;  }\n    For, see the dragon[293] winged on his way,     }\n    To watch the travail,[294] and devour the prey: }\n    Or, if allusions may not rise so high,   }\n    Thus, when Alcides raised his infant cry,}\n    The snakes besieged his young divinity;  }\n    But vainly with their forked tongues they threat,\n    For opposition makes a hero great.\n    To needful succour all the good will run,\n    And Jove assert the godhead of his son.\n      O still repining at your present state,\n    Grudging yourselves the benefits of fate;\n    Look up, and read in characters of light\n    A blessing sent you in your own despite!\n    The manna falls, yet that celestial bread,\n    Like Jews, you munch, and murmur while you feed.\n    May not your fortune be, like theirs, exiled,\n    Yet forty years to wander in the wild!\n    Or, if it be, may Moses live at least,\n    To lead you to the verge of promised rest!\n      Though poets are not prophets, to foreknow\n    What plants will take the blight, and what will grow,\n    By tracing heaven, his footsteps may be found;\n    Behold, how awfully he walks the round!\n    God is abroad, and, wondrous in his ways,\n    The rise of empires, and their fall, surveys;\n    More, might I say, than with an usual eye,          }\n    He sees his bleeding church in ruins lie,           }\n    And hears the souls of saints beneath his altar cry.}\n    Already has he lifted high the sign,\n    Which crowned the conquering arms of Constantine.[295]\n    The moon[296] grows pale at that presaging sight,\n    And half her train of stars have lost their light.\n      Behold another Sylvester,[297] to bless\n    The sacred standard, and secure success;\n    Large of his treasures, of a soul so great,\n    As fills and crowds his universal seat.\n    Now view at home a second Constantine;[298]\n    (The former too was of the British line,)\n    Has not his healing balm your breaches closed,\n    Whose exile many sought, and few opposed?[299]\n    O, did not heaven, by its eternal doom,\n    Permit those evils, that this good might come?\n    So manifest, that even the moon-eyed sects\n    See whom and what this Providence protects.\n    Methinks, had we within our minds no more\n    Than that one shipwreck on the fatal Ore,[300]\n    That only thought may make us think again,\n    What wonders God reserves for such a reign.\n    To dream, that chance his preservation wrought,\n    Were to think Noah was preserved for nought;\n    Or the surviving eight were not designed\n    To people earth, and to restore their kind.\n      When humbly on the royal babe we gaze,\n    The manly lines of a majestic face\n    Give awful joy; 'tis paradise to look\n    On the fair frontispiece of nature's book:\n    If the first opening page so charms the sight,\n    Think how the unfolded volume will delight!\n      See how the venerable[301] infant lies\n    In early pomp; how through the mother's eyes\n    The father's soul, with an undaunted view,\n    Looks out, and takes our homage as his due!\n    See on his future subjects how he smiles,\n    Nor meanly flatters, nor with craft beguiles;\n    But with an open face, as on his throne,\n    Assures our birthrights, and assumes his own\n    Born in broad day-light, that the ungrateful rout\n    May find no room for a remaining doubt;[302]\n    Truth, which itself is light, does darkness shun,\n    And the true eaglet safely dares the sun.\n      Fain[303] would the fiends have made a dubious birth,\n    Loth to confess the godhead clothed in earth;\n    But, sickened, after all their baffled lies,\n    To find an heir apparent in the skies,\n    Abandoned to despair, still may they grudge,\n    And, owning not the Saviour, prove the judge.\n      Not great \u00c6neas stood in plainer day,[304]\n    When the dark mantling mist dissolved away;\n    He to the Tyrians showed his sudden face,\n    Shining with all his goddess mother's grace;\n    For she herself had made his countenance bright,\n    Breathed honour on his eyes, and her own purple light.\n      If our victorious Edward,[305] as they say,\n    Gave Wales a prince on that propitious day,\n    Why may not years revolving with his fate\n    Produce his like, but with a longer date;\n    One, who may carry to a distant shore\n    The terror that his famed forefather bore?\n    But why should James, or his young hero, stay\n    For slight presages of a name or day?\n    We need no Edward's fortune to adorn\n    That happy moment when our prince was born;\n    Our prince adorns this day, and ages hence\n    Shall wish his birth-day for some future prince.\n      Great Michael,[306] prince of all the etherial hosts,\n    And whate'er inborn saints our Britain boasts;\n    And thou, the adopted patron[307] of our isle,\n    With cheerful aspects on this infant smile!\n    The pledge of heaven, which, dropping from above,\n    Secures our bliss, and reconciles his love.\n      Enough of ills our dire rebellion wrought,[308]\n    When to the dregs we drank the bitter draught;\n    Then airy atoms did in plagues conspire,              }\n    Nor did the avenging angel yet retire,                }\n    But purged our still-increasing crimes with fire.[309]}\n    Then perjured plots,[310] the still impending test,[311]\n    And worse--[312] but charity conceals the rest.\n    Here stop the current of the sanguine flood;\n    Require not, gracious God! thy martyrs' blood;\n    But let their dying pangs, their living toil,\n    Spread a rich harvest through their native soil;\n    A harvest ripening for another reign,\n    Of which this royal babe may reap the grain.\n      Enough of early Saints one womb has given,\n    Enough increased the family of heaven;[313]\n    Let them for his and our atonement go,\n    And, reigning blest above, leave him to rule below.\n      Enough already has the year foreslowed\n    His wonted course, the sea has overflowed,\n    The meads were floated with a weeping spring,\n    And frightened birds in woods forgot to sing;\n    The strong-limbed steed beneath his harness faints,\n    And the same shivering sweat his lord attaints.[314]\n    When will the minister of wrath give o'er?\n    Behold him at Araunah's threshing-floor!\n    He stops, and seems to sheath his flaming brand,\n    Pleased with burnt incense from our David's hand;[315]\n    David has bought the Jebusite's abode,\n    And raised an altar to the living God.\n      Heaven, to reward him, makes his joys sincere;}\n    No future ills nor accidents appear,            }\n    To sully and pollute the sacred infant's year.  }\n    Five months to discord and debate were given;[316]\n    He sanctifies the yet remaining seven.\n    Sabbath of months! henceforth in him be blest,\n    And prelude to the realms perpetual rest!\n      Let his baptismal drops for us atone;[317]\n    Lustrations for offences not his own:\n    Let conscience, which is interest ill disguised,[318]\n    In the same font be cleansed, and all the land baptized.\n      Unnamed[319] as yet; at least unknown to fame;\n    Is there a strife in heaven about his name,\n    Where every famous predecessor vies,\n    And makes a faction for it in the skies?\n    Or must it be reserved to thought alone?\n    Such was the sacred Tetragrammaton.[320]\n    Things worthy silence must not be revealed;\n    Thus the true name of Rome[321] was kept concealed,\n    To shun the spells and sorceries of those,\n    Who durst her infant majesty oppose.\n    But when his tender strength in time shall rise\n    To dare ill tongues, and fascinating eyes,\n    This isle, which hides the little Thunderer's fame,\n    Shall be too narrow to contain his name:\n    The artillery of heaven shall make him known;\n    Crete[322] could not hold the god, when Jove was grown.\n      As Jove's increase,[323] who from his brain was born,\n    Whom arms and arts did equally adorn,\n    Free of the breast was bred, whose milky taste\n    Minerva's name to Venus had debased;\n    So this imperial babe rejects the food,\n    That mixes monarch's with plebeian blood:[324]\n    Food that his inborn courage might controul,\n    Extinguish all the father in his soul,\n    And for his Estian race, and Saxon strain,\n    Might reproduce some second Richard's reign.\n    Mildness he shares from both his parents' blood;\n    But kings too tame are despicably good:\n    Be this the mixture of this regal child,\n    By nature manly, but by virtue mild.\n      Thus far the furious transport of the news\n    Had to prophetic madness fired the muse;\n    Madness ungovernable, uninspired,\n    Swift to foretel whatever she desired.\n    Was it for me the dark abyss to tread,\n    And read the book which angels cannot read?\n    How was I punished, when the sudden blast[325]\n    The face of heaven, and our young sun, o'ercast!\n    Fame, the swift ill increasing as she rolled,\n    Disease, despair, and death, at three reprises told:\n    At three insulting strides she stalked the town,\n    And, like contagion, struck the loyal down.\n    Down fell the winnowed wheat; but, mounted high,\n    The whirlwind bore the chaff, and hid the sky.\n    Here black rebellion shooting from below,       }\n    (As earth's gigantic brood by moments grow,)    }\n    And here the sons of God are petrified with woe:}\n    An apoplex of grief! so low were driven\n    The saints, as hardly to defend their heaven.\n      As, when pent vapours run their hollow round,\n    Earthquakes, which are convulsions of the ground,\n    Break bellowing forth, and no confinement brook,\n    Till the third settles what the former shook;\n    Such heavings had our souls, till, slow and late,\n    Our life with his returned, and faith prevailed on fate.\n    By prayers the mighty blessing was implored,\n    To prayers was granted, and by prayers restored.\n      So, ere the Shunamite a son conceived,\n    The prophet promised, and the wife believed;\n    A son was sent, the son so much desired,\n    But soon upon the mother's knees expired.\n    The troubled seer approached the mournful door,\n    Ran, prayed, and sent his pastoral staff before,\n    Then stretched his limbs upon the child, and mourned,\n    Till warmth, and breath, and a new soul returned.[326]\n      Thus mercy stretches out her hand, and saves\n    Desponding Peter, sinking in the waves.\n      As when a sudden storm of hail and rain\n    Beats to the ground the yet unbearded grain,\n    Think not the hopes of harvest are destroyed\n    On the flat field, and on the naked void;\n    The light, unloaded stem, from tempest freed,\n    Will raise the youthful honours of his head;\n    And, soon restored by native vigour, bear\n    The timely product of the bounteous year.\n      Nor yet conclude all fiery trials past,\n    For heaven will exercise us to the last;\n    Sometimes will check us in our full career,\n    With doubtful blessings, and with mingled fear,\n    That, still depending on his daily grace,\n    His every mercy for an alms may pass;\n    With sparing hands will diet us to good,\n    Preventing surfeits of our pampered blood.\n    So feeds the mother bird her craving young\n    With little morsels, and delays them long.\n      True, this last blessing was a royal feast;\n    But where's the wedding-garment on the guest?\n    Our manners, as religion were a dream,\n    Are such as teach the nations to blaspheme.\n    In lusts we wallow, and with pride we swell,\n    And injuries with injuries repel;\n    Prompt to revenge, not daring to forgive,\n    Our lives unteach the doctrine we believe.\n    Thus Israel sinned, impenitently hard,\n    And vainly thought the present ark their guard;[327]\n    But when the haughty Philistines appear,       }\n    They fled, abandoned to their foes and fear;   }\n    Their God was absent, though his ark was there.}\n    Ah! lest our crimes should snatch this pledge away,\n    And make our joys the blessings of a day!\n    For we have sinned him hence, and that he lives,\n    God to his promise, not our practice, gives.\n    Our crimes would soon weigh down the guilty scale,\n    But James and Mary, and the church prevail.\n    Nor Amalek[328] can rout the chosen bands,\n    While Hur and Aaron hold up Moses' hands.\n      By living well, let us secure his days,\n    Moderate in hopes, and humble in our ways.\n    No force the free-born spirit can constrain,\n    But charity, and great examples gain.\n    Forgiveness is our thanks for such a day;\n    'Tis godlike God in his own coin to pay.\n      But you, propitious queen, translated here,    }\n    From your mild heaven, to rule our rugged sphere,}\n    Beyond the sunny walks, and circling year;       }\n    You, who your native climate have bereft\n    Of all the virtues, and the vices left;\n    Whom piety and beauty make their boast,\n    Though beautiful is well in pious lost;\n    So lost as star-light is dissolved away,\n    And melts into the brightness of the day;\n    Or gold about the royal diadem,\n    Lost, to improve the lustre of the gem,--\n    What can we add to your triumphant day?\n    Let the great gift the beauteous giver pay;\n    For should our thanks awake the rising sun,                }\n    And lengthen, as his latest shadows run,                   }\n    That, though the longest day, would soon, too soon be done.}\n    Let angels' voices with their harps conspire,\n    But keep the auspicious infant from the choir;\n    Late let him sing above, and let us know\n    No sweeter music than his cries below.\n      Nor can I wish to you, great monarch, more\n    Than such an annual income to your store;\n    The day, which gave this unit, did not shine\n    For a less omen, than to fill the trine.\n    After a prince, an admiral beget;\n    The Royal Sovereign wants an anchor yet.\n    Our isle has younger titles still in store,   }\n    And when the exhausted land can yield no more,}\n    Your line can force them from a foreign shore.}\n      The name of great your martial mind will suit;\n    But justice is your darling attribute:\n    Of all the Greeks, 'twas but one hero's due,[329]\n    And, in him, Plutarch prophesied of you.\n    A prince's favours but on few can fall,\n    But justice is a virtue shared by all.\n      Some kings the name of conquerors have assumed,\n    Some to be great, some to be gods presumed;\n    But boundless power, and arbitrary lust,\n    Made tyrants still abhor the name of just;\n    They shunned the praise this godlike virtue gives,\n    And feared a title that reproached their lives.\n      The power, from which all kings derive their state,\n    Whom they pretend, at least, to imitate,\n    Is equal both to punish and reward;\n    For few would love their God, unless they feared.\n      Resistless force and immortality\n    Make but a lame, imperfect deity;\n    Tempests have force unbounded to destroy,\n    And deathless being even the damned enjoy;\n    And yet heaven's attributes, both last and first,\n    One without life, and one with life accurst;\n    But justice is heaven's self, so strictly he,\n    That could it fail, the godhead could not be.\n    This virtue is your own; but life and state\n    Are, one to fortune subject, one to fate:\n    Equal to all, you justly frown or smile;        }\n    Nor hopes nor fears your steady hand beguile;   }\n    Yourself our balance hold, the world's our isle.}\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 289: The 10th of June.]\n\n[Footnote 290: Whitsunday.]\n\n[Footnote 291: Trinity Sunday, the octave of Whitsunday.]\n\n[Footnote 292: Note I.]\n\n[Footnote 293: Alluding only to the commonwealth party here, and in\nother parts of the poem. DRYDEN.--See Note II.]\n\n[Footnote 294: Rev. xii. v. 4.]\n\n[Footnote 295: The Cross.]\n\n[Footnote 296: The Crescent, which the Turks bear for their arms.\nDRYDEN. Note III.]\n\n[Footnote 297: The Pope, in the time of Constantine the Great; alluding\nto the present Pope. DRYDEN.--See Note IV.]\n\n[Footnote 298: King James II.]\n\n[Footnote 299: Bill of Exclusion.]\n\n[Footnote 300: The Lemmon Ore, on which the vessel of King James was\nlost in his return from Scotland. The crew perished, and he himself\nescaped with difficulty. See Vol. IX. p. 401.]\n\n[Footnote 301: Venerable is here used in its original sense, as\ndeserving of veneration. But the epithet has been so commonly connected\nwith old age, that a modern poet would hardly venture to apply it to an\ninfant.]\n\n[Footnote 302: Note V.]\n\n[Footnote 303: Alluding to the temptation in the wilderness.]\n\n[Footnote 304:\n\n    _Restitit \u00c6neas, clar\u00e2que in luce refulsit,\n    Os, humerosque deo similis; namque ipsa decoram\n    C\u00e6sariem nato genetrix, lumenque juvent\u00e6\n    Purpureum, et l\u00e6tos oculis afflarat honores._\n\n    \u00c6neid, Lib. I.\n]\n\n[Footnote 305: Edward the Black Prince, born on Trinity Sunday.]\n\n[Footnote 306: The motto of the poem explained.]\n\n[Footnote 307: St George.]\n\n[Footnote 308: The great Civil War.]\n\n[Footnote 309: The Fire of London.]\n\n[Footnote 310: The Popish plot.]\n\n[Footnote 311: The Test-act.]\n\n[Footnote 312: The death of the Jesuits, executed for the Plot.]\n\n[Footnote 313: All the queen's former children died in infancy.]\n\n[Footnote 314: The year 1688, big with so many events of importance,\ncommenced very unfavourably with stormy weather, and an epidemical\ndistemper among men and cattle.]\n\n[Footnote 315: 1 Kings, chap, xxxiv.]\n\n[Footnote 316: Note VI.]\n\n[Footnote 317: Original sin, supposed to be washed off by baptism.]\n\n[Footnote 318: See \"The Hind and the Panther,\" p. 224.]\n\n[Footnote 319: The prince christened, but not named.]\n\n[Footnote 320: Jehovah, or the name of God, unlawful to be pronounced\nby the Jews. DRYDEN.]\n\n[Footnote 321: Some authors say, that the true name of Rome was kept a\nsecret, _ne hostes incantamentis deos elicerent_. DRYDEN.]\n\n[Footnote 322: Candia, where Jupiter was born and lived secretly.\nDRYDEN.]\n\n[Footnote 323: Pallas, or Minerva, said by the poets to have been bred\nup by hand. DRYDEN.]\n\n[Footnote 324: The prince had no wet nurse.]\n\n[Footnote 325: The sudden false report of the prince's death. See Note\nVII.]\n\n[Footnote 326: 2 Kings, chap. iv.]\n\n[Footnote 327: 1 Samuel, chap. iv. v. 10.]\n\n[Footnote 328: Exodus, chap. xvii. v. 8.]\n\n[Footnote 329: Aristides. See his Life in Plutarch.]\n\n\n\n\nNOTES\n\nON\n\nBRITANNIA REDIVIVA.\n\n\nNote I.\n\n    _Hail, son of prayers! by holy violence\n    Drawn down from heaven!_----P. 290.\n\nWe have noticed, in the introduction, that the birth of a Prince of\nWales, at a time of such critical importance to the Catholic faith,\nwas looked upon, by the Papists, as little less than miraculous. Some\ntalked of the petition of the Duchess of Modena to Our Lady of Loretto;\nand Burnet affirms, that, in that famous chapel, there is actually a\nregister of the queen's conception, in consequence of her mother's\nvow. But, in that case, the good duchess's intercession must have been\nposthumous; for she died upon the 19th July, and the queen's time\nrun from the 6th of October. Others ascribed the event to the king's\npilgrimage to St Winifred's Well; and others, among whom was the Earl\nof Melfort, suffered their zeal to hurry them into profaneness, and\nspoke of the angel of the Lord moving the Bath waters, like the Pool of\nBethsaida. But the Jesuits claimed to their own prayers the principal\nmerit of procuring this blessing, which, indeed, they had ventured to\nprophecy; for, among other devices which that order exhibited to the\nEnglish ambassador from James to the Pope, there was, according to Mr\nMisson, one of a lily, from whose leaves distilled some drops of water,\nwhich were once supposed, by naturalists, to become the seed of new\nlilies: the motto was--_Lachrimor in prolem_--\"I weep for children.\"\nBeneath which was the following distich:\n\n    _Pro natis, Jacobe, gemis, flos candide regum!\n      Hos natura tibi si neget, astra dabunt._\n\n    For sons, fair flower of kings, why melts thine eye?\n    The heavens shall grant what nature may deny.\n\n\nNote II.\n\n    _For, see the dragon winged on his way,\n    To watch the travail, and devour the prey._--P. 291.\n\n\"And the dragon stood before the woman, who was ready to be delivered,\nfor to devour her child, as soon as it was born,\"--Revel. xii. 4.\nDryden is at pains, by an original marginal note, which, with others,\nis restored in this edition, to explain, that, by this allusion here,\nand in other parts of the poem, he meant \"the commonwealth's party.\"\nThe acquittal of the bishops, on the 17th of June, two days before the\npoem was licensed, must have excited a prudential reverence for the\nchurch of England in the moment of her triumph. The poet fixes upon\nthis commonwealth party therefore, exclusively, the common reports\nwhich had been circulated during the queen's pregnancy, and which are\nthus noticed in the (supposititious) letter to Father La Chaise: \"As\nto the queen's being with child, that great concern goes as well as\nwe could wish, notwithstanding all the satirical discourses of the\nheretics, who content themselves to vent their poison in libels, which,\nby night, they disperse in the street, or fix upon the walls. There was\none lately found upon a pillar of a church, that imported, that such a\nday thanks should be given to God for the queen's being great with a\ncushion. If one of these pasquil-makers could be discovered, he would\nbut have an ill time on't, and should be made to take his last farewell\nat Tyburn.\"\n\nThe usual topics of wit, during the queen's pregnancy, were, allusions\nto a cushion, a tympany, &c. &c.; and Partridge, the Protestant\nalmanack-maker, utters the following predictions:--\"That there was some\nbawdy project on foot, either about buying, selling, or procuring, a\nchild or children, for some pious uses.\" And, again, \"Some child is to\nbe topped upon the lawful heirs, to cheat them out of their right and\nestate.\"--\"God preserve the kingdom of England from invasion! for about\nthis time I fear it in earnest, and keep the Protestants there from\nbeing dragooned.\"\n\nOne single circumstance is sufficient to rout all suspicions thus\ncarefully infused into the people. It is well known, and is noticed\nin one of L'Estrange's papers at the time, that a similar outcry was\nraised during a former pregnancy of the queen; but the child proving a\nfemale, there was no use for pushing the calumny any further upon that\noccasion.\n\n\nNote III.\n\n    _Already has he lifted high the sign,\n    Which crowned the conquering arms of Constantine;\n    The moon grows pale at that presaging sight,\n    And half her train of stars have lost their light._--P. 292.\n\nThe public exercise of the Catholic religion in England is compared\nto the miraculous display of the cross, with the motto, _In hoc signo\nvinces_; which is said to have appeared to Constantine on the eve of\nhis great victory.\n\nThe war against the Turks, which was now raging in Hungary, seems\nto have occupied much of James's attention. He amused himself with\nanxiety about the fate of this holy warfare, as he probably thought\nit, while his own crown was tottering on his head. In all his letters\nto the Prince of Orange, he expresses his wishes for the peace of\nChristendom, that the emperor and the Venetians might have leisure to\nprosecute the war against the Turks; and conjectures about the taking\nof Belgrade, and the progress of the Duke of Lorraine, are very gravely\nsent, as interesting matter to the prince, who was anticipating the\nconquest of England, and the dethronement of his father-in-law. There\nmay be something of affectation in this; but, as Dryden takes up\nthe same tone, it may be supposed to have forwarded James's general\nconversation, as well as his letters to the Prince of Orange.--_See_\nDALRYMPLE'S _Memoirs_. _Appendix to Book V._\n\n\nNote IV.\n\n    _Behold another Sylvester, to bless\n    The sacred standard, and secure success;\n    Large of his treasures, of a soul so great,\n    As fills and crowds his universal seat._--P. 292.\n\nDryden talks of the Pope with the respect of a good Catholic.\nNevertheless it happened, by a very odd chance, that, while the throne\nof England was held by a Catholic, for the first time during the course\nof a century, the chair of St Peter was occupied by Innocent XI. who\nacquired the uncommon epithet of the Protestant Pope. He received, with\ngreat coldness, the Earl of Castlemain, whom James sent to Rome as his\nambassador, and refused the only two requests which a king of England\nhad made to Rome since the days of Henry VIII., although they were only\na dispensation to Petre the king's confessor, to hold a bishopric,\nand another to the Mareschal D'Humier's daughter to marry within the\nprohibited degrees. Nay, the Pope is said to have privately admitted\nthe Prince of Orange's envoy to his confidence, while he treated\nCastlemaine with so much contempt. The cause of this coldness was the\nPope's quarrel with James's ally, Louis, and his dislike to the order\nof Jesuits, by whom the king of England was entirely ruled. In truth,\nInnocent XI. was much more anxious to maintain the privileges of the\nRoman see against those princes who retained her communion, than to add\nEngland to a flock which was become so mutinous and untractable. He\nwas, besides, a man of no extended views, and chiefly concerned himself\nwith managing the papal revenue, involved in debt by a succession of\nwasteful pontificates. To this the conversion of England promised no\nimmediate addition, and, with the narrowness of view natural to his\npursuits, Innocent XI. thought it better to employ his exertions in\nrealizing an immediate income, than in endeavouring to extend the faith\nand authority of the church, by embarking in a design of great doubt\nand hazard. He was, therefore, but a very poor representative of Pope\nSylvester. As for the last two lines, they contain, what we seldom\nmeet with in Dryden's poetry, a compliment not only bombastic, but\nunappropriate, and even unmeaning.\n\n\nNote V.\n\n    _Born in broad day-light, that the ungrateful rout\n    May find no room for a remaining doubt._--P. 293.\n\nIn these lines, and the following, where the poet, with indecent\nfreedom, compares the suspicions entertained of a spurious birth to\nthe devil's doubts concerning our Saviour's godhead, he alludes to\nthose circumstances of publicity, which one would have supposed might\nhave rendered the birth of the prince indisputable. It took place at\nten o'clock in the morning; and eighteen privy counsellors, besides a\nnumber of ladies, were present at the delivery. But the party violence\nof the period was so extravagant, as to receive and circulate a variety\nof reports, inconsistent with each other, and agreeing only in the\ngeneral conclusion, that the child was an imposition upon the nation.\nThe reasoning of the Bishop of Salisbury, on this point, is admirably\nsummed up by Smollet.\n\n\"On the 10th of June, 1688, the queen was suddenly seized with\nlabour-pains, and delivered of a son, who was baptized by the name of\nJames, and declared Prince of Wales. All the Catholics and friends of\nJames were transported with the most extravagant joy at the birth of\nthis child; while great part of the nation consoled themselves with\nthe notion, that it was altogether supposititious. They carefully\ncollected a variety of circumstances, upon which this conjecture\nwas founded; and though they were inconsistent, contradictory, and\ninconclusive, the inference was so agreeable to the views and passions\nof the people, that it made an impression which, in all probability,\nwill never be totally effaced. Dr Burnet, who seems to have been at\nuncommon pains to establish this belief, and to have consulted all the\nWhig nurses in England upon the subject, first pretends to demonstrate,\nthat the queen was not with child; secondly, that she was with child,\nbut miscarried; thirdly, that a child was brought into the queen's\napartment in a warming-pan; fourthly, that there was no child at all\nin the room; fifthly, that the queen actually bore a child, but it\ndied that same day; sixthly, that it had the fits, of which it died at\nRichmond; therefore, the Chevalier de St George must be the fruit of\nfour different impostures.\"\n\n\nNote VI.\n\n    _Five months to discord and debate were given._--P. 295.\n\nDuring the five months preceding the birth of the Chevalier de St\nGeorge, James was wholly engaged by those feuds and dissensions which\ntended to render irreparable the breach between him and his subjects.\nThe arbitrary attacks upon the privileges of Magdalen College, and\nof the Charter-House, fell nearly within this period. Above all, the\npetition of the seven bishops against reading the Declaration of\nIndulgence, their imprisonment, their memorable trial and acquittal,\nhad all taken place since the month of April; and it is well known\nto what a state of violent opposition the nation had been urged by a\ntrain of arbitrary acts of violence, so imprudently commenced, and\nperversely insisted in. Dryden, like other men of sense, probably began\nto foresee the consequences of so violent and general irritation; and\nexpresses himself in moderate and soothing language, both as to the\npast and future. Nothing is therefore dropt which can offend the church\nof England. Perhaps they may have been spared by the royal command;\nfor it seems, as is hinted by a letter from Halifax to the Prince of\nOrange, that, not finding his expectations answered by the dissenters,\nwhom he had so greatly favoured of late, James entertained thoughts of\nreturning to his old friends, the High-churchmen; \"but the truth is,\"\nhis lordship adds, \"the Papists have of late been so hard and fierce\nupon them, that the very species of those formerly mistaking men is\ndestroyed; they have so broken that loom in pieces, that they cannot\nnow set it up again to work upon it.\"--DALRYMPLE'S _Memoirs_. Appendix\nto Book V.\n\n\nNote VII.\n\n    ----_When the sudden blast,\n    The face of heaven, and our young sun, o'ercast,\n    Fame, the swift ill increasing as she rolled,\n    Disease, despair, and death, at three reprises told._--P. 297.\n\nThere was, Dryden informs us, a report of the prince's death, to which\nhe alludes. James, in a letter to the Prince of Orange, dated June 12,\nmentions the birth of his son on the Sunday preceding, and adds, \"the\nchild was somewhat ill this last night, of the wind, and some gripes,\nbut is now, blessed be God, very well, and like to have no returns\nof it, and is a strong boy.\" About this illness, Burnet tells the\nfollowing gossipping story: \"That night, one Hemings, a very worthy\nman, an apothecary by his trade, who lived in St Martin's Lane, the\nvery next door to a family of an eminent Papist, (Brown, brother to\nthe Viscount Montacute, lived there;) the wall between his parlour and\ntheir's being so thin, that he could easily hear any thing that was\nsaid with a louder voice, he (Hemings) was reading in his parlour late\nat night, when he heard one come into the neighbouring parlour, and\nsay, with a doleful voice, the Prince of Wales is dead: Upon which a\ngreat many that lived in the house came down stairs very quick. Upon\nthis confusion he could not hear any thing more; but it was plain they\nwere in a great consternation. He went with the news next morning to\nthe bishops in the Tower. The Countess of Clarendon came thither soon\nafter, and told them, she had been at the young prince's door, but\nwas denied access: she was amazed at it; and asked, if they knew her:\nthey said, they did; but that the queen had ordered, that no person\nwhatsoever should be suffered to come in to him. This gave credit to\nHemings' story; and looked as if all was ordered to be kept shut up\nclose, till another child was found. One, that saw the child two days\nafter, said to me, that he looked strong, and not like a child so newly\nborn.\"\n\nThe poem of Dryden plainly proves, that such a report was so far\nfrom being confined among the Catholics, that it was spread over\nall the town; and what the worthy Mr Hemings over-heard in his next\nneighbour's, the Papist's, might probably have been heard in any\ncompany in London that evening, although the mode of communication\nwould doubtless have been doleful or joyous, according to the party and\nreligion of the news-bearer.\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUES\n\nAND\n\nEPILOGUES.\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUES AND EPILOGUES.\n\n\nThe prologue of the English drama was originally, like that of the\nancients, merely a kind of argument of the play, instructing the\naudience concerning those particulars of the plot, which were necessary\nin order to understand the opening of the piece. That this might be\ndone more artificially, it was often spoken in the character of some\nperson connected with the preceding history of the intrigue, though\nnot properly one of the _dramatis person\u00e6_. But when increasing\nrefinement introduced the present mode of opening the action in the\ncourse of the play itself, the prologue became a preliminary address\nto the audience, bespeaking their attention and favour for the piece.\nThe epilogue had always borne this last character, being merely an\nextension of the ancient \"_valete et plaudite_;\" an opportunity seized\nby the performers, after resigning their mimic characters, to pay their\nrespects to the public in their own, and to solicit its approbation\nof their exertions. By degrees it assumed a more important shape, and\nwas indulged in descanting upon such popular topics as were likely to\ninterest the audience, even though less immediately connected with the\nactor's address of thanks, or the piece they had been performing. Both\nthe prologue and epilogue had assumed their present character so early\nas the days of Shakespeare and Jonson.\n\nWith the revival of dramatic entertainments, after the Restoration,\nthese addresses were revived also; and a degree of consequence seems\nto have been attached to them in that witty age, which they did not\npossess before, and which has not since been given to them. They were\nnot only used to propitiate the audience; to apologize for the players,\nor poet; or to satirize the follies of the day, which is now their\nchief purpose; but they became, during the collision of contending\nfactions, vehicles of political tenets and political sarcasm, which\ncould, at no time, be insinuated with more success, than when clothed\nin nervous verse, and delivered with all the advantages of elocution\nto an audience, whose numbers rendered the impression of poetry and\neloquence more contagious.\n\nIt is not surprising that Dryden soon obtained a complete and absolute\nsuperiority in this style of composition over all who pretended to\ncompete with him. While the harmony of his verse gave that advantage\nto the speaker, which was wanting in the harsh, coarse, broken measure\nof his contemporaries, his powers of reasoning and of satire left them\nas far behind in sense as in sound. This superiority, and the great\ninfluence which he had in the management of the theatre, made it usual\nto invoke his assistance in the case of new plays; many of which he\naccordingly furnished either with prologues or epilogues. The players\nalso had recourse to him upon any remarkable occasion; as, when a new\nhouse was opened; when the theatre was honoured by a visit from the\nking or duke; when they played at Oxford, during the public acts;\nor, in short, in all cases when an occasional prologue was thought\nnecessary to grace their performance.\n\nThe collection of these pieces, which follows, is far from being the\nleast valuable part of our author's labours. The variety and richness\nof fancy which they indicate, is one of Dryden's most remarkable\npoetical attributes. Whether the theme be, the youth and inexperience\nor the age and past services, of the author; the plainness or\nmagnificence of a new theatre; the superiority of ancient authors, or\nthe exaltation of the moderns; the censure of political faction, or\nof fashionable follies; the praise of the monarch, or the ridicule\nof the administration; the poet never fails to treat it with the\nliveliness appropriate to verses intended to be spoken, and spoken\nbefore a numerous assembly. The manner which Dryden assumes, varies\nalso with the nature of his audience. The prologues and epilogues,\nintended for the London stage, are written in a tone of superiority,\nas if the poet, conscious of the justice of his own laws of criticism,\nrather imposed them upon the public as absolute and undeniable,\nthan as standing in need of their ratification. And if he sometimes\ncondescends to solicit, in a more humble style, the approbation of the\naudience, and to state circumstances of apology, and pleas of favour,\nit is only in the case of other poets; for, in the prologues of his\nown plays, he always rather demands than begs their applause; and if\nhe acknowledges any defects in the piece, he takes care to intimate,\nthat they are introduced in compliance with the evil taste of the age;\nand that the audience must take the blame to themselves, instead of\nthrowing it upon the writer. This bold, style of address, although it\noccasionally drew upon our author the charge of presumption, was,\nnevertheless, so well supported by his perception of what was just\nin criticism, and his powers of defending even what was actually\nwrong, that a miscellaneous audience was, in general, fain to submit\nto a domination, as successfully supported as boldly claimed. In the\nOxford prologues, on the other hand, the audience furnished by that\nseat of the Muses, as of more competent judgment, are addressed with\nmore respectful deference by the poet.[330] He seems, in these, to lay\ndown his rules of criticism, as it were under correction of superior\njudges; and intermingles them with such compliments to the taste and\nlearning of the members of the university, as he disdains to bestow\nupon the motley audience of the metropolis. In one style, the author\nseems dictating to scholars, whose conceit and presumption must be\nlowered by censure, to make them sensible of their own deficiencies,\nand induce them to receive the offered instruction; in the other, he\nseems to deliver his opinions before men, whom he acknowledges as his\nequals, if not his superiors, in the arts of which he is treating. And\nalthough Brown has very grossly charged Dryden with having affected,\nfor the university, an esteem and respect, which he was far from really\nfeeling; and with having exposed its members, in their turn, to the\nridicule of the London audience, whom he had stigmatized in his Oxford\nprologues as void of taste and judgment; it is but fair to state, that\nnothing can be produced in proof of such an accusation.[331] In another\nrespect, the reader may remark a pleasing difference between the London\nprologues and epilogues, and those spoken at Oxford. The licence\nof the times permitted, and even exacted from an author, in these\ncompositions, the indulgence of an indelicate vein of humour; which,\nhowever humiliating, is, in general, successful in a vulgar or mixed\naudience, as turning upon subjects adapted to the meanest capacity.\nThis continued even down to our times; for, till very lately, it was\nexpected by the mobbish part of the audience, that they should be\nindemnified for the patience with which they had listened to the moral\nlessons of a tragedy, by the indecency of the epilogue. In Dryden's\ntime, this coarse raillery was carried to great excess; but our author,\nhowever culpable in other compositions, is, generally speaking, more\ncorrect than his contemporaries in his prologues and epilogues. In the\nOxford pieces, particularly, where the decorum of manners, suited to\nthat mother of learning, required him to abstain from all licentious\nallusion, Dryden has given some excellent specimens of how little he\nneeded to rely upon this obvious and vulgar aid, for the amusement of\nhis audience. Upon the whole, it will be difficult to find pieces of\nthis occasional nature so interesting and unexceptionable as those\nspoken at Oxford. They are, as they ought to be, by far the most\nlaboured and correct which our author gave to the stage. It may not be\nimproper to add, that the players were only permitted to visit Oxford\nduring the Public Acts, which were frequently celebrated on occasions\nof public rejoicing. They acted, it would appear, in a Tennis-court,\nfitted up as an occasional theatre; and the prologues and epilogues\nof Dryden tended doubtless greatly to conciliate the favour of an\naudience, consisting of all that was learned in the generation then\nmature, and all that was hopeful in that which was rising to succeed it.\n\nThe more miscellaneous prologues and epilogues of Dryden are not\nwithout interest. In ridiculing the vices or follies of the age, they\noften touch upon circumstances illustrative of manners; and certainly,\nthough the modern theatres of the metropolis are so ill regulated,\nas nearly to exclude modest females from all the house, except the\nprivate boxes, their decorum is superior to that of their predecessors.\nIf we conceive the boxes filled with women, whose masks levelled\nall distinction between the woman of fashion and the courtezan; the\ngalleries crowded with a rabble, more ferocious and ignorant than\nits present inmates; the pit occupied by drunken bullies, whose\nquarrels perpetually interrupted the performers, and often ended in\nbloodshed, and even murder, upon the spot; we shall have occasion to\ncongratulate ourselves upon being at least in the way of reformation.\nThese enormities of his time, Dryden has pointed out, and censured in\nhis strong and nervous satire. It is to be regretted, that his painting\nis often coarse, and sometimes intentionally licentious; although,\nas has been already observed, more seldom so than that of most of\nhis contemporaries. The historical antiquary may also glean some\nobservations on the state of parties, from those pieces which turn upon\nthe politics of the day; and there occur numerous hints, which may be\nuseful to an historian of the drama. Thus the Prologues and Epilogues\nform no improper supplement to Dryden's historical poetry.\n\nIt remains to say, that all these prologues and epilogues were,\naccording to the custom of that time, printed on single leaves, or\nbroadsides, as they are called, and sold by the hawkers at the door\nof the theatres. Some of these, but very few, have been preserved by\nMr Luttrell, in the collection belonging to Mr Bindley. If a set of\nthem existed, I think it probable they would be found to contain many\nvariations from those editions, which the more mature reflection of\nthe author gave to the world in the Miscellanies. But the loss is the\nless to be lamented, as, in general, the original editions which I have\nseen are not only more inaccurate, but coarser and more licentious,\nthan those which Dryden finally adopted. In the original prologue\nof Circe, which is printed in this edition, for example, the reader\nwill find, that, in place of the well-known apology for an author's\nfirst production, by an appeal to those of Shakespeare, Fletcher,\nand Jonson, his youth is only made the subject of some commonplace\nraillery. Indeed, so little value did Dryden himself set upon these\noccasional effusions before they were collected, and so little did he\nconsider them as entitled to live in the recollection of the public,\nthat, on one occasion at least, but probably upon several, he actually\ntransferred the same prologue from one new play to another. Thus he\nreclaimed, from his adversary Shadwell's play of \"The True Widow,\"\nthe prologue which he had furnished, and affixed it to the \"Widow\nRanter\" of Mrs Behn. Sometimes also he laid under contribution former\npublications of his own, which he supposed to be forgotten, in order to\nfurnish out one of these theatrical prefaces. Thus the satire against\nthe Dutch furnishes the principal part of the prologue and epilogue to\n\"Amboyna.\"\n\nInaccurate as they seem to have been, the original editions might have\nproved useful in arranging the prologues and epilogues according\nto their exact dates, which, where they are not attached to any\nparticular play, can now only be assigned from internal evidence. But\nabsolute accuracy in this point, though no doubt desirable if it can\nbe obtained, does not appear to be a point of any serious moment; and,\nafter having bestowed considerable pains, the Editor will neither\nbe much ashamed, nor inconsolably sorry, to find, that some of the\nprologues and epilogues have been misplaced in the order which he has\nadopted.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 330: Our author's several modes of coaxing or bullying the\naudience in the prologues, are ridiculed in the \"Rehearsal;\" where\nBayes says, \"You must know there is in nature but two ways of making\nvery good prologues;--the one is, by civility, by insinuation, good\nlanguage, and all that to ---- a ---- in a manner steal your plaudit\nfrom the courtesy of the auditors: the other, by making use of some\ncertain personal things, which may keep a hank upon such censuring\npersons as cannot otherwise, egad, in nature, be hindered from being\ntoo free with their tongues.\"]\n\n[Footnote 331: The following is the statement of the accusation in\nTom's peculiar style, being a sort of cant jargon, not void of low\nhumour:\n\n\"_Bayes._ Now, there being but three remarkable places in the whole\nisland; that is, the two universities, and the great metropolitan city;\nI shall, consequently, confine my discourse only to them: But, first\nof all, I must tell you, that I am altogether of my Lord Plausible's\nopinion in the \"Plain Dealer;\" if I chance to commend any place, or\norder of men, out of pure friendship, I choose to do it before their\nfaces; and if I have occasion to speak ill of any person or place,\nout of a principle of respect and good manners, I do it behind their\nbacks. You cannot imagine, Mr Crites, when I visit either of the\ntwo universities, in my own person, or by my commissioners of the\nplayhouse, how much I am taken with a college life: Oh, there's nothing\nlike a cheese cut out into farthings! and my Lord Mayor, amidst all\nhis brutal city luxury, does not dine half so well as a student upon\na single chop of rotten roasted mutton; nay, I can scarce prevail\nwith myself, for a month or two after, to eat my meat on a plate,\nso great a respect have I for a university trencher; and then their\nconversation is so learned, and withal so innocent, that I could sit a\nwhole day together at a coffee-house to hear them dispute about _actus\nperspicui_, and _forma misti_. From this beginning I naturally fall a\nrailing at London, with as much zeal as a Buckingham-shire grazier, who\nhad his pocket picked at a Smithfield entertainment; or a country lady,\nwhose obsequious knight has spent his estate among misses, vintners,\nand linen-drapers; and then I tell my audience, that a man may walk\nfarther in the city to meet a true judge of poetry, than ride his horse\non Salisbury Plain to find a house.\n\n    London likes grossly, but this nicer pit\n    Examines, fathoms, all the depths of wit.\n\nYou see here, Mr Crites, that scholars won't take Alderman Duncomb's\nleaden halfpence for Irish half crowns, while dull Londoner swallows\nevery thing; and takes it with as little consideration, as a true\nRomanist takes a spiritual dose of relicts, that are sealed up with the\ncouncil of Trent's coat-of-arms.\n\n_Eugen._ How was that, Mr Bayes, about the council of Trent? Pray, let\nus hear it again.\n\n_Bayes._ Gad forgive me for't!--it dropt from me ere I was aware; but I\nshall in time wear off this hitching in my gait, and walk in Catholic\ntrammels as well as the best of them; nature, I must confess, is not\novercome on the sudden--But let me see, gentlemen, whether I have any\nmore lines to our last purpose; oh, here they are!\n\n    Poetry, which is in Oxford made\n    An art, in London only is a trade.\n    Our poet, could he find forgiveness here,\n    Would wish it rather than a plaudit there.\n\nYou are sensible, without question, how little beholden the city is to\nme, when I am upon my progress elsewhere. But 'tis a comfort that this\nperemptory humour does not continue long upon me; for, as I have the\ngrace to disown my mother-university, with a jug in one hand, and a\nlink in the other, when I am at Oxford,--\n\n    Thebes did his green unknowing years engage;\n    He chuses Athens in his riper age.\n\nSo, when I am got amongst my honest acquaintance here in Covent-Garden,\nI disown both the sisters, and make myself as merry as a grig, with\ntheir greasy trenchers, rusty salt-sellers, and no napkins, with their\neverlasting drinking, and no intervals of fornication to relieve it.\nIn fine, I make a great scruple of it, whether it be possible for a\nman to write sound heroics, and make an accomplished thorough-paced\nwit, unless he comes to refine and cultivate himself at London;\nunless be knows how many stories high the houses are in Cheapside\nand Fleet-street; is acquainted with all the gaming ordinaries about\ntown, and the rates of porters and hackney-coachmen; has shot the\nbridge; seen the tombs at Westminster; heard the Wooden-head speak; can\ntell you where the insuring-office is kept; and which of the twelve\ncompanies has the honour of precedence.\"\n\n    _The Reasons for Mr Bayes changing his Religion_, p. 10.\n]\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nSPOKEN\n\nTHE FIRST DAY OF THE KING'S HOUSE ACTING AFTER THE FIRE.\n\n\n    _In January_, 1671-2, _the play-house in Drury-Lane_, _occupied by\n    the King's company_, _took fire_, _and was entirely destroyed_, _with\n    fifty or sixty adjoining houses_, _which were either involved in\n    the conflagration_, _or blown up to stop its progress_. _During the\n    rebuilding of this theatre, the King's servants acted in the old\n    house in Lincoln's-Inn-Fields. The following Prologue announces\n    the distressed situation of the company on their retreat to this\n    temporary asylum. The sixth couplet alludes to the recent desertion\n    of the Lincoln's-Inn theatre, by the rival company, called the\n    Duke's, who were now acting at one in Dorset Gardens, splendidly\n    fitted up under the direction of Sir William D'Avenant._\n\n    So shipwrecked passengers escaped to land,\n    So look they, when on the bare beach they stand,\n    Dropping and cold, and their first fear scarce o'er,\n    Expecting famine on a desart shore.\n    From that hard climate we must wait for bread,\n    Whence even the natives, forced by hunger, fled.\n    Our stage does human chance present to view,\n    But ne'er before was seen so sadly true:\n    You are changed too, and your pretence to see\n    Is but a nobler name for charity.\n    Your own provisions furnish out our feasts,\n    While you, the founders, make yourselves the guests.\n    Of all mankind beside, fate had some care,    }\n    But for poor Wit no portion did prepare,      }\n    'Tis left a rent-charge to the brave and fair.}\n    You cherished it, and now its fall you mourn,\n    Which blind unmannered zealots make their scorn,\n    Who think that fire a judgment on the stage,\n    Which spared not temples[332] in its furious rage.\n    But as our new-built city rises higher,   }\n    So from old theatres may new aspire,      }\n    Since fate contrives magnificence by fire.}\n    Our great metropolis does far surpass\n    Whate'er is now, and equals all that was:\n    Our wit as far does foreign wit excel,\n    And, like a king, should in a palace dwell.\n    But we with golden hopes are vainly fed,\n    Talk high, and entertain you in a shed:\n    Your presence here, for which we humbly sue,\n    Will grace old theatres, and build up new.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 332: St Paul's, and other churches, were consumed in the\ngreat fire, then a recent event.]\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nFOR\n\nTHE WOMEN, WHEN THEY ACTED AT THE OLD THEATRE, LINCOLN'S-INN-FIELDS.\n\n\n    _Female performers were first introduced after the Restoration.\n    They became speedily acceptable to the court and the public.\n    The dramatic poets were in so many ways indebted to them, that\n    occasional exertions, dedicated to their benefit, as I presume the\n    following to have been, were but a suitable return for various\n    favours received. Our author's intimacy with the beautiful\n    Mrs Reeves particularly called forth his talents in behalf of\n    these damsels, distressed as they must have been by the unlucky\n    burning of the theatre in Drury-Lane. The Prologue occurs in the\n    Miscellanies; but is, I know not why, omitted by Derrick in his\n    edition of Dryden's poems._\n\n    Were none of you, gallants, e'er driven so hard,\n    As when the poor kind soul was under guard,\n    And could not do't at home, in some by-street\n    To take a lodging, and in private meet?\n    Such is our case; we can't appoint our house,\n    The lovers' old and wonted rendezvous,\n    But hither to this trusty nook remove;\n    The worse the lodging is, the more the love.\n    For much good pastime, many a dear sweet hug,\n    Is stolen in garrets, on the humble rug.\n    Here's good accommodation in the pit;\n    The grave demurely in the midst may sit,\n    And so the hot Burgundian[333] on the side,\n    Ply vizard mask, and o'er the benches stride:\n    Here are convenient upper boxes too,         }\n    For those that make the most triumphant show;}\n    All that keep coaches, must not sit below.   }\n    There, gallants, you betwixt the acts retire,\n    And, at dull plays, have something to admire:\n    We, who look up, can your addresses mark,\n    And see the creatures coupled in the ark:\n    So we expect the lovers, braves, and wits;\n    The gaudy house with scenes[334] will serve for cits.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 333: That is, the consumer of Burgundy, or drunken bully of\nthe day.]\n\n[Footnote 334: Dorset-Garden theatre, where the Duke's company acted\nvarious shewy pieces, directed by D'Avenant.]\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nSPOKEN AT\n\nTHE OPENING OF THE NEW HOUSE,\n\nMARCH 26, 1674.\n\n\n    _The Drury-Lane theatre, after being burned in_ 1671-2, _was rebuilt\n    upon a plan furnished by Sir Christopher Wren_, _who superintended\n    the execution_. _It is said to have been most admirably planned,\n    but spoiled by some injudicious alterations in the course of\n    building. The following Prologue informs us, that the exterior\n    decorations were plain and simple in comparison to those of the\n    rival house in Dorset Gardens, which, as repeatedly noticed, had\n    been splendidly fitted up under the direction of D'Avenant, noted\n    for his attachment to stage pomp and shew. It appears that Charles\n    II., who was possessed of considerable taste, and did not disdain\n    to interest himself in the affairs of the drama, had himself\n    recommended to the King's company, the simplicity and frugality of\n    scenery and ornament to which the poet alludes. The other house\n    were not unapt to boast of the superior splendour which is here\n    conceded to them. In the epilogue to_ \"_Psyche_\" _the actors boast_,\n\n          ----Gallants, you can tell,\n    No foreign stage can ours in pomp excel;\n    And here none e'er shall treat you half so well.\n    Poor players have this day such splendour shown,\n    Which yet but by great monarchs has been done.\n\n    _D'Avenant, by whom the Duke's company were long directed, was the\n    first who introduced regular scenery upon a public stage. His drama\n    of the \"Siege of Rhodes\" seems to have been the first exhibited\n    with these decorations._--See MALONE'S Account of the English\n    Stage.\"\n\n\n    A plain-built house, after so long a stay,\n    Will send you half unsatisfied away;\n    When, fallen from your expected pomp, you find\n    A bare convenience only is designed.\n    You, who each day can theatres behold,\n    Like Nero's palace, shining all with gold,\n    Our mean ungilded stage will scorn, we fear,\n    And, for the homely room, disdain the chear.\n    Yet now cheap druggets to a mode are grown,    }\n    And a plain suit, since we can make but one,   }\n    Is better than to be by tarnished gawdry known.}\n    They, who are by your favours wealthy made,\n    With mighty sums may carry on the trade;\n    We, broken bankers, half destroyed by fire, }\n    With our small stock to humble roofs retire;}\n    Pity our loss, while you their pomp admire. }\n    For fame and honour we no longer strive;\n    We yield in both, and only beg--to live;\n    Unable to support their vast expence,\n    Who build and treat with such magnificence,\n    That, like the ambitious monarchs of the age,\n    They give the law to our provincial stage.\n    Great neighbours enviously promote excess,\n    While they impose their splendour on the less;\n    But only fools, and they of vast estate,     }\n    The extremity of modes will imitate,         }\n    The dangling knee-fringe, and the bib-cravat,}\n    Yet if some pride with want may be allowed,\n    We in our plainness may be justly proud;\n    Our Royal Master willed it should be so;\n    Whate'er he's pleased to own, can need no show:\n    That sacred name gives ornament and grace,\n    And, like his stamp, makes basest metal pass.\n    'Twere folly now a stately pile to raise,\n    To build a playhouse while you throw down plays;\n    While scenes, machines, and empty operas reign,\n    And for the pencil you the pen disdain;\n    While troops of famished Frenchmen hither drive,\n    And laugh at those upon whose alms they live:\n    Old English authors vanish, and give place\n    To these new conquerors of the Norman race.\n    More tamely than your fathers you submit;\n    You're now grown vassals to them in your wit.\n    Mark, when they play, how our fine fops advance    }\n    The mighty merits of their men of France,          }\n    Keep time, cry, _Bon!_ and humour the cadence.}\n    Well, please yourselves; but sure 'tis understood,\n    That French machines have ne'er done England good.[335]\n    I would not prophecy our house's fate;\n    But while vain shows and scenes you over-rate,\n    'Tis to be feared----\n    That, as a fire the former house o'erthrew,\n    Machines and tempests[336] will destroy the new.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 335: St Andr\u00e9, the famous ballet dancer, composed dances\nfor many operas about this time, which were probably performed by his\nlight-footed countrymen, at Dorset-Gardens.]\n\n[Footnote 336: \"In 1673, the 'Tempest, or the Enchanted Island,'\nmade into an opera by Mr Shadwell, having all new in it, as scenes,\nmachines, &c.: one scene painted with myriads of \u00e6rial spirits; and\nothers flying away with a table furnished with fruits, sweetmeats, and\nall sorts of viands, just when Duke Trinculo and his company were going\nto dinner. All things were performed so admirably well, that not any\nsucceeding opera could get any money.\"--_Roscius Anglicanus_, p. 34.\nShadwell had also, about this time, produced his opera of \"Psyche,\"\nwhich, with the \"Tempest\" and other pieces depending chiefly upon shew\nand scenery, were acting in Dorset-Garden, when this Prologue was\nwritten. In order to ridicule these splendid exhibitions, the company\nat Drury-Lane brought forward parodies on them, such as the \"Mock\nTempest,\" \"Psyche Debauched,\" &c. These pieces, though written in the\nmeanest style by one Duffet, a low buffoon, had a transient course of\nsuccess.]\n\n\n\n\nEPILOGUE\n\nON\n\nTHE SAME OCCASION.\n\n\n    Though what our Prologue said was sadly true,}\n    Yet, gentlemen, our homely house is new,     }\n    A charm that seldom fails with wicked you.   }\n    A country lip may have the velvet touch;      }\n    Though she's no lady, you may think her such: }\n    A strong imagination may do much.             }\n    But you, loud sirs, who through your curls look big,\n    Critics in plume and white vallancy wig,\n    Who, lolling, on our foremost benches sit,\n    And still charge first, the true forlorn of wit;\n    Whose favours, like the sun, warm where you roll,\n    Yet you, like him, have neither heat nor soul;\n    So may your hats your foretops never press,\n    Untouched your ribbons, sacred be your dress;\n    So may you slowly to old age advance,\n    And have the excuse of youth for ignorance;\n    So may fop-corner full of noise remain,\n    And drive far off the dull, attentive train;\n    So may your midnight scourings happy prove,\n    And morning batteries force your way to love;\n    So may not France your warlike hands recal,\n    But leave you by each others swords to fall,[337]\n    As you come here to ruffle vizard punk,\n    When sober rail, and roar when you are drunk.\n    But to the wits we can some merit plead,\n    And urge what by themselves has oft been said:\n    Our house relieves the ladies from the frights\n    Of ill-paved streets, and long dark winter nights;\n    The Flanders horses from a cold bleak road,\n    Where bears in furs dare scarcely look abroad;[338]\n    The audience from worn plays and fustian stuff,\n    Of rhime, more nauseous than three boys in buff.[339]\n    Though in their house the poets' heads[340] appear,\n    We hope we may presume their wits are here.\n    The best which they reserved they now will play,  }\n    For, like kind cuckolds, though we've not the way }\n    To please, we'll find you abler men who may.      }\n    If they should fail, for last recruits we breed }\n    A troop of frisking monsieurs to succeed:       }\n    You know the French sure cards at time of need. }\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 337: This seems to be an allusion to the recent death of\nMr Scroop; a man of fortune, who, about this time, was stabbed in\nthe theatre at Dorset-Gardens by Sir Thomas Armstrong, afterwards\nthe confidential friend of the Duke of Monmouth. Langbaine says, he\nwitnessed this real tragedy, which happened during the representation\nof \"Macbeth,\" as altered and revised by D'Avenant in 1674. Mr Scroop\ndied immediately after his removal into a neighbouring house.]\n\n[Footnote 338: Alluding to the recent establishment in\nLincoln's-Inn-Fields, then separated from the city by a large vacant\nspace.]\n\n[Footnote 339: \"The three boys in buff,\" were, I believe, the three\nBold Beauchamps in an old ranting play:\n\n    \"The three bold Beauchamps shall revive again,\n    And, with the London Prentice, conquer Spain.\"\n]\n\n[Footnote 340: Some part of the ornaments of D'Avenant's scenes\nprobably presented the portraits of dramatic writers.]\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nTO\n\nTHE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD, 1674.\n\nSPOKEN BY MR HART.\n\n\n    _Hart, who had been a captain in the civil wars, belonged to\n    the King's company. He was an excellent actor, and particularly\n    celebrated in the character of Othello. He left the stage,\n    according to Cibber, on the union of the companies in_ 1686. _But it\n    appears from a paper published in a note on the article_ \"_Betterton_\"\n    _in the_ Biographia, _that he retired in_ 1681, _upon receiving a\n    pension from Dr D'Avenant_, _then manager of the Duke's company_,\n    _who in this manner bought off both Hart and Kynaston_, _and greatly\n    weakened the opposite set_.\n\n    Poets, your subjects, have their parts assigned,\n    To unbend, and to divert their sovereign's mind;\n    When tired with following nature, you think fit\n    To seek repose in the cool shades of wit,\n    And, from the sweet retreat, with joy survey\n    What rests, and what is conquered, of the way.\n    Here, free yourselves from envy, care, and strife,\n    You view the various turns of human life;\n    Safe in our scene, through dangerous courts you go,\n    And, undebauched, the vice of cities know.\n    Your theories are here to practice brought,\n    As in mechanic operations wrought;\n    And man, the little world, before you set,\n    As once the sphere of crystal[341] shewed the great.\n    Blest sure are you above all mortal kind,\n    If to your fortunes you can suit your mind;\n    Content to see, and shun, those ills we show,\n    And crimes on theatres alone to know.\n    With joy we bring what our dead authors writ,\n    And beg from you the value of their wit:\n    That Shakespeare's, Fletcher's, and great Jonson's claim,\n    May be renewed from those who gave them fame.\n    None of our living poets dare appear;\n    For muses so severe are worshipped here,\n    That, conscious of their faults, they shun the eye,  }\n    And, as profane, from sacred places fly,             }\n    Rather than see the offended God, and die.           }\n    We bring no imperfections, but our own;\n    Such faults as made are by the makers shown;\n    And you have been so kind, that we may boast,\n    The greatest judges still can pardon most.\n    Poets must stoop, when they would please our pit,\n    Debased even to the level of their wit;\n    Disdaining that, which yet they know will take,\n    Hating themselves what their applause must make.\n    But when to praise from you they would aspire,\n    Though they, like eagles, mount, your Jove is higher.\n    So far your knowledge all their power transcends,\n    As what should be, beyond what is, extends.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 341: Its properties are thus described by Spenser:\n\n      It vertue had to show in perfect sight\n        Whatever thing was in the world contained,\n      Betwixt the lowest earth and heaven's height,\n        So that it to the looker appertained.\n      Whatever foe had wrought, or friend designed,\n        Therein discovered was ne ought mote pass,\n      Ne ought in secret from the same remained,\n        Forthy it round, and hollow-shaped was,\n    Like to the world itself, and seemed a world of glass.\n\n      Such was the glassy globe that Merlin made,\n      And gave unto King Ryence for his guard.\n\n    _Fairy Queen_, Book iii. Canto 2.\n]\n\n\n\n\nEPILOGUE\n\nSPOKEN\n\nAT OXFORD, BY MRS MARSHALL.\n\n\n    _The date of this Epilogue is fixed by that of Bathurst's\n    vice-chancellorship_, _which lasted from 3d October_, 1673, _to 9th\n    October_ 1675.\n\n    Oft has our poet wished, this happy seat\n    Might prove his fading muse's last retreat:\n    I wondered at his wish, but now I find\n    He sought for quiet, and content of mind;\n    Which noiseful towns, and courts, can never know,\n    And only in the shades, like laurels, grow.\n    Youth, ere it sees the world, here studies rest,\n    And age, returning thence, concludes it best.\n    What wonder if we court that happiness\n    Yearly to share, which hourly you possess,\n    Teaching e'en you, while the vext world we show,\n    Your peace to value more, and better know?\n    'Tis all we can return for favours past,\n    Whose holy memory shall ever last,\n    For patronage from him whose care presides\n    O'er every noble art, and every science guides;[342]\n    Bathurst, a name the learned with reverence know,\n    And scarcely more to his own Virgil owe;\n    Whose age enjoys but what his youth deserved,\n    To rule those muses whom before he served.\n    His learning, and untainted manners too,\n    We find, Athenians, are derived to you;\n    Such antient hospitality there rests             }\n    In yours, as dwelt in the first Grecian breasts, }\n    Whose kindness was religion to their guests.     }\n    Such modesty did to our sex appear,           }\n    As, had there been no laws, we need not fear, }\n    Since each of you was our protector here.     }\n    Converse so chaste, and so strict virtue shown,\n    As might Apollo with the muses own.\n    Till our return, we must despair to find\n    Judges so just, so knowing, and so kind.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 342: Ralph Bathurst, thus highly distinguished by our author,\nwas a distinguished character of the age. He was uncle to Allen, the\nfirst Lord Bathurst. He was born in 1620, and bred to the church, but\nabandoned divinity for the pursuit of medicine, which he practised\nuntil the Restoration, when he resumed his clerical character. In 1663\nhe became head of Trinity college, Oxford, into the court and chapel\nof which he introduced the beauties of classical architecture, to\nrival, if it were possible, the magnificence of the Gothic edifices\nby which it is surrounded. In 1673, he had the honour to be appointed\nvice-chancellor; an office which he retained for two years. During\nhis execution of this duty he is said to have reformed many abuses\nwhich had crept into the university; and by liberal benefactions\nadded considerably to the prosperity of literature. Anthony Wood, who\nhad some private reason for disliking him, and who, moreover, was as\ndetermined an enemy to the fair sex as ever harboured in a cloister,\npicked a quarrel with Bathurst's wife, as he could find no reasonable\nfault with the vice-chancellor himself. \"Dr Bathurst took his place\nof vice-chancellor; a man of good parts, and able to do good things;\nbut he has a wife that scorns that he should be in print; a scornful\nwoman! scorns that he was dean of Wells: no need of marrying such a\nwoman, who is so conceited, that she thinks herself fit to govern a\ncollege, or university.\"--Perhaps the countenance given by Bathurst\nto the theatre, for which Dryden here expresses his gratitude, might\nnot tend to conciliate the good will of Anthony, who quarrelled\nwith his sister-in-law by refusing to treat her to the play. But it\nagreed well with the character of Bathurst, who was not only a patron\nof literature in all its branches, but himself an excellent Latin\npoet, as his verses prefixed to Hobbes' \"Leviathan,\" fully testify;\nand as good an English poet as most of his contemporaries. He died\nin his eighty-fourth year, 1704. Warton has given us the following\ncharacter of his Latin compositions, for which Dryden has celebrated\nhim so highly: \"His Latin orations are wonderful specimens of wit and\nantithesis, which were the delight of his age. They want, upon the\nwhole, the purity and simplicity of Tully's eloquence, but even exceed\nthe sententious smartness of Seneca, and the surprising turns of Pliny.\nThey are perpetually spirited, and discover an uncommon quickness of\nthought. The manner is concise and abrupt, but yet perspicuous and\neasy: His allusions are delicate, and his observations sensible and\nanimated; his sentiments of congratulation, or indignation, are equally\nforcible: his compliments are most elegantly turned, and his satire is\nmost ingeniously severe. These compositions are extremely agreeable to\nread, but, in the present improvement of classical taste, not so proper\nto be imitated.\"--_Life of Bathurst, prefixed to his Literary Remains,\npublished under the inspection of Mr Warton._]\n\n\n\n\nORIGINAL\n\nPROLOGUE TO CIRCE,\n\nBY\n\nDR CHARLES D'AVENANT, 1675.\n\n\n    _Dr Charles D'Avenant, the author of \"Circe,\" was son of the\n    Rare Sir William D'Avenant, whom he succeeded as manager of the\n    Duke's company. He practised physic in Doctor's Commons, which\n    he afterwards abandoned for politics. He became a member of\n    Parliament, and inspector of the exports and imports, of which\n    office he died possessed in_ 1714. _He wrote many tracts upon\n    political subjects, especially those connected with the revenue.\n    \"Circe,\" his only drama, is an opera, to which Bannister composed\n    the music. Besides the Prologue by our author, it was honoured by\n    an Epilogue by the famous Rochester, and thus graced was received\n    favourably. It contains some good writing, considering it was\n    composed at the age of nineteen; a circumstance alluded to in the\n    following Prologue. The original Prologue is from the 4to edition\n    of \"_Circe_,\" _London_, 1677. _It was afterwards much improved, or\n    rather entirely re-written, by our author._\n\n    Were you but half so wise as you're severe,\n    Our youthful poet should not need to fear;\n    To his green years your censures you would suit,\n    Not blast the blossom, but expect the fruit.\n    The sex, that best does pleasure understand,\n    Will always chuse to err on t'other hand.\n    They check not him that's aukward in delight,\n    But clap the young rogue's cheek, and set him right.\n    Thus heartened well, and fleshed upon his prey,\n    The youth may prove a man another day.\n    For your own sakes, instruct him when he's out,\n    You'll find him mend his work at every bout.\n    When some young lusty thief is passing by,        }\n    How many of your tender kind will cry,--          }\n    \"A proper fellow! pity he should die!             }\n    He might be saved, and thank us for our pains,\n    There's such a stock of love within his veins.\"\n    These arguments the women may persuade,\n    But move not you, the brothers of the trade,\n    Who, scattering your infection through the pit,       }\n    With aching hearts and empty purses sit,              }\n    To take your dear five shillings worth of wit.        }\n    The praise you give him, in your kindest mood,\n    Comes dribbling from you, just like drops of blood;\n    And then you clap so civilly, for fear\n    The loudness might offend your neighbour's ear,\n    That we suspect your gloves are lined within,\n    For silence sake, and cotton'd next the skin.\n    From these usurpers we appeal to you,\n    The only knowing, only judging few;\n    You, who in private have this play allowed,\n    Ought to maintain your suffrage to the crowd.\n    The captive, once submitted to your bands,\n    You should protect from death by vulgar hands.\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE TO CIRCE,\n\nAS CORRECTED BY DRYDEN.\n\n\n    Were you but half so wise as you're severe,\n    Our youthful poet should not need to fear;\n    To his green years your censures you would suit,\n    Not blast the blossom, but expect the fruit.\n    The sex, that best does pleasure understand,\n    Will always choose to err on t'other hand.\n    They check not him that's aukward in delight,\n    But clap the young rogue's cheek, and set him right.\n    Thus heartened well, and fleshed upon his prey,\n    The youth may prove a man another day.\n    Your Ben and Fletcher, in their first young flight,\n    Did no Volpone, nor no Arbaces write;[343]\n    But hopped about, and short excursions made           }\n    From bough to bough, as if they were afraid,          }\n    And each was guilty of some Slighted Maid.[344]       }\n    Shakespeare's own muse her Pericles first bore;[345]\n    The Prince of Tyre was elder than the Moor:\n    'Tis miracle to see a first good play;\n    All hawthorns do not bloom on Christmas-day.[346]\n    A slender poet must have time to grow,\n    And spread and burnish as his brothers do.\n    Who still looks lean, sure with some pox is curst,\n    But no man can be Falstaff-fat at first.\n    Then damn not, but indulge his rude essays,\n    Encourage him, and bloat him up with praise,\n    That he may get more bulk before he dies;\n    He's not yet fed enough for sacrifice.\n    Perhaps, if now your grace you will not grudge,\n    He may grow up to write, and you to judge.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 343: Characters in Jonson's \"Volpone,\" and Fletcher's \"King\nand no King,\" which plays are justly held the master-pieces of these\nauthors.]\n\n[Footnote 344: The \"Slighted Maid\" was a contemporary drama, written\nby Sir Richard Stapylton, of which Dryden elsewhere takes occasion\nto speak in terms of contempt. See the _Parallel betwixt Poetry and\nPainting_.]\n\n[Footnote 345: This opinion seems to be solely founded on the\ninferiority of \"Pericles,\" to the other plays of Shakspeare; an\ninferiority so great, as to warrant very strong doubts of its being the\nlegitimate offspring of his muse at all.]\n\n[Footnote 346: Alluding to the legend of the Glastonbury thorn,\nsupposed to bloom on Christmas day.]\n\n\n\n\nEPILOGUE\n\nINTENDED TO HAVE BEEN SPOKEN BY\n\nTHE LADY HEN. MAR. WENTWORTH.\n\nWHEN CALISTO WAS ACTED AT COURT, IN 1675.\n\n\n    \"_Calisto, or the Chaste Nymph_,\" _was a masque written by John\n    Crowne, who, by the interference of Rochester, was employed to\n    compose such an entertainment to be exhibited at court, though this\n    was an encroachment on the office of Dryden, the poet laureat.\n    The principal characters were represented by the daughters of the\n    Duke of York, and the first nobility. The Lady Mary, afterwards\n    Queen, to whom the masque was dedicated, acted Calisto; Nyphe was\n    represented by the Lady Anne, who also succeeded to the throne;\n    Jupiter, by Lady Harriot Wentworth; Psecas, by Lady Mary Mordaunt;\n    Diana, by Mrs Blague, and Mercury by Mrs Sarah Jennings, afterwards\n    Duchess of Marlborough. Among the attendant nymphs and dancers were\n    the Countesses of Pembroke and of Derby, Lady Catharine Herbert,\n    Mrs Fitzgerald, and Mrs Fraser. The male dancers were the Duke\n    of Monmouth, Viscount Dunblaine, Lord Daincourt, and others of\n    the first quality. Although the exhibition of this masque, which\n    it was the privilege of his office to have written, must have\n    been somewhat galling to Dryden, we see that he so far suppressed\n    his feelings as to compose the following Epilogue, which, to his\n    farther mortification, was rejected, through the interference of\n    Rochester._\n\n    _The Lady Henrietta Maria Wentworth, Baroness of Nettlested, who\n    acted the part of Jupiter on the present occasion, afterwards\n    adapted her conduct to that of Calisto, and became the mistress of\n    the Duke of Monmouth. He was so passionately attached to her, that\n    upon the scaffold he vindicated their intercourse by some very warm\n    and enthusiastic expressions, and could by no means be prevailed on\n    to express any repentance of it as unlawful. This lady died about\n    a year after the execution of her unfortunate lover_, _in_ 1685.\n    _Her mother, Lady Wentworth, ordered a monument of L._ 2000 _value\n    to be erected over her in the church of Teddington, Bedfordshire._\n\n    As Jupiter I made my court in vain;\n    I'll now assume my native shape again.\n    I'm weary to be so unkindly used,\n    And would not be a God, to be refused.\n    State grows uneasy when it hinders love;\n    A glorious burden, which the wise remove.\n    Now, as a nymph, I need not sue, nor try\n    The force of any lightning but the eye.\n    Beauty and youth, more than a god command;\n    No Jove could e'er the force of these withstand.\n    'Tis here that sovereign power admits dispute;\n    Beauty sometimes is justly absolute.\n    Our sullen Cato's, whatsoe'er they say,\n    Even while they frown and dictate laws, obey.\n    You, mighty sir, our bonds more easy make,\n    And, gracefully, what all must suffer, take;\n    Above those forms the grave affect to wear,\n    For 'tis not to be wise to be severe.\n    True wisdom may some gallantry admit,\n    And soften business with the charms of wit.\n    These peaceful triumphs with your cares you bought,\n    And from the midst of fighting nations brought.[347]\n    You only hear it thunder from afar,\n    And sit, in peace, the arbiter of war:\n    Peace, the loathed manna, which hot brains despise,\n    You knew its worth, and made it early prize;\n    And in its happy leisure, sit and see\n    The promises of more felicity;\n    Two glorious nymphs of your own godlike line,\n    Whose morning rays, like noontide, strike and shine;[348]\n    Whom you to suppliant monarchs shall dispose,\n    To bind your friends, and to disarm your foes.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 347: The war between France and the confederates was now\nraging on the Continent.]\n\n[Footnote 348: The glorious nymphs, afterwards Queens Anne and Mary,\nboth lived to exclude their own father and his son from the throne.\nDerrick, I suppose, alluded to this circumstance, when in the next line\nhe read _supplant_ for _suppliant_ monarchs.]\n\n\n\n\nEPILOGUE\n\nTO THE\n\nMAN OF MODE; OR SIR FOPLING FLUTTER.\n\nBY\n\nSIR GEORGE ETHEREGE, 1676.\n\n\n    _This play, which long maintained a high degree of reputation\n    on the stage, presents us with the truest picture of what was\n    esteemed good breeding and wit in the reign of Charles II. All\n    the characters, from Dorimant down to the Shoemaker, were either\n    really drawn from the life, or depicted so accurately according\n    to the manners of the times, that each was instantly ascribed to\n    some individual. Sir Fopling Flutter, in particular, was supposed\n    to represent Sir George Hewit, mentioned in the Essay on Satire,\n    and who seems to have been one of the most choice coxcombs of\n    the period. A very severe criticism in the_ Spectator, _pointing\n    out the coarseness as well as the immorality of this celebrated\n    performance, had a great effect in diminishing its popularity. The\n    satire being in fact personal, it followed as a matter of course,\n    that the Prologue should disclaim all personality, that being an\n    attribute to be discovered by the audience, but not avowed by\n    the poet. Dryden has accomplished this with much liveliness, and\n    enumerates for our edification the special fopperies which went\n    to make up a complete fine gentleman in_ 1676--_differing only in\n    form from those required in_ 1806, _excepting that the ancient beau\n    needed, to complete his character, a slight sprinkling of literary\n    accomplishment, which the modern has discarded with the \"_sacred\n    periwig_.\"_\n\n    Most modern wits such monstrous fools have shown,\n    They seem not of heaven's making, but their own.\n    Those nauseous Harlequins in farce may pass;\n    But there goes more to a substantial ass:\n    Something of man must be exposed to view,\n    That, gallants, they may more resemble you.\n    Sir Fopling is a fool so nicely writ,\n    The ladies would mistake him for a wit;\n    And, when he sings, talks loud, and cocks, would cry,\n    I vow, methinks, he's pretty company!\n    So brisk, so gay, so travelled, so refined,\n    As he took pains to graff upon his kind.\n    True fops help nature's work, and go to school,\n    To file and finish God Almighty's fool.\n    Yet none Sir Fopling him, or him can call;\n    He's knight o' the shire, and represents ye all.\n    From each he meets he culls whate'er he can;\n    Legion's his name, a people in a man.\n    His bulky folly gathers as it goes,\n    And, rolling o'er you, like a snow-ball, grows.\n    His various modes from various fathers follow;\n    One taught the toss, and one the new French wallow;\n    His sword-knot this, his cravat that designed;\n    And this the yard-long snake he twirls behind.\n    From one the sacred periwig he gained,\n    Which wind ne'er blew, nor touch of hat profaned.\n    Another's diving bow he did adore,\n    Which with a shog casts all the hair before,\n    Till he, with full decorum, brings it back,\n    And rises with a water-spaniel shake.\n    As for his songs, the ladies' dear delight,\n    These sure he took from most of you who write.\n    Yet every man is safe from what he feared;\n    For no one fool is hunted from the herd.\n\n\n\n\nEPILOGUE\n\nTO\n\nMITHRIDATES, KING OF PONTUS.\n\nBY\n\nMR N. LEE, 1678.\n\n\n    _This, as appears from the Prologue preserved in the Luttrell\n    collection, was the first play acted in the season_, 1698-9. _It has,\n    like all Lee's productions, no small share of bombast, with some\n    strikingly beautiful passages._\n\n    You've seen a pair of faithful lovers die;        }\n    And much you care; for most of you will cry,      }\n    'Twas a just judgment on their constancy.         }\n    For, heaven be thanked, we live in such an age,\n    When no man dies for love, but on the stage:\n    And e'en those martyrs are but rare in plays;\n    A cursed sign how much true faith decays.\n    Love is no more a violent desire;\n    'Tis a mere metaphor, a painted fire.\n    In all our sex, the name examined well,\n    'Tis pride to gain, and vanity to tell.\n    In woman, 'tis of subtle interest made;\n    Curse on the punk, that made it first a trade!\n    She first did wit's prerogative remove,\n    And made a fool presume to prate of love.\n    Let honour and preferment go for gold,\n    But glorious beauty is not to be sold;\n    Or, if it be, 'tis at a rate so high,\n    That nothing but adoring it should buy.\n    Yet the rich cullies may their boasting spare;\n    They purchase but sophisticated ware.\n    'Tis prodigality that buys deceit,\n    Where both the giver and the taker cheat.\n    Men but refine on the old half-crown way;\n    And women fight, like Swissers, for their pay.\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nTO\n\nTHE TRUE WIDOW, 1679.\n\n\nAt this period Shadwell and our author were on such good terms, that\nDryden obliged him with the following Prologue to the \"True Widow;\" a\nplay intended to display the humours of various men of the town. Thus\nwe have in the Dramatis Person\u00e6,--\n\n\"_Selfish._ A coxcomb, conceited of his beauty, wit, and breeding,\nthinking all women in love with him, always admiring and talking to\nhimself.\n\n_Old Maggot._ An old, credulous fellow; a great enemy to wit, and a\nlover of business for business-sake.\n\n_Young Maggot._ His nephew: an inns-of-court man, who neglects law,\nand runs mad after wit, pretending much to love, and both in spite of\nnature, since his face makes him unfit for one, and his brains for the\nother.\n\n_Prig._ A coxcomb, who never thinks or talks of any thing but dogs,\nhorses, hunting, hawking, bowls, tennis, and gaming; a rook, a most\nnoisy jockey.\n\n_Lump._ A methodical coxcomb, as regular as a clock, and goes as true\nas a pendulum; one that knows what he shall do every day of his life by\nhis almanack, where he sets down all his actions before-hand; a mortal\nenemy to wit.\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nSo many characters, so minutely described, lead us to suppose, that\nsome personal satire lay concealed under them; and, accordingly,\nthe Prologue seems to have been written with a view of deprecating\nthe resentment which this idea might have excited in the audience.\nWe learn, however, by the Preface, that the piece was unfavourably\nreceived, \"either through the calamity of the time (during the Popish\nplot), which made people not care for diversions, or through the anger\nof a great many who thought themselves concerned in the satire.\" The\npiece is far from being devoid of merit; and the characters, though\ndrawn in Shadwell's coarse, harsh manner, are truly comic. That of\nthe jockey, since so popular, seems to have been brought upon the\nstage for the first time in the \"True Widow.\" It is remarkable, that,\nthough Dryden writes the Prologue, the piece contains a sly hit at\nhim. Maggot, finding himself married to a portionless jilt, says, \"I\nmust e'en write hard for the play-house; I may get the reversion of\nthe poet-laureat's place.\" This, however, might be only meant as a\ngood-humoured pleasantry among friends.\n\nAfter the deadly quarrel with Shadwell, our author seems to have\nresumed his property in the Prologue, as it is prefixed to \"The Widow\nRanter, or The History of Bacon in Virginia,\" a tragi-comedy by Mrs\nBehn, acted in 1690.\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nTO\n\nTHE TRUE WIDOW.\n\nBY\n\nTHOMAS SHADWELL, 1679.\n\n\n    Heaven save ye, gallants, and this hopeful age!\n    Y'are welcome to the downfall of the stage.\n    The fools have laboured long in their vocation,\n    And vice, the manufacture of the nation,\n    O'erstocks the town so much, and thrives so well,\n    That fops and knaves grow drugs, and will not sell.\n    In vain our wares on theatres are shown,\n    When each has a plantation of his own.\n    His cause ne'er fails; for whatsoe'er he spends,\n    There's still God's plenty for himself and friends.\n    Should men be rated by poetic rules,\n    Lord, what a poll would there be raised from fools!\n    Meantime poor wit prohibited must lie,\n    As if 'twere made some French commodity.\n    Fools you will have, and raised at vast expence;\n    And yet, as soon as seen, they give offence.\n    Time was, when none would cry,--That oaf was me;\n    But now you strive about your pedigree.\n    Bauble and cap[349] no sooner are thrown down,\n    But there's a muss[350] of more than half the town.\n    Each one will challenge a child's part at least;\n    A sign the family is well encreased.\n    Of foreign cattle there's no longer need,\n    When we're supplied so fast with English breed.\n    Well! flourish, countrymen; drink, swear, and roar;\n    Let every free-born subject keep his whore,\n    And wandering in the wilderness about,\n    At end of forty years not wear her out.\n    But when you see these pictures, let none dare\n    To own beyond a limb, or single share;\n    For where the punk is common, he's a sot,\n    Who needs will father what the parish got.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 349: The fool's cap and bauble, with which the ancient jester\nwas equipped.]\n\n[Footnote 350: A scramble.]\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nTO\n\nC\u00c6SAR BORGIA.\n\nBY MR N. LEE, 1680.\n\n\n    _This play of Nathaniel Lee's was first acted at the Duke's\n    theatre, in_ 1680. _It is founded on the history of the natural son\n    of Pope Alexander VI. The play fell soon into disrepute; for Cibber\n    tells us, that when Powel was jealous of his fine dress in Lord\n    Foppington, and complained bitterly, that he had not so good a suit\n    to play \"C\u00e6sar Borgia,\" this bouncing play could do little more\n    than pay candles and fiddles._--Apology.\n\n    The unhappy man, who once has trailed a pen,\n    Lives not to please himself, but other men;\n    Is always drudging, wastes his life and blood,\n    Yet only eats and drinks what you think good.\n    What praise soe'er the poetry deserve,\n    Yet every fool can bid the poet starve.\n    That fumbling letcher to revenge is bent,\n    Because he thinks himself, or whore, is meant:\n    Name but a cuckold, all the city swarms;\n    From Leadenhall to Ludgate is in arms.\n    Were there no fear of Antichrist, or France,\n    In the blest time poor poets live by chance.\n    Either you come not here, or, as you grace      }\n    Some old acquaintance, drop into the place,     }\n    Careless and qualmish with a yawning face:      }\n    You sleep o'er wit,--and by my troth you may;\n    Most of your talents lie another way.\n    You love to hear of some prodigious tale,\n    The bell that tolled alone, or Irish whale.[351]\n    News is your food, and you enough provide,\n    Both for yourselves, and all the world beside.\n    One theatre there is, of vast resort,\n    Which whilome of Requests was called the Court[352];\n    But now the great exchange of news 'tis hight,\n    And full of hum and buzz from noon till night.\n    Up stairs and down you run, as for a race,\n    And each man wears three nations in his face.\n    So big you look, though claret you retrench,\n    That, armed with bottled ale, you huff the French.\n    But all your entertainment still is fed\n    By villains in your own dull island bred.\n    Would you return to us, we dare engage\n    To shew you better rogues upon the stage.\n    You know no poison but plain ratsbane here;\n    Death's more refined, and better bred elsewhere.\n    They have a civil way in Italy,                    }\n    By smelling a perfume to make you die;             }\n    A trick would make you lay your snuff-box by.      }\n    Murder's a trade, so known and practised there,\n    That 'tis infallible as is the chair.\n    But mark their feast, you shall behold such pranks!\n    The pope says grace, but 'tis the devil gives thanks.[353]\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 351: In Dryden's days, as in our own, there were provided\nby the hawkers a plentiful assortment of wonders and prodigies to\ncaptivate the people; with this difference, that, in that earlier\nperiod, the readers and believers of these wonders were more numerous,\nand of higher rank. I cannot point out the particular prodigies\nreferred to; but I suppose they were of the same description as \"The\nwonderful blazing star; with the dreadful apparition of two armies in\nthe air; the one out of the north, the other out of the south, seen on\nthe 17th December, 1680, betwixt four and five o'clock in the evening,\nat Ottery, ten miles eastward of Exon;\" or as \"The strange and dreadful\nrelation of a horrible tempest of thunder and lightning, and of strange\napparitions in the air, accompanied with whirlwinds, gusts of hail and\nrain, which happened the 10th of June, 1680, at a place near Weatherby,\nin the county of York: with the account how the top of strong oak,\ncontaining one load of wood, was taken off by a sheet of fire, wrapped\nin a whirlwind, and carried through the air, half a mile distant from\nthe place, &c. As, likewise, another strange relation of a monstrous\nchild with two heads, four arms, four legs, and all things thereunto\nbelonging; born at a village, called Ill-Brewers, in the county of\nSomerset, on the 19th of May last, with several other circumstances and\ncurious observations, to the wonder of all that have beheld it.\"]\n\n[Footnote 352: The court of Requests was a general rendezvous for the\nnews-mongers, politicians, and busy bodies of the time. North says,\n\"It was observable of Oates, that while he had his liberty, as in King\nCharles's time and King William's, especially the latter, he never\nfailed to give his attendance in the court of Requests, and in the\nlobbies, to solicit hard in all points under deliberation that might\nterminate in the prejudice of the church, crown, or of any gentlemen\nof the loyal, or church of England party.\" Swift, in his journal to\nStella, makes frequent mention of the Court of Requests as a scene of\npolitical bustle and intrigue.]\n\n[Footnote 353: The Popish plot being now in full force and credit,\nour author here, as in the \"Spanish Friar,\" flatters the universal\nprejudice entertained against the Catholics.]\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nTO\n\nSOPHONISBA; SPOKEN AT OXFORD,\n\n1680.\n\n\n    _Sophonisba was play of N. Lee, first acted about_ 1676. _It is in\n    the taste of the French stage, and of the romances of Calprenede\n    and Scuderi. Hannibal and Massinissa are introduced in the\n    character of whining love-sick adorers of relentless beauty. This\n    prevailing taste is admirably ridiculed by Boileau, in a dialogue\n    where a scene is laid in the infernal regions. In the prologue\n    spoken at Oxford, which was always famous for Tory principles, our\n    author ventures to ridicule the Popish Plot, and to predict the\n    consequences of the predominance of fanatical principles to the\n    studies cultivated in the University._\n\n    Thespis, the first professor of our art,\n    At country wakes, sung ballads from a cart.\n    To prove this true, if Latin be no trespass,\n    _Dicitur et plaustris vexisse poemata Thespis._\n    But \u00c6schylus, says Horace in some page,\n    Was the first mountebank that trod the stage:\n    Yet Athens never knew your learned sport,\n    Of tossing poets in a tennis-court[354].\n    But 'tis the talent of our English nation,\n    Still to be plotting some new reformation;\n    And few years hence, if anarchy goes on,\n    Jack Presbyter shall here erect his throne,\n    Knock out a tub with preaching once a day,\n    And every prayer be longer than a play.\n    Then all your heathen wits shall go to pot,\n    For disbelieving of a Popish-plot;\n    Your poets shall be used like infidels,\n    And worst, the author of the Oxford bells;[355]\n    Nor should we 'scape the sentence, to depart,\n    Even in our first original, a cart;\n    No zealous brother there would want a stone,\n    To maul us cardinals, and pelt pope Joan.\n    Religion, learning, wit, would be supprest,\n    Rags of the whore, and trappings of the beast;\n    Scot, Suarez, Tom of Aquin,[356] must go down,\n    As chief supporters of the triple crown;\n    And Aristotle's for destruction ripe;\n    Some say, he called the soul an organ-pipe,\n    Which, by some little help of derivation,\n    Shall then be proved a pipe of inspiration.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 354: Apparently, a tennis-court was the place where the\ntemporary stage was erected at Oxford.]\n\n[Footnote 355: Probably some pasquinade against the Whigs, then current\nin the university.]\n\n[Footnote 356: Noted school divines, whose works (the greater was the\npity) were then in high esteem in the university.]\n\n\n\n\nA PROLOGUE.\n\n\n    _This Prologue was obviously spoken in_ 1680-1, _from its frequent\n    reference to the politics of that period: but upon what particular\n    occasion I have not discovered._\n\n    If yet there be a few that take delight      }\n    In that which reasonable men should write,   }\n    To them alone we dedicate this night.        }\n    The rest may satisfy their curious itch\n    With city-gazettes, or some factious speech,[357]\n    Or whate'er libel, for the public good,\n    Stirs up the shrove-tide crew to fire and blood.\n    Remove your benches, you apostate pit,\n    And take, above, twelve pennyworth of wit;\n    Go back to your dear dancing on the rope,\n    Or see what's worse, the devil and the pope.[358]\n    The plays, that take on our corrupted stage,\n    Methinks, resemble the distracted age;\n    Noise, madness, all unreasonable things,\n    That strike at sense, as rebels do at kings.\n    The style of forty-one our poets write,\n    And you are grown to judge like forty-eight.[359]\n    Such censures our mistaking audience make,\n    That 'tis almost grown scandalous to take.\n    They talk of fevers that infect the brains;\n    But nonsense is the new disease that reigns.\n    Weak stomachs, with a long disease opprest,\n    Cannot the cordials of strong wit digest;\n    Therefore thin nourishment of farce ye choose,\n    Decoctions of a barley-water muse.\n    A meal of tragedy would make ye sick,\n    Unless it were a very tender chick.\n    Some scenes in sippets would be worth our time;\n    Those would go down; some love that's poached in rhime:\n    If these should fail----\n    We must lie down, and, after all our cost,\n    Keep holiday, like watermen in frost;\n    While you turn players on the world's great stage,\n    And act yourselves the farce of your own age.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 357: The City Gazettes were such publications as the Petition\nof the City, Mayor, and Aldermen, for the sitting of parliament on the\n13th January, 1680, which is printed with the city arms prefixed, by\na solemn order of the common council, and an appointment by the Lord\nMayor, that Samuel Roycroft, printer to the city, do print the same,\npursuant to order, and that no other person presume to do so. The\n\"factious speech\" was probably that of Shaftesbury, which was burned by\nthe hands of the common hangman.]\n\n[Footnote 358: The Pope-burning, so often mentioned.]\n\n[Footnote 359: The meaning is, that the poets rebel against sense and\ncriticism, like the parliament, in 1641, against the king; and that the\naudience judge as ill as those, who, in 1648, condemned Charles to the\nblock. The parallel between the political disputes in 1680, and 1681,\nand those which preceded the great civil war, was fashionable among\nthe Tories. A Whig author, who undertakes \"to answer the clamours of\nthe malicious, and to inform the ignorant on this subject,\" complains,\n\"It hath been all the clamour of late, _forty-one_, _forty-one_ is now\ncoming to be acted over again; we are running in the very same steps,\nin the same path and road, to undo the nation, and to ruin kingly\ngovernment, as our predecessors did in _forty_, _and forty-one_. We\nrun the same courses, we take the same measures; _latet anguis in\nherba_; beware of the Presbyterian serpent, who lurks in the affairs of\n_eighty_, being the very same complexion, form, and shape, as that of\nforty and forty one.\"--_The Disloyal Forty and Forty-one, and the Loyal\nEighty, presented to public view._ Folio 1680.]\n\n\n\n\nEPILOGUE\n\nSPOKEN AT\n\nMITHRIDATES, KING OF PONTUS,\n\nTHE FIRST PLAY ACTED AT THE THEATRE ROYAL, 1681.\n\n\n    _This Epilogue, which occurs in Luttrell's collection with many\n    marginal corrections, seems to have been spoken by Goodman, who is\n    mentioned with great respect by Cibber in his \"Apology.\" It is now\n    for the first time received into Dryden's poems._\n\n    Pox on this playhouse! 'tis an old tired jade,\n    'Twill do no longer, we must force a trade.\n    What if we all turn witnesses o' th' plot?--\n    That's overstockt, there's nothing to be got.\n    Shall we take orders?--That will parts require,    }\n    And colleges give no degrees for hire;             }\n    Would Salamanca were a little nigher!              }\n    Will nothing do?--O, now 'tis found, I hope;\n    Have not you seen the dancing of the rope?\n    When Andr\u00e9's[360] wit was clean run off the score,\n    And Jacob's capering tricks could do no more,\n    A damsel does to the ladder's top advance,\n    And with two heavy buckets drags a dance;\n    The yawning crowd perk up to see the sight,\n    And slaver'd at the mouth for vast delight.\n    Oh, friend, there's nothing, to enchant the mind,\n    Nothing like that sweet sex to draw mankind:\n    The foundered horse, that switching will not stir,\n    Trots to the mare afore, without a spur.\n    Faith, I'll go scour the scene-room, and engage\n    Some toy within to save the falling stage.      [_Exit._\n\n_Re-enters with Mrs_ Cox.\n\n    Who have we here again? what nymph's i' th' stocks?\n    Your most obedient slave, sweet madam Cox.\n    You'd best be coy, and blush for a pretence;\n    For shame! say something in your own defence!\n\n    _Mrs Cox._ What shall I say? I have been hence so long,\n    I've e'en almost forgot my mother-tongue;\n    If I can act, I wish I were ten fathom\n    Beneath----\n\n    _Goodman._ O Lord! pray, no swearing, madam!\n\n    _Mrs Cox._ If I had sworn, yet sure, to serve the nation,\n    I could find out some mental reservation.\n    Well, in plain terms, gallants, without a sham,\n    Will you be pleased to take me as I am?\n    Quite out of countenance, with a downcast look,\n    Just like a truant that returns to book:\n    Yet I'm not old; but, if I were, this place\n    Ne'er wanted art to piece a ruined face.\n    When greybeards governed, I forsook the stage;\n    You know 'tis piteous work to act with age.\n    Though there's no sense among these beardless boys,\n    There's what we women love, that's mirth and noise.\n    These young beginners may grow up in time,\n    And the devil's in't, if I am past my prime.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 360: Alluding to St Andr\u00e9, the famous dancing master, and\nJacob Hall, the performer on the slack rope.]\n\n\n\n\nEPILOGUE\n\nTO A\n\nTRAGEDY CALLED TAMERLANE, 1681.\n\nBY CHARLES SAUNDERS.\n\n\n    _This play was highly applauded at its first representation.\n    Langbaine, following perhaps this epilogue, tells us, that the\n    genius of the author budded as early as that of the incomparable\n    Cowley; and adds, in evidence of farther sympathy, that Saunders\n    was, like him, a king's scholar. The play is said to be taken from\n    a novel called \"Tamerlane and Asteria,\" and was complimented with\n    a copy of commendatory verses by Mr Banks. It does not appear that\n    Saunders wrote any thing else._\n\n    Ladies, the beardless author of this day\n    Commends to you the fortune of his play.\n    A woman-wit has often graced the stage,\n    But he's the first boy-poet of our age.\n    Early as is the year his fancies blow,\n    Like young Narcissus peeping through the snow.\n    Thus Cowley[361] blossomed soon, yet flourished long;\n    This is as forward, and may prove as strong.\n    Youth with the fair should always favour find,\n    Or we are damned dissemblers of our kind.\n    What's all this love they put into our parts?\n    'Tis but the pit-a-pat of two young hearts.\n    Should hag and grey-beard make such tender moan,    }\n    Faith, you'd even trust them to themselves alone,   }\n    And cry, \"Let's go, here's nothing to be done.\"     }\n    Since love's our business, as 'tis your delight,\n    The young, who best can practise, best can write.\n    What though he be not come to his full power?\n    He's mending and improving every hour.\n    You sly she-jockies of the box and pit,\n    Are pleased to find a hot unbroken wit;\n    By management he may in time be made,\n    But there's no hopes of an old battered jade;\n    Faint and unnerved, he runs into a sweat,\n    And always fails you at the second heat.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 361: Cowley published in his sixteenth year, a book called\n\"Poetical Blossoms.\"]\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nTO THE\n\nUNIVERSITY OF OXFORD, 1681.\n\n\n    _This Prologue appears to have been spoken at Oxford shortly after\n    the dissolution of the famous Parliament held there, March, 1680-1.\n    From the following couplet, it would seem that the players had made\n    an unsuccessful attempt to draw houses during the short sitting of\n    that Parliament:_\n\n    We looked what representatives would bring,\n    But they served us just as they did the king.\n\n    _At that time a greater stage was opened for the public amusement,\n    and the mimic theatre could excite little interest._\n\n    _Dryden seems, though perhaps unconsciously, to have borrowed the\n    two first lines of this Prologue from Drayton:_\n\n    The Tuscan poet doth advance\n    The frantic Paladin of France.\n\n    _Nymphidia._\n\n    The famed Italian muse, whose rhimes advance\n    Orlando, and the Paladins of France,\n    Records, that, when our wit and sense is flown,\n    'Tis lodged within the circle of the moon,\n    In earthern jars, which one, who thither soared,\n    Set to his nose, snuffed up, and was restored.\n    Whate'er the story be, the moral's true;\n    The wit we lost in town, we find in you.\n    Our poets their fled parts may draw from hence,\n    And fill their windy heads with sober sense\n    When London votes[362] with Southwark's disagree,\n    Here may they find their long lost loyalty.\n    Here busy senates, to the old cause inclined,\n    May snuff the votes their fellows left behind;\n    Your country neighbours, when their grain grows dear,\n    May come, and find their last provision here;\n    Whereas we cannot much lament our loss,\n    Who neither carried back, nor brought one cross.\n    We looked what representatives would bring,\n    But they helped us--just as they did the king.\n    Yet we despair not; for we now lay forth\n    The Sibyl's books to those who know their worth;\n    And though the first was sacrificed before,\n    These volumes doubly will the price restore.\n    Our poet bade us hope this grace to find,\n    To whom by long prescription you are kind.\n    He, whose undaunted Muse, with loyal rage,\n    Has never spared the vices of the age,\n    Here finding nothing that his spleen can raise,\n    Is forced to turn his satire into praise.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 362: The city of London had now declared against petitioning\nfor parliament.]\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nTO THE\n\nUNIVERSITY OF OXFORD.\n\n\n    _This Prologue must have been spoken at Oxford during the residence\n    of the Duke of York in Scotland, in 1681-2. The humour turns upon\n    a part of the company having attended the Duke to Scotland, where,\n    among other luxuries little known to my countrymen, he introduced,\n    during his residence at Holy Rood House, the amusements of the\n    theatre. I can say little about the actors commemorated in the\n    following verses, excepting, that their stage was erected in the\n    tennis-court of the palace, which was afterwards converted into\n    some sort of manufactory, and finally, burned down many years\n    ago. Besides these deserters, whom Dryden has described very\n    ludicrously, he mentions a sort of strolling company, composed, it\n    would seem, of Irishmen, who had lately acted at Oxford._\n\n    Discord, and plots, which have undone our age,\n    With the same ruin have o'erwhelmed the stage.\n    Our house has suffered in the common woe,\n    We have been troubled with Scotch rebels too.\n    Our brethren are from Thames to Tweed departed, }\n    And of our sisters, all the kinder-hearted      }\n    To Edinburgh gone, or coached, or carted.       }\n    With bonny bluecap there they act all night\n    For Scotch half-crown, in English three-pence hight.\n    One nymph, to whom fat Sir John Falstaff's lean,\n    There with her single person fills the scene.\n    Another, with long use and age decayed,\n    Dived here old woman, and rose there a maid.\n    Our trusty door-keepers of former time\n    There strut and swagger in heroic rhime.\n    Tack but a copper-lace to drugget suit,\n    And there's a hero made without dispute;\n    And that, which was a capon's tail before,\n    Becomes a plume for Indian emperor.\n    But all his subjects, to express the care\n    Of imitation go, like Indians, bare;\n    Laced linen there would be a dangerous thing;     }\n    It might perhaps a new rebellion bring;           }\n    The Scot, who wore it, would be chosen king.      }\n    But why should I these renegades describe,\n    When you yourselves have seen a lewder tribe?\n    Teague has been here, and, to this learned pit,\n    With Irish action slandered English wit;\n    You have beheld such barbarous Macs appear,\n    As merited a second massacre;[363]\n    Such as, like Cain, were branded with disgrace,\n    And had their country stamped upon their face.\n    When strollers durst presume to pick your purse,\n    We humbly thought our broken troop not worse.\n    How ill soe'er our action may deserve,\n    Oxford's a place where wit can never starve.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 363: Alluding to the Irish massacre.]\n\n\n\n\nAN\n\nEPILOGUE\n\nFOR\n\nTHE KING'S HOUSE\n\n\n    _From the date of the various circumstances referred to, this\n    Epilogue seems to have been spoken in 1681-2._\n\n    We act by fits and starts, like drowning men,\n    But just peep up, and then pop down again.\n    Let those who call us wicked change their sense,\n    For never men lived more on Providence.\n    Not lottery cavaliers[364] are half so poor,\n    Nor broken cits, nor a vacation whore;\n    Not courts, nor courtiers living on the rents\n    Of the three last ungiving parliaments;[365]\n    So wretched, that, if Pharaoh could divine,           }\n    He might have spared his dream of seven lean kine,    }\n    And changed his vision for the muses nine.            }\n    The comet, that, they say, portends a dearth,\n    Was but a vapour drawn from playhouse earth;\n    Pent there since our last fire, and, Lilly says,[366]\n    Foreshows our change of state, and thin third-days.\n    'Tis not our want of wit that keeps us poor;\n    For then the printer's press would suffer more.\n    Their pamphleteers each day their venom spit;\n    They thrive by treason, and we starve by wit.\n    Confess the truth, which of you has not laid\n    Four farthings out to buy the Hatfield Maid?[367]\n    Or, which is duller yet, and more would spite us,\n    Democritus his wars with Heraclitus?[368]\n    Such are the authors, who have run us down,\n    And exercised you critics of the town.\n    Yet these are pearls to your lampooning rhimes,\n    Ye abuse yourselves more dully than the times.\n    Scandal, the glory of the English nation,\n    Is worn to rags, and scribbled out of fashion;\n    Such harmless thrusts, as if, like fencers wise,\n    They had agreed their play before their prize.\n    Faith, they may hang their harps upon their willows;\n    'Tis just like children when they box with pillows.\n    Then put an end to civil wars, for shame!\n    Let each knight-errant, who has wronged a dame,\n    Throw down his pen, and give her, as he can,\n    The satisfaction of a gentleman.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 364: The lottery cavaliers were the loyal indigent officers,\nto whom the right of keeping lotteries was granted by patent in the\nreign of Charles II. There are many proclamations in the gazettes of\nthe time against persons encroaching upon this exclusive privilege.]\n\n[Footnote 365: The \"three ungiving parliaments\" were that convoked\nin 1679, and dissolved on the 10th July in the same year; that which\nwas held at Westminster 21st October, 1680, and dissolved on the 18th\nJanuary following; and, finally, the Oxford parliament, assembled 21st\nMarch, 1680-1, and dissolved on the 28th of the same month. All these\nparliaments refused supplies to the crown, until they should obtain\nsecurity, as they termed it, for the Protestant religion.]\n\n[Footnote 366: The famous astrologer Lilly is here mentioned\nironically. In his \"Strange and wonderful prophecy, being a relation\nof many universal accidents that will come to pass in the year 1681,\naccording to the prognostications of the celestial bodies, as well in\nthis our English nation, as in parts beyond the seas, with a sober\ncaution to all, by speedy repentance, to avert the judgments that are\nimpendent,\" I find \"an account of the great stream of light, by some\ntermed a blazing star, which was seen in the south-west on Saturday\nand Sunday, the 11th and 12th of this instant December, between\nsix and seven in the evening, with several judicial opinions and\nconjectures on the same.\" But the comet, mentioned in the text, may\nbe that which is noticed in \"A strange and wonderful Trinity, or a\nTriplicity of Stupendous Prodigies, consisting of a wonderful eclipse,\nas well as of a wonderful comet, and of a wonderful conjunction, now\nin its second return; seeing all these three prodigious wonders do\njointly portend wonderful events, all meeting together in a strange\nharmonious triangle, and are all the three royal heralds successively\nsent from the King of Heaven, to sound succeeding alarms for awakening\na slumbering world. _Beware the third time._\" 4to. London, 1683. This\ncomet is said to have appeared in October 1682. Various interpretations\nwere put upon these heavenly phenomena, by Gadbury, Lilly, Kirkby,\nWhalley, and other Philo-maths, who were chiefly guided in their\npredictions by their political attachments. Some insisted they meant\ncivil war, others foreign conquest; some that they presaged the\ndownfall of the Turk, others that of the Pope and French king; some\nthat they foretold dearth on the land, and others, the fertility of\nthe king's bed, by the birth of a son, to the exclusion of the Duke of\nYork.]\n\n[Footnote 367: This was one of the numerous devices used by the\npartizans of Monmouth to strengthen his interest: \"A relation was\npublished, in the name of one Elizabeth Freeman, afterwards called the\nMaid of Hatfield, setting forth, That, on the 24th of January, the\nappearance of a woman all in white, with a white veil over her face,\naccosted her with these words: 'Sweetheart, the 15th day of May is\nappointed for the royal blood to be poisoned. Be not afraid, for I am\nsent to tell thee.' That on the 25th, the same appearance stood before\nher again, and she having then acquired courage enough to lay it under\nthe usual adjuration, in the name, &c. it assumed a more glorious\nshape, and said in a harsher tone of voice: 'Tell King Charles from\nme, and bid him not remove his parliament, and stand to his council:'\nadding, 'do as I bid you.' That on the 26th it appeared to her a third\ntime, but said only, 'do your message.' And that on the next night,\nwhen she saw it for the last time, it said nothing at all.\n\n\"Those who depend upon the people for support, must try all manners\nof practices upon them; and such fooleries as these sometimes operate\nmore forcibly than expedients of a more rational kind. Care was,\nbesides, taken, to have this relation attested by Sir Joseph Jordan,\na justice of the peace, and the rector of Hatfield, Dr Lee, who was\none of the king's chaplains: Nay, the message was actually sent to his\nmajesty, and the whole forgery very officiously circulated all over the\nkingdom.\"--RALPH'S _Review of the Reigns of Charles II. and James II._\nVol. I. p. 562.\n\nThe Tories, according to the custom of that time, endeavoured to\nturn this apparition against those who invented it, and published an\nironical account of its appearance to Lady Gray, the supposed mistress\nof the Duke of Monmouth.--See RALPH, _ibid._ and this Work, Vol. IX. p.\n276.]\n\n[Footnote 368: \"Heraclitus Ridens\" was a paper published weekly, by\nL'Estrange, on the part of the court, and answered by one called\n\"Democritus\" on that of the Whigs.]\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nTO HIS\n\nROYAL HIGHNESS,\n\nUPON HIS\n\nFIRST APPEARANCE AT THE DUKE'S THEATRE AFTER HIS RETURN FROM SCOTLAND.\n\nSPOKEN BY MR SMITH, 21st APRIL, 1682.\n\n\n    _The Duke's return from Scotland, and the shock which it gave\n    to the schemes of Shaftesbury and the Exclusionists, has been\n    mentioned at length in the Notes to the Second Part of \"Absalom and\n    Achitophel,\"_ Vol. ix. p. 402. _The passage upon which the note\n    is given, agrees with this Prologue, in representing the secret\n    enemies of the Duke of York as anxiously pressing forwards to greet\n    his return:_\n\n    While those that sought his absence to betray,\n    Press first, their nauseous false respects to pay;\n    Him still the officious hypocrites molest,\n    And with malicious duty break his rest.\n\n    Vol. ix. p. 344.\n\n    _The date of the Prologue, and the name of the speaker, are marked\n    on a copy in Mr Luttrell's collection._\n\n    In those cold regions which no summers cheer,\n    Where brooding darkness covers half the year,\n    To hollow caves the shivering natives go,\n    Bears range abroad, and hunt in tracks of snow.\n    But when the tedious twilight wears away,\n    And stars grow paler at the approach of day,\n    The longing crowds to frozen mountains run,\n    Happy who first can see the glimmering sun;\n    The surly savage offspring disappear,\n    And curse the bright successor of the year.\n    Yet, though rough bears in covert seek defence,    }\n    White foxes stay, with seeming innocence;          }\n    That crafty kind with day-light can dispense.      }\n    Still we are thronged so full with Reynard's race,\n    That loyal subjects scarce can find a place;\n    Thus modest truth is cast behind the crowd,\n    Truth speaks too low, hypocrisy too loud.\n    Let them be first to flatter in success;\n    Duty can stay, but guilt has need to press.\n    Once, when true zeal the sons of God did call,\n    To make their solemn show at heaven's Whitehall,\n    The fawning Devil appeared among the rest,\n    And made as good a courtier as the best.\n    The friends of Job, who railed at him before,\n    Came cap in hand when he had three times more.\n    Yet late repentance may, perhaps, be true;\n    Kings can forgive, if rebels can but sue:\n    A tyrant's power in rigour is exprest;\n    The father yearns in the true prince's breast.\n    We grant, an o'ergrown Whig no grace can mend,\n    But most are babes, that know not they offend;\n    The crowd, to restless motion still inclined,\n    Are clouds, that rack according to the wind.\n    Driven by their chiefs, they storms of hailstones pour,\n    Then mourn, and soften to a silent shower.\n    O welcome to this much-offending land,\n    The prince that brings forgiveness in his hand!\n    Thus angels on glad messages appear,\n    Their first salute commands us not to fear;\n    Thus heaven, that could constrain us to obey,       }\n    (With reverence if we might presume to say,)        }\n    Seems to relax the rights of sovereign sway;        }\n    Permits to man the choice of good and ill,\n    And makes us happy by our own free-will.\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nTO THE EARL OF ESSEX.\n\nBY MR J. BANKS, 1682.\n\nSPOKEN TO THE KING AND THE QUEEN AT THEIR COMING TO THE HOUSE.\n\n\n    When first the ark was landed on the shore,\n    And heaven had vowed to curse the ground no more;\n    When tops of hills the longing patriarch saw,\n    And the new scene of earth began to draw;\n    The dove was sent to view the waves decrease,\n    And first brought back to man the pledge of peace.\n    'Tis needless to apply, when those appear,\n    Who bring the olive, and who plant it here.\n    We have before our eyes the royal dove,\n    Still innocence is harbinger of love:\n    The ark is opened to dismiss the train,\n    And people with a better race the plain.\n    Tell me, ye powers, why should vain man pursue,    }\n    With endless toil, each object that is new,        }\n    And for the seeming substance leave the true?      }\n    Why should he quit for hopes his certain good,\n    And loath the manna of his daily food?\n    Must England still the scene of changes be,          }\n    Tost and tempestuous, like our ambient sea?          }\n    Must still our weather and our wills agree?          }\n    Without our blood our liberties we have;\n    Who, that is free, would fight to be a slave?\n    Or, what can wars to after-times assure,\n    Of which our present age is not secure?\n    All that our monarch would for us ordain,\n    Is but to enjoy the blessings of his reign.\n    Our land's an Eden, and the main's our fence,\n    While we preserve our state of innocence:\n    That lost, then beasts their brutal force employ,\n    And first their lord, and then themselves destroy.\n    What civil broils have cost, we know too well;\n    Oh! let it be enough that once we fell!\n    And every heart conspire, and every tongue,\n    Still to have such a king, and this king long.\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nTO THE\n\nLOYAL BROTHER, OR THE PERSIAN PRINCE.\n\n\nThe \"Loyal Brother, or the Persian Prince,\" was the first play of\nSoutherne, afterwards so deservedly famous as a tragic poet. It is said\nto be borrowed from a novel, called, \"Tachmas, Prince of Persia.\" The\ncharacter of the Loyal Brother is obviously designed as a compliment to\nthe Duke of York, whose adherents and opponents now divided the nation.\nSoutherne was at this time but three-and-twenty. It is said, that, upon\noffering Dryden five guineas for the following prologue, which had\nhitherto been the usual compliment made him for such favours, the bard\nreturned the money; and added, \"not that I do so out of disrespect to\nyou, young man, but the players have had my goods too cheap. In future,\nI must have ten guineas.\" Southerne was the first poet who drew large\nprofit from the author's nights; insomuch, that he is said to have\ncleared by one play seven hundred pounds; a circumstance that greatly\nsurprised Dryden, who seldom gained by his best pieces more than a\nseventh part of the sum. From these circumstances, Pope, in his verses\nto Southerne on his birth-day, distinguishes him as\n\n    ----Tom, whom heaven sent down to raise\n    The price of prologues and of plays.\n\nThe prologue, as might be expected, is very severe upon the Whigs; and\nalludes to all the popular subjects of dispute between the factions.\nThe refusal of supplies, and the petition against the king's guards,\nare slightly noticed, but the great pope-burning is particularly dwelt\nupon; and probably the reader will be pleased with an opportunity of\ncomparing the account in the prologue with that given by Roger North,\nwho seems to have entertained the same fear with Dryden, that the\nrabble might chuse to cry, God save the king, at Whitehall.\n\n\"But, to return to our tumults.--After it was found that there was to\nbe a reinforcement at the next anniversary, which was in 1682, it is\nnot to be thought that the court was asleep, or that the king would\nnot endeavour to put a stop to this brutal outrage. His majesty thought\nfit to take the ordinary regular course; which was, to send for the\nlord mayor, &c. and to charge him to prevent riots in the city. So\nthe lord mayor and sheriffs attended the king in council; and there\nthey were told, that dangerous tumults and disorders were designed\nin the city upon the 17th of November next, at night, on pretence of\nbonfires; and his majesty expected that they, who were entrusted with\nthe government of the city, for keeping the peace, should, by their\nauthority, prevent all such riotous disorders, which, permitted to\ngo on, was a misdemeanour of their whole body. Then one of them came\nforward, and, in a whining tone, told the king, that they did not\napprehend any danger to his majesty, or the city, from these bonfires;\nthere was an ardour of the people against popery, which they delighted\nto express in that manner, but meant no harm: And, if they should go\nabout to hinder them, it would be taken as if they favoured popery;\nand, considering the great numbers, and their zeal, it might make them\noutrageous, which, let alone, would not be; and perhaps they themselves\nmight not be secure in resisting them, no not in their own houses; and\nthey hoped his majesty would not have them so exposed, so long as they\ncould assure his majesty that care should be taken, that, if they went\nabout any ill thing, they should be prevented: or to this purpose, as\nI had it from undoubted authority. This was the godly care they had of\nthe public peace, and the repose of the city; by which the king saw\nplainly what they were, and what was to be expected from them. There\nwanted not those who suggested the sending regiments into the city; but\nthe king (always witty) said, he did not love to play with his horse.\nBut his majesty ordered that a party of horse should be drawn up, and\nmake a strong guard on the outside of Temple-Bar; and all the other\nguards were ordered to be in a posture at a minute's warning; and so he\ntook a middle, but secure and inoffensive way; and these guards did not\nbreak up till all the rout was over.\n\n\"There were not a few in the court who either feared or favoured these\ndoings; it may be both; the former being the cause of the latter. This\nputs me in mind of a passage told me by one present. It was of the Lord\nArchbishop of York, Dolben, who was a goodly person, and corpulent; he\ncame to the Lord Chief-Justice North, and, my lord, said he, (clapping\nhis hand upon his great self,) what shall we do with these tumults\nof the people? They will bear all down before them. My lord, said\nthe Chief Justice, fear God, and don't fear the people. A good hint\nfrom a man of law to an archbishop. But when the day of execution was\ncome, all the show-fools of the town had made sure of places; and,\ntowards the evening, there was a great clutter in the street, with\ntaking down glass-windows, and faces began to show themselves thereat;\nand the hubbub was great, with the shoals of people come there, to\ntake or seek accommodation. And, for the greater amazement of the\npeople, somebody had got up to the statue of Elizabeth, in the nich\nof Temple-Bar, and set her out like an heathen idol. A bright shield\nwas hung upon her arm, and a spear put in, or leaned upon, the other\nhand; and lamps, or candles, were put about, on the wall of the nich,\nto enlighten her person, that the people might have a full view of the\ndeity that, like the goddess Pallas, stood there as the object of the\nsolemn sacrifice about to be made. There seemed to be an inscription\nupon the shield, but I could not get near enough to discern what it\nwas, nor divers other decorations; but whatever they were, the eyes\nof the rout were pointed at them, and lusty shouts were raised, which\nwas all the adoration could be paid before the grand procession came\nup. I could fix in no nearer post than the Green-Dragon Tavern, below\nin Fleet-Street; but, before I settled in my quarters, I rounded the\ncrowd, to observe, as well as I could, what was doing, and saw much,\nbut afterwards heard more of the hard battles and skirmishes, that were\nmaintained from windows and balconies of several parties with one and\nthe other, and with the floor, as the fancy of Whig and Tory incited.\nAll which were managed with the artillery of squibs, whereof thousands\nof vollies went off, to the great expence of powder and paper, and\nprofit to the poor manufacturer; for the price of ammunition rose\ncontinually, and the whole trade could not supply the consumption of an\nhour or two.\n\n\"When we had posted ourselves at windows, expecting the play to begin,\nit was very dark, but we could perceive the street to fill, and the hum\nof the crowd grew louder and louder; and, at length, with help of some\nlights below, we could discern, not only upwards towards the Bar, where\nthe squib war was maintained, but downwards towards Fleet-Bridge, the\nwhole street was crowded with people, which made that which followed\nseem very strange; for, about eight at night, we heard a din from\nbelow, which came up the street, continually increasing, till we could\nperceive a motion; and that was a row of stout fellows, that came,\nshouldered together, cross the street, from wall to wall, on each side.\nHow the people melted away, I cannot tell; but it was plain these\nfellows made clear board, as if they had swept the street for what was\nto come after. They went along like a wave; and it was wonderful to\nsee how the crowd made way: I suppose the good people were willing to\ngive obedience to lawful authority. Behind this wave (which, as all the\nrest, had many lights attending) there was a vacancy, but it filled\na-pace, till another like wave came up; and so four or five of these\nwaves passed, one after another; and then we discerned more numerous\nlights, and throats were opened with hoarse and tremendous noise; and,\nwith that, advanced a pageant, borne along above the heads of the\ncrowd, and upon it sat an huge Pope, in _pontificalibus_, in his chair,\nwith a reasonable attendance for state; but his premier minister,\nthat shared most of his ear, was, Il Signior Diavolo, a nimble little\nfellow, in a proper dress, that had a strange dexterity in climbing and\nwinding about the chair, from one of the pope's ears to the other.\n\n\"The next pageant was of a parcel of Jesuits; and after that (for\nthere was always a decent space between them) came another, with some\nordinary persons with halters, as I took it, about their necks; and\none with a stenterophonic tube, sounded--Abhorrers! Abhorrers! most\ninfernally; and, lastly, came one, with a single person upon it,\nwhich, some said, was the pamphleteer Sir Roger L'Estrange, some the\nKing of France, some the Duke of York; but, certainly, it was a very\ncomplaisant civil gentleman, like the former, that was doing what\nevery body pleased to have him, and, taking all in good part, went on\nhis way to the fire; and however some, to gratify their fancy, might\ndebase his character, yet certainly he was a person of high quality,\nbecause he came in the place of state, which is last of all. When\nthese were passed, our coast began to clear, but it thickened upwards,\nand the noise increased; for, as we were afterwards informed, these\nstately figures were planted in a demilune about an huge fire, that\nshined upon them; and the balconies of the club were ready to crack\nwith their factious load, till the good people were satiated with the\nfine show; and then the hieroglyphic monsters were brought condignly\nto a new light of their own making, being, one after another, added\nto increase the flames: all which was performed with fitting salvos\nof the rabble, echoed from the club, which made a proper music to so\npompous a sacrifice. Were it not for the late attempts to have renewed\nthese barbarities,[369] it had been more reasonable to have forgot\nthe past, that such a stain might not have remained upon the credit\nof human kind, whom we would not have thought obnoxious to any such;\nbut, as it is now otherwise, all persons, that mean humanely, ought\nto discourage them; and one way is, to expose the factious brutality\nof such unthinking rabble sports, by showing, as near as we can, how\nreally they were acted; the very knowledge of which, one would think,\nshould make them for ever to be abhorred and detested of all rational\nbeings.\"--NORTH'S _Examen_.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 369: Probably alluding to the pope-burning, meditated by the\nWhigs during the administration of Harley. Swift, in his journal to\nStella, mentions the figures intended for the procession having been\nseized by government.]\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nTO THE\n\nLOYAL BROTHER, OR THE PERSIAN PRINCE.\n\nBY MR SOUTHERNE, 1682.\n\n\n    Poets, like lawful monarchs, ruled the stage,\n    Till critics, like damned Whigs, debauched our age.\n    Mark how they jump! critics would regulate          }\n    Our theatres, and Whigs reform our state;           }\n    Both pretend love, and both (plague rot them!) hate.}\n    The critic humbly seems advice to bring,\n    The fawning Whig petitions to the king;\n    But one's advice into a satire slides,\n    T'other's petition a remonstrance hides.\n    These will no taxes give, and those no pence;\n    Critics would starve the poet, Whigs the prince.\n    The critic all our troops of friends discards;\n    Just so the Whig would fain pull down the guards.\n    Guards are illegal, that drive foes away,\n    As watchful shepherds, that fright beasts of prey.\n    Kings, who disband such needless aids as these,\n    Are safe--as long as e'er their subjects please;\n    And that would be till next Queen Bess's night,\n    Which thus grave penny chroniclers indite.[370]\n    Sir Edmondbury first, in woful wise,\n    Leads up the show, and milks their maudlin eyes.\n    There's not a butcher's wife but dribs her part,\n    And pities the poor pageant from her heart;\n    Who, to provoke revenge, rides round the fire,\n    And, with a civil cong\u00e9, does retire:\n    But guiltless blood to ground must never fall;\n    There's Antichrist behind, to pay for all.\n    The punk of Babylon in pomp appears,\n    A lewd old gentleman of seventy years;\n    Whose age in vain our mercy would implore,\n    For few take pity on an old cast whore.\n    The devil, who brought him to the shame, takes part; }\n    Sits cheek by jowl, in black, to cheer his heart,    }\n    Like thief and parson in a Tyburn-cart.              }\n    The word is given, and with a loud huzza\n    The mitred poppet from his chair they draw:\n    On the slain corpse contending nations fall--\n    Alas! what's one poor pope among them all!\n    He burns; now all true hearts your triumphs ring;\n    And next, for fashion, cry, \"God save the king!\"\n    A needful cry in midst of such alarms,\n    When forty thousand men are up in arms.\n    But after he's once saved, to make amends,       }\n    In each succeeding health they damn his friends: }\n    So God begins, but still the devil ends.         }\n    What if some one, inspired with zeal, should call,\n    Come, let's go cry, \"God save him at Whitehall?\"\n    His best friends would not like this over-care,\n    Or think him e'er the safer for this prayer.\n    Five praying saints[371] are by an act allowed,\n    But not the whole church-militant in crowd;\n    Yet, should heaven all the true petitions drain }\n    Of Presbyterians, who would kings maintain,     }\n    Of forty thousand, five would scarce remain.    }\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 370: See a copy of the penny chronicle alluded to, containing\na minute account of this celebrated procession, with a cut illustrative\nof the description, Vol. VI. p. 222.]\n\n[Footnote 371: Only five dissenters were allowed to meet together by\nthe penal statutes.]\n\n\n\n\nEPILOGUE\n\nTO\n\nTHE SAME.\n\n\n    A virgin poet was served up to-day,\n    Who, till this hour, ne'er cackled for a play.\n    He's neither yet a Whig nor Tory boy;               }\n    But, like a girl, whom several would enjoy,         }\n    Begs leave to make the best of his own natural toy. }\n    Were I to play my callow author's game,\n    The King's House would instruct me by the name.[372]\n    There's loyalty to one; I wish no more:\n    A commonwealth sounds like a common whore.\n    Let husband or gallant be what they will,\n    One part of woman is true Tory still.\n    If any factious spirit should rebel,\n    Our sex, with ease, can every rising quell.\n    Then, as you hope we should your failings hide,\n    An honest jury for our play provide.\n    Whigs at their poets never take offence;\n    They save dull culprits, who have murdered sense.\n    Though nonsense is a nauseous heavy mass,\n    The vehicle called Faction makes it pass;\n    Faction in play's the commonwealth-man's bribe;\n    The leaden farthing of the canting tribe:\n    Though void in payment laws and statutes make it,\n    The neighbourhood, that knows the man, will take it.[373]\n    'Tis faction buys the votes of half the pit;\n    Their's is the pension-parliament[374] of wit.\n    In city-clubs their venom let them vent;\n    For there 'tis safe, in its own element.\n    Here, where their madness can have no pretence,\n    Let them forget themselves an hour of sense.\n    In one poor isle, why should two factions be? }\n    Small difference in your vices I can see:     }\n    In drink and drabs both sides too well agree. }\n    Would there were more preferments in the land!\n    If places fell, the party could not stand.\n    Of this damned grievance every Whig complains,\n    They grunt like hogs till they have got their grains.\n    Mean time, you see what trade our plots advance;\n    We send each year good money into France;\n    And they that know what merchandize we need,\n    Send o'er true Protestants[375] to mend our breed.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 372: Where the play was acted.]\n\n[Footnote 373: Alluding to the tokens issued by tradesmen in place of\ncopper money, which, though not a legal tender of payment, continued to\nbe current by the credit of the individual whose name they bore. Tom\nBrown mentions Alderman Buncombe's leaden halfpence.]\n\n[Footnote 374: The Parliament, which sat from the Restoration till\n1678, bore this ignominious epithet among the Whigs.]\n\n[Footnote 375: Alluding to the emigration of the French Huguenots,\nwhich the intolerance of Louis XIV. and his ministers began to render\ngeneral. Many took refuge in England. See Vol. X. p. 264.]\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nTO\n\nTHE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD,\n\nSPOKEN BY MR HART\n\nAT THE ACTING OF THE SILENT WOMAN.\n\n\n    What Greece, when learning flourished, only knew,\n    Athenian judges, you this day renew.\n    Here, too, are annual rites to Pallas done,\n    And here poetic prizes lost or won.\n    Methinks I see you, crowned with olives, sit,\n    And strike a sacred horror from the pit.\n    A day of doom is this of your decree,                  }\n    Where even the best are but by mercy free;             }\n    A day, which none but Jonson durst have wished to see. }\n    Here they, who long have known the useful stage,\n    Come to be taught themselves to teach the age.\n    As your commissioners our poets go,\n    To cultivate the virtue which you sow;\n    In your Lyc\u00e6um first themselves refined,\n    And delegated thence to human kind.\n    But as ambassadors, when long from home,\n    For new instructions to their princes come,\n    So poets, who your precepts have forgot,\n    Return, and beg they may be better taught:\n    Follies and faults elsewhere by them are shown,\n    But by your manners they correct their own.\n    The illiterate writer, emp'ric-like, applies\n    To minds diseased, unsafe chance remedies:\n    The learned in schools, where knowledge first began,\n    Studies with care the anatomy of man;\n    Sees virtue, vice, and passions in their cause,\n    And fame from science, not from fortune, draws;\n    So Poetry, which is in Oxford made\n    An art, in London only is a trade.\n    There haughty dunces, whose unlearned pen\n    Could ne'er spell grammar, would be reading men.[376]\n    Such build their poems the Lucretian way;\n    So many huddled atoms make a play;\n    And if they hit in order by some chance,\n    They call that nature, which is ignorance.\n    To such a fame let mere town-wits aspire,\n    And their gay nonsense their own cits admire.\n    Our poet, could he find forgiveness here,\n    Would wish it rather than a plaudit there.\n    He owns no crown from those Pr\u00e6torian bands,[377]\n    But knows that right is in the senate's hands.\n    Not impudent enough to hope your praise,    }\n    Low at the Muses' feet his wreath he lays,  }\n    And, where he took it up, resigns his bays. }\n    Kings make their poets whom themselves think fit,\n    But 'tis your suffrage makes authentic wit.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 376: An allusion to Shadwell; who boasted, that he drew his\ncharacters from nature, in contempt of regular criticism.]\n\n[Footnote 377: Alluding to the mode in which the emperors were chosen\nduring the decline of the empire, when the soldiers of the Pr\u00e6torian\nguards were the electors, without regard to the legal rights of the\nsenate.]\n\n\n\n\nEPILOGUE,\n\nSPOKEN BY THE SAME.\n\n\n    No poor Dutch peasant, winged with all his fear,\n    Flies with more haste, when the French arms draw near,\n    Than we, with our poetic train, come down,\n    For refuge hither, from the infected town:\n    Heaven, for our sins, this summer has thought fit\n    To visit us with all the plagues of wit.\n    A French troop first swept all things in its way;\n    But those hot Monsieurs were too quick to stay:\n    Yet, to our cost, in that short time, we find\n    They left their itch of novelty behind.\n    The Italian merry-andrews took their place,\n    And quite debauched the stage with lewd grimace:\n    Instead of wit, and humours, your delight\n    Was there to see two hobby-horses fight;\n    Stout Scaramoucha with rush lance rode in,\n    And ran a tilt at centaur Arlequin.\n    For love you heard how amorous asses brayed,\n    And cats in gutters gave their serenade.\n    Nature was out of countenance, and each day\n    Some new-born monster shown you for a play.\n    But when all failed, to strike the stage quite dumb,\n    Those wicked engines, called machines, are come.\n    Thunder and lightning now for wit are played,\n    And shortly scenes in Lapland will be laid:\n    Art magic is for poetry profest,[378]\n    And cats and dogs, and each obscener beast,\n    To which Egyptian dotards once did bow,\n    Upon our English stage are worshipped now.\n    Witchcraft reigns there, and raises to renown\n    Macbeth[379] and Simon Magus of the town.\n    Fletcher's despised, your Jonson's out of fashion,\n    And wit the only drug in all the nation.\n    In this low ebb our wares to you are shown,  }\n    By you those staple authors' worth is known, }\n    For wit's a manufacture of your own.         }\n    When you, who only can, their scenes have praised,\n    We'll back, and boldly say, their price is raised.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 378: This and the following lines refer to the success of\nShadwell's comedy of \"The Lancashire Witches,\" in which a great deal\nof machinery is introduced; the witches flying away with the clown's\ncandles, and the priest's bottle of holy water, and converting a\ncountry-fellow into a horse upon the stage. Not content with this, the\nauthor has introduced upon the stage all that writers upon D\u00e6monology\nhave rehearsed of the Witches' Sabbath, or Festival, with their\ninfernal master; and has thus, very clumsily, mixed the horrible with\nthe ludicrous. As for the cats and dogs, we have, in one place,--\"Enter\nan Imp, in the shape of a black Shock;\" and, in another,\n\n\"Enter Mother Hargrave, Mother Madge, and two Witches more; they mew,\nand spit, like cats, and fly at them, and scratch them.\n\n_Young Hartford._ What's this? we're set on by cats.\n\n_Sir Timothy._ They're witches in the shape of cats; what shall we do?\n\n_Priest._ Phaat will I do? cat, cat, cat! oh, oh! _Conjuro vobis!\nfugite, fugite, Cacod\u00e6mones_; cats, cats! (They scratch all their\nfaces, till the blood runs about them.)\n\n_Tom Shacklehead._ Have at ye all! (he cuts at them.) I ha' mauled some\nof them, by the mass! they are fled, but I am plaguily scratched. (The\nWitches shriek, and run away.)\"\n\nBesides the offence which Shadwell gave, in point of taste, by the\nintroduction of these pantomimical absurdities, Dryden was also\ndispleased by the whole tenor of the play, which was directed against\nthe High-Churchmen and Tories.--_See Dedication of the Duke of Guise_,\nVol. VII. p. 15.]\n\n[Footnote 379: This has no reference to any recent representation of\nthe tragedy of \"Macbeth.\" Shadwell, from the witchcraft introduced in\nhis play, is ironically termed, \"Macbeth and Simon Magus.\"]\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nTO\n\nTHE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD.\n\n\n    Though actors cannot much of learning boast,\n    Of all who want it, we admire it most:\n    We love the praises of a learned pit,\n    As we remotely are allied to wit.\n    We speak our poet's wit, and trade in ore,\n    Like those who touch upon the golden shore;\n    Betwixt our judges can distinction make,\n    Discern how much, and why our poems take;\n    Mark if the fools, or men of sense, rejoice;\n    Whether the applause be only sound or voice.\n    When our fop gallants, or our city folly,\n    Clap over loud, it makes us melancholy:\n    We doubt that scene which does their wonder raise,\n    And, for their ignorance, contemn their praise.\n    Judge, then, if we who act, and they who write,\n    Should not be proud of giving you delight.\n    London likes grossly; but this nicer pit\n    Examines, fathoms, all the depths of wit;\n    The ready finger lays on every blot;\n    Knows what should justly please, and what should not.\n    Nature herself lies open to your view;\n    You judge, by her, what draught of her is true,\n    Where outlines false, and colours seem too faint,\n    Where bunglers daub, and where true poets paint.\n    But by the sacred genius of this place,\n    By every muse, by each domestic grace,\n    Be kind to wit, which but endeavours well,\n    And, where you judge, presumes not to excel!\n    Our poets hither for adoption come,\n    As nations sued to be made free of Rome:\n    Not in the suffragating tribes[380] to stand,\n    But in your utmost, last, provincial band.\n    If his ambition may those hopes pursue,\n    Who, with religion, loves your arts and you,\n    Oxford to him a dearer name shall be\n    Than his own mother-university.\n    Thebes[381] did his green, unknowing, youth engage;\n    He chooses Athens in his riper age.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 380: Alluding to the Roman citizens, who had the right of\nvoting, denied to the lower, or provincial orders.]\n\n[Footnote 381: Our author was educated at Cambridge. Whether the sons\nof Cam relished this avowed preference of Oxford, may be doubted.]\n\n\n\n\nEPILOGUE\n\nTO\n\nCONSTANTINE THE GREAT.\n\nBY MR N. LEE, 1684.\n\n\n    _The play, to which this is the prologue, is but a second-rate\n    performance. It is founded on the story of Faustina and Crispus,\n    which the learned will find in Ammianus Marcellinus, and the\n    English reader in Gibbon. Arius, the heretic, is the villain of the\n    piece, which concludes fortunately._\n\n    Our hero's happy in the play's conclusion;\n    The holy rogue at last has met confusion:\n    Though Arius all along appeared a saint,\n    The last act showed him a True Protestant.[382]\n    Eusebius,--for you know I read Greek authors,--\n    Reports, that, after all these plots and slaughters,\n    The court of Constantine was full of glory,\n    And every Trimmer turned addressing Tory.\n    They followed him in herds as they were mad:\n    When Clause _was_ king, then all the world was glad.[383]\n    Whigs kept the places they possest before,\n    And most were in a way of getting more;\n    Which was as much as saying, Gentlemen,\n    Here's power and money to be rogues again.\n    Indeed, there were a sort of peaking tools,\n    Some call them modest, but I call them fools;\n    Men much more loyal, though not half so loud,\n    But these poor devils were cast behind the crowd;\n    For bold knaves thrive without one grain of sense,\n    But good men starve for want of impudence.\n    Besides all these, there were a sort of wights,\n    (I think my author calls them Tekelites,)\n    Such hearty rogues against the king and laws,\n    They favoured e'en a foreign rebel's cause,\n    When their own damned design was quashed and awed;\n    At least they gave it their good word abroad.\n    As many a man, who, for a quiet life,\n    Breeds out his bastard, not to noise his wife,\n    Thus, o'er their darling plot these Trimmers cry, }\n    And, though they cannot keep it in their eye,     }\n    They bind it 'prentice to Count Tekely.[384]      }\n    They believe not the last plot; may I be curst,\n    If I believe they e'er believed the first!\n    No wonder their own plot no plot they think,--\n    The man, that makes it, never smells the stink.\n    And, now it comes into my head, I'll tell\n    Why these damned Trimmers loved the Turks so well.\n    The original Trimmer,[385] though a friend to no man,\n    Yet in his heart adored a pretty woman;\n    He knew that Mahomet laid up for ever\n    Kind black-eyed rogues for every true believer;\n    And,--which was more than mortal man e'er tasted,--\n    One pleasure that for threescore twelvemonths lasted.\n    To turn for this, may surely be forgiven;\n    Who'd not be circumcised for such a heaven?\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 382: Alluding to the Whigs, who called themselves so. See\nVol. IX. p. 211.]\n\n[Footnote 383: Alluding to the gratulating speech of Orator Higgins to\nClause, when elected King of the Beggars:\n\n    Who is he here that did not wish thee chosen,\n    Now thou _art_ chosen? Ask them; all will say so,\n    Nay, swear't--'tis for the king,--but let that pass.\n\n    _Beggars' Bush_, Act II. Scene I.\n]\n\n[Footnote 384: The severity of the Austrian government, in Hungary\nparticularly, towards those who dissented from the Roman Catholic\nfaith, occasioned several insurrections. The most memorable was headed\nby Count Teckeli, who allied himself with the sultan, assumed the\ncrown of Transylvania, as a vassal of the Porte, and joined, with a\nconsiderable force, the large army of Turks which besieged Vienna, and\nthreatened to annihilate the Austrian empire. A similarity of situation\nand of interest induced the Whig party in England to look with a\nfavourable eye upon this Hungarian insurgent, as may be fully inferred\nfrom the following passage in De Foe's \"Appeal to Honour and Justice:\"\n\n\"The first time I had the misfortune to differ with my friends, was\nabout the year 1683, when the Turks were besieging Vienna, and the\nWhigs in England, generally speaking, were for the Turks taking it;\nwhich I, having read the history of the cruelty and perfidious dealings\nof the Turks in their wars, and how they had rooted out the name of\nthe Christian religion in above threescore and ten kingdoms, could by\nno means agree with; and, though then but a young man, and a younger\nauthor, I opposed it, and wrote against it, which was taken very\nunkindly indeed.\"\n\nThe incongruity of the opinion combated by De Foe, with the high\npretences of religion set up by the Whigs, was the constant subject\nof ridicule to the Tory wits. In a poem, entitled, \"The Third Part of\nAdvice to the Painter,\" dated by Luttrell 28th May, 1684, we find the\nfollowing passage:\n\n    Paint me that mighty powerful state a shaking,\n    And their great prophet, Teckely, a quaking;\n    Who for religion made such bustling work,\n    That, to reform it, he brought in the Turk.\n    Next, paint our English muftis of the tub,\n    Those great promoters of the Teckelites' club.\n    Draw me them praying for the Turkish cause,\n    And for the overthrow of Christian laws.\n\nAnother Tory poet prophecies of the infant son of James II.,--\n\n    His conquering arm shall soon subdue\n    Teckelite Turks and home-bred Jew,\n    Such as our great forefathers never knew.\n\n    _Pindaric Ode on the Queen's Delivery, by Caleb Calle._\n\nAnother ballad, written shortly after the defeat of Monmouth, is\nentitled, \"A Song upon the Rendezvous on Hounsley-heath, with a\nParallel of the Destruction of our English Turks in the West, and the\nMahometans in Hungary.\" The expression occurs also in the Address of\nthe Carlisle Citizens on the Declaration of Indulgence, who \"thank his\nmajesty for his royal army, which is really both the honour and safety\nof the nation, let the Teckelites think and say what they will.\" An\nindignant Whig commentator on this effusion of loyalty, says, \"What the\ngood men of Carlisle mean by Teckelites, we know not any more than they\nknow themselves. However, the word has a pretty effect at a time when\nthe Protestant Hungarians, under Count Teckely, were well beaten by the\nPopish standing army in Hungary.\" _History of Addresses_, p. 161.]\n\n[Footnote 385: The _original Trimmer_ was probably meant for Lord\nShaftesbury, once a member of the Cabal, and a favourite minister,\nthough afterwards in such violent opposition. His lordship's turn\nfor gallantry was such as distinguished him even at the court of\nCharles.--See Vol. IX. p. 446. The party of Trimmers, properly so\ncalled, only comprehended the followers of Halifax; but our author\nseems to include all those who, professing to be friends of monarchy,\nwere enemies of the Duke of York, and who were as odious to the\ncourt as the fanatical republicans. Much wit, and more virulence,\nwas unchained against them. Among others, I find in Mr Luttrell's\nCollection, a poem, entitled, \"The Character of a Trimmer,\" beginning\nthus:\n\n    Hang out your cloth, and let the trumpet sound,\n    Here's such a beast as Afric never owned:\n    A twisted brute, the satyr in the story,\n    That blows up the Whig heat, and cools the Tory;\n    A state hermaphrodite, whose doubtful lust\n    Salutes all parties with an equal gust.\n    Like Ireland shocks, he seems two natures joined;\n    Savage before, and all betrimmed behind;\n    And the well-tutored curs like him will strain,\n    Come over for the king, and back again, &c.\n]\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nTO THE\n\nDISAPPOINTMENT, OR THE MOTHER IN FASHION.\n\nBY MR SOUTHERNE, 1684.\n\nSPOKEN BY MR BETTERTON.\n\n\n    _This play is founded on the novel of the Impertinent Curiosity,\n    in Don Quixote. It possesses no extraordinary merit. The satire of\n    the Prologue, though grossly broad, is very forcibly expressed;\n    and describes what we may readily allow to have been the career of\n    many, who set up for persons of wit and honour about town._\n\n    How comes it, gentlemen, that, now a-days,\n    When all of you so shrewdly judge of plays,\n    Our poets tax you still with want of sense?\n    All prologues treat you at your own expence.\n    Sharp citizens a wiser way can go;\n    They make you fools, but never call you so.\n    They in good manners seldom make a slip,\n    But treat a common whore with--ladyship:\n    But here each saucy wit at random writes,\n    And uses ladies as he uses knights.\n    Our author, young and grateful in his nature,\n    Vows, that from him no nymph deserves a satire:\n    Nor will he ever draw--I mean his rhime,\n    Against the sweet partaker of his crime;\n    Nor is he yet so bold an undertaker,\n    To call men fools--'tis railing at their Maker.\n    Besides, he fears to split upon that shelf;\n    He's young enough to be a fop himself:\n    And, if his praise can bring you all a-bed,\n    He swears such hopeful youth no nation ever bred.\n      Your nurses, we presume, in such a case,    }\n    Your father chose, because he liked the face, }\n    And often they supplied your mother's place.  }\n    The dry nurse was your mother's ancient maid,\n    Who knew some former slip she ne'er betrayed.\n    Betwixt them both, for milk and sugar-candy,\n    Your sucking bottles were well stored with brandy.\n    Your father, to initiate your discourse,           }\n    Meant to have taught you first to swear and curse, }\n    But was prevented by each careful nurse.           }\n    For, leaving dad and mam, as names too common,\n    They taught you certain parts of man and woman.\n    I pass your schools; for there, when first you came,\n    You would be sure to learn the Latin name.\n    In colleges, you scorned the art of thinking,\n    But learned all moods and figures of good drinking;\n    Thence come to town, you practise play, to know\n    The virtues of the high dice, and the low.[386]\n    Each thinks himself a sharper most profound:\n    He cheats by pence; is cheated by the pound.\n    With these perfections, and what else he gleans, }\n    The spark sets up for love behind our scenes,    }\n    Hot in pursuit of princesses and queens.         }\n    There, if they know their man, with cunning carriage,\n    Twenty to one but it concludes in marriage.\n    He hires some homely room, love's fruits to gather,\n    And, garret high, rebels against his father:\n    But, he once dead----\n    Brings her in triumph, with her portion, down--\n    A toilet, dressing-box, and half-a-crown.[387]\n    Some marry first, and then they fall to scowering,\n    Which is refining marriage into whoring.\n    Our women batten well on their good nature;\n    All they can rap and rend for the dear creature.\n    But while abroad so liberal the dolt is,\n    Poor spouse at home as ragged as a colt is.\n    Last, some there are, who take their first degrees\n    Of lewdness in our middle galleries;\n    The doughty bullies enter bloody drunk,\n    Invade and grubble one another's punk:\n    They caterwaul, and make a dismal rout,\n    Call sons of whores, and strike, but ne'er lug out:\n    Thus, while for paltry punk they roar and stickle,\n    They make it bawdier than a conventicle.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 386: Loaded dice, contrived some for high, and others for low\nthrows.]\n\n[Footnote 387: Our author seems to copy himself in this passage. \"His\nold father, in the country, would have given him but little thanks\nfor it, to see him bring down a fine-bred woman, with a lute and a\ndressing-box, and a handful of money to her portion.\"--_The Wild\nGallant_, Vol. II. p. 66.]\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nTO\n\nTHE KING AND QUEEN,\n\nUPON THE\n\nUNION OF THE TWO COMPANIES, IN 1686.\n\n\n    _The two rival Companies, so long known by the names of the King's\n    and the Duke's players, after exhausting every effort, both of\n    poetry and machinery, to obtain a superiority over each other,\n    were, at length, by the expence of these exertions, and the\n    inconstancy of the public, reduced to the necessity of uniting\n    their forces, in order to maintain their ground. \"Taste and\n    fashion,\" says Colley Cibber, \"with us, have always had wings, and\n    fly from one public spectacle to another so wantonly, that I have\n    been informed, by those who remember it, that a famous puppet-show,\n    in Salisbury-change, then standing where Cecil-street now is, so\n    far distressed these two celebrated companies, that they were\n    reduced to petition the king for relief against it. Nor ought we,\n    perhaps, to think this strange, when, if I mistake not, Terence\n    himself reproaches the Roman auditors of his time with the like\n    fondness for the_ funambuli, _the rope-dancers. Not to dwell too\n    long, therefore, upon that part of my history, which I have only\n    collected from oral tradition, I shall content myself with telling\n    you, that Mohun and Hart now growing old, (for above thirty years\n    before this time, they had severally borne the king's commission\n    of major and captain in the civil wars,) and the younger actors,\n    as Goodman, Clark, and others, being impatient to get into their\n    parts, and growing intractable, the audiences too of both houses\n    then falling off, the patentees of each, by the king's advice,\n    (which, perhaps, amounted to a command,) united their interests,\n    and both companies into one, exclusive of all others, in the year_\n    1684. _This union was, however, so much in favour of the Duke's\n    company, that Hart left the stage upon it, and Mohun survived not\n    long after.\"_[388] Apology, p. 58.\n\n    _It appears, that the king and queen honoured with their presence\n    the first performance under the union they had recommended.\n    Dryden's prologue abounds with those violent expressions of loyalty\n    with which James loved to be greeted._\n\n    Since faction ebbs, and rogues grow out of fashion,\n    Their penny scribes take care t' inform the nation,\n    How well men thrive in this or that plantation:[389]\n\n    How Pennsylvania's air agrees with Quakers,\n    And Carolina's with Associators;\n    Both e'en too good for madmen and for traitors.[390]\n\n    Truth is, our land with saints is so run o'er,\n    And every age produces such a store,\n    That now there's need of two New Englands more.\n\n    What's this, you'll say, to us, and our vocation?\n    Only thus much, that we have left our station,\n    And made this theatre our new plantation.\n\n    The factious natives never could agree;\n    But aiming, as they called it, to be free,\n    Those play-house Whigs set up for property.[391]\n\n    Some say, they no obedience paid of late;\n    But would new tears and jealousies create,\n    Till topsy-turvy they had turned the state.\n\n    Plain sense, without the talent of foretelling,\n    Might guess 'twould end in downright knocks and quelling;\n    For seldom comes there better of rebelling.\n\n    When men will, needlessly, their freedom barter\n    For lawless power, sometimes they catch a Tartar;--\n    There's a damned word that rhimes to this, called Charter.[392]\n\n    But, since the victory with us remains,\n    You shall be called to twelve in all our gains,\n    If you'll not think us saucy for our pains.\n\n    Old men shall have good old plays to delight them;\n    And you, fair ladies and gallants, that slight them,\n    We'll treat with good new plays, if our new wits can write them.\n\n    We'll take no blundering verse, no fustain tumor,\n    No dribbling love, from this or that presumer;\n    No dull fat fool shammed on the stage for humour:[393]\n\n    For, faith, some of them such vile stuff have made,\n    As none but fools or fairies ever played;\n    But 'twas, as shopmen say, to force a trade.\n\n    We've given you tragedies, all sense defying,\n    And singing men, in woful metre dying;\n    This 'tis when heavy lubbers will be flying.\n\n    All these disasters we will hope to weather;\n    We bring you none of our old lumber hither;\n    Whig poets and Whig sheriffs[394] may hang together.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 388: In this last point Colley is, however, mistaken. See p.\n328.]\n\n[Footnote 389: The American colonies, from the time of the first\ntroubles in the reign of Charles I., continued to be the place of\nrefuge to all who were discontented with the government of the time,\nor experienced oppression under it. The settlers did not fail to\nexcite their countrymen to emigration, by exaggerated accounts of\nthe fertility and advantages of their places of refuge, which were\ncirculated by the hawkers.]\n\n[Footnote 390: The settlement of Pennsylvania, under the famous Penn,\nhad just taken place; and the design of a Scottish insurrection, at the\ntime of the Rye-house plot, was carried on by Baillie of Jerviswood,\nunder pretence of being agent for some gentlemen of the south of\nScotland, who proposed to leave their country, and make a settlement in\nCarolina.]\n\n[Footnote 391: This seems to allude to the mutiny of the younger actors\nagainst Hart and Mohun, mentioned by Cibber. The performers were also\nanxious to emancipate themselves from the thraldom of the patentees,\nwhich they did not accomplish till after the Revolution. They were\nemancipated by King William, who considered them, says Cibber, as the\nonly subjects he had not yet relieved from arbitrary power. Dryden\nseems to allude to some ineffectual struggles made for this purpose,\nwhich he compares to those of the Whigs in the latter end of the reign\nof Charles II.]\n\n[Footnote 392: Alluding to the forfeiture of the city charter, by the\nprocess of _Quo Warranto_.]\n\n[Footnote 393: Our author, who writes in all the exultation of\ntriumphant Toryism, does not forget to bestow a passing sarcasm upon\nhis political and personal enemy, Shadwell. In the observations on\n\"Mac-Flecnoe,\" and elsewhere, we have noticed Shadwell's affectation\nof treading in the paths of Ben Jonson, by describing what he\ncalls _humours_; a word as great a favourite with the fat bard as\nwith Corporal Nym. The following passage in the dedication of \"The\nVirtuoso,\" may serve to explain what he means by the phrase:\n\n\"I have endeavoured in this play, at humour, wit, and satire, which\nare the three things (however I may have fallen short in my attempt)\nwhich your grace has often told me are the life of a comedy. Four\nof the humours are entirely new; and, without vanity, I may say I\nnever produced a comedy that had not some natural humour in it, not\nrepresented before, nor, I hope, ever shall. Nor do I count those\nhumours which a great many do; that is to say, such as consist in using\none or two by-words; or in having a fantastic extravagant dress, as\nmany pretended humours have; nor in the affectation of some French\nwords, which several plays have shown us. I say nothing of impossible,\nunnatural, farce fools, which some intend for comical; who think it\nthe easiest thing in the world to write a comedy, and yet will sooner\ngrow rich upon their ill plays than write a good one: Nor is downright\nsilly folly a humour, as some take it to be, for it is a mere natural\nimperfection; and they might as well call it a humour of blindness in a\nblind man, or lameness in a lame one; or as a celebrated French farce\nhas the humour of one who speaks very fast, and of another who speaks\nvery slow: But natural imperfections are not fit subjects for comedy,\nsince they are not to be laughed at, but pitied. But the artificial\nfolly of those who are not coxcombs by nature, but, with great art and\nindustry, make themselves so, is a proper object of comedy; as I have\ndiscoursed at large in the Preface to \"The Humourists,\" written five\nyears since. Those slight circumstantial things, mentioned before, are\nnot enough to make a good comical humour; which ought to be such an\naffectation as misguides men in knowledge, art, or science; or that\ncauses defection in manners and morality, or perverts their minds in\nthe main actions of their lives: And this kind of humour, I think, I\nhave not improperly described in the Epilogue to \"The Humourists.\"\n\n\"But your grace understands humour too well not to know this, and much\nmore than I can say of it. All I have now to do, is, humbly to dedicate\nthis play to your grace, which has succeeded beyond my expectation; and\nthe humours of which have been approved by men of the best sense and\nlearning. Nor do I hear of any professed enemies to the play, but some\nwomen, and some men of feminine understandings, who like slight plays\nonly that represent a little tattle-sort of conversation like their\nown: but true humour is not liked or understood by them; and therefore\neven my attempt towards it is condemned by them: but the same people,\nto my great comfort, damn all Mr Jonson's plays, who was incomparably\nthe best dramatic poet that ever was, or, I believe, ever will be; and\nI had rather be author of one scene in his best comedies, than of any\nplay this age has produced.\"]\n\n[Footnote 394: This inhuman jest turns on the execution of Henry\nCornish, who, with Slingsby Bethel, was sheriff in 1680, and\ndistinguished himself in opposition to the court.--See Note on \"Absalom\nand Achitophel,\" Part I. vol. ix. p. 280. He was condemned as accessary\nto the Rye-house plot, and executed accordingly on 23d October, 1685;\nprobably a short time before this prologue was spoken, which might be\nin January 1686.]\n\n\n\n\nEPILOGUE\n\nON\n\nTHE SAME OCCASION.\n\n\n    New ministers, when first they get in place,\n    Must have a care to please; and that's our case:\n    Some laws for public welfare we design,\n    If you, the power supreme, will please to join.\n    There are a sort of prattlers in the pit,\n    Who either have, or who pretend to wit;\n    These noisy sirs so loud their parts rehearse,\n    That oft the play is silenced by the farce.\n    Let such be dumb, this penalty to shun,\n    Each to be thought my lady's eldest son.\n    But stay; methinks some vizard mask I see,\n    Cast out her lure from the mid gallery:\n    About her all the fluttering sparks are ranged;\n    The noise continues, though the scene is changed:\n    Now growling, sputtering, wauling, such a clutter!\n    'Tis just like puss defendant in a gutter:\n    Fine love, no doubt; but ere two days are o'er ye,\n    The surgeon will be told a woful story.\n    Let vizard mask her naked face expose,\n    On pain of being thought to want a nose:\n    Then for your lacqueys, and your train beside,\n    By whate'er name or title dignified,\n    They roar so loud, you'd think behind the stairs\n    Tom Dove,[395] and all the brotherhood of bears:\n    They're grown a nuisance, beyond all disasters;\n    We've none so great but--their unpaying masters.\n    We beg you, Sirs, to beg your men, that they\n    Would please to give you leave to hear the play.\n      Next, in the play-house, spare your precious lives;\n    Think, like good Christians, on your bearns and wives:\n    Think on your souls; but, by your lugging forth,[396]\n    It seems you know how little they are worth.\n    If none of these will move the warlike mind,\n    Think on the helpless whore you leave behind.\n    We beg you, last, our scene-room to forbear,\n    And leave our goods and chattels to our care.\n    Alas! our women are but washy toys,\n    And wholly taken up in stage employs:\n    Poor willing tits they are; but yet, I doubt,\n    This double duty soon will wear them out.\n    Then you are watched besides with jealous care;\n    What if my lady's page should find you there?\n    My lady knows t' a tittle what there's in ye;\n    No passing your gilt shilling for a guinea.\n      Thus, gentlemen, we have summed up in short\n    Our grievances, from country, town, and court:\n    Which humbly we submit to your good pleasure;\n    But first vote money, then redress at leisure.[397]\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 395: A Bear so called, which was a favourite with the courtly\naudience of the Bear Garden.]\n\n[Footnote 396: See Note, p. 237.]\n\n[Footnote 397: This was the course which Charles usually recommended to\nParliament, who generally followed that which was precisely opposite.]\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nTO\n\nTHE PRINCESS OF CLEVES.\n\nBY MR N. LEE, 1689.\n\n\n    _This play is one of the coarsest which ever appeared upon the\n    stage. The author himself seems to be ashamed of it, and gives, for\n    the profligacy of his hero, the Duke of Nemours, the odd reason\n    of a former play on the subject of the Paris massacre having been\n    prohibited, at the request, I believe, of the French ambassador._\n    See Vol. VII. p. 188.\n\n    Ladies! (I hope there's none behind to hear)\n    I long to whisper something in your ear:\n    A secret, which does much my mind perplex,--\n    There's treason in the play against our sex.\n    A man that's false to love, that vows and cheats,\n    And kisses every living thing he meets;\n    A rogue in mode,--I dare not speak too broad,--\n    One that--does something to the very bawd.\n    Out on him, traitor, for a filthy beast!\n    Nay, and he's like the pack of all the rest:\n    None of them stick at mark; they all deceive.  }\n    Some Jew has changed the text, I half believe; }\n    There Adam cozened our poor grandame Eve.      }\n    To hide their faults they rap out oaths, and tear;\n    Now, though we lie, we're too well-bred to swear.\n    So we compound for half the sin we owe,\n    But men are dipt for soul and body too;\n    And, when found out, excuse themselves, pox cant them,\n    With Latin stuff, _Perjuria ridet Amant\u00fbm_.\n    I'm not book-learned, to know that word in vogue,\n    But I suspect 'tis Latin for a rogue.\n    I'm sure, I never heard that screech-owl hollowed\n    In my poor ears, but separation followed.\n    How can such perjured villains e'er be saved?\n    Achitophel's not half so false to David.[398]\n    With vows and soft expressions to allure,\n    They stand, like foremen of a shop, demure:\n    No sooner out of sight, but they are gadding,\n    And for the next new face ride out a padding.\n    Yet, by their favour, when they have been kissing,\n    We can perceive the ready money missing.\n    Well! we may rail; but 'tis as good e'en wink;\n    Something we find, and something they will sink.\n    But, since they're at renouncing, 'tis our parts\n    To trump their diamonds, as they trump our hearts.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 398: Alluding to Shaftesbury and Charles II. in his own\nadmirable satire.]\n\n\n\n\nEPILOGUE\n\nTO\n\nTHE SAME.\n\n\n    A qualm of conscience brings me back again,\n    To make amends to you bespattered men.\n    We women love like cats, that hide their joys,\n    By growling, squalling, and a hideous noise.\n    I railed at wild young sparks; but, without lying,\n    Never was man worse thought on for high-flying.\n    The prodigal of love gives each her part,\n    And, squandering, shows at least a noble heart.\n    I've heard of men, who, in some lewd lampoon,\n    Have hired a friend to make their valour known.\n    That accusation straight this question brings,--\n    What is the man that does such naughty things?\n    The spaniel lover, like a sneaking fop,\n    Lies at our feet:--he's scarce worth taking up.\n    'Tis true, such heroes in a play go far;\n    But chamber-practice is not like the bar.\n    When men such vile, such faint petitions make,\n    We fear to give, because they fear to take;\n    Since modesty's the virtue of our kind,\n    Pray let it be to our own sex confined.\n    When men usurp it from the female nation,\n    'Tis but a work of supererogation.\n    We shewed a princess in the play, 'tis true,\n    Who gave her C\u00e6sar[399] more than all his due;\n    Told her own faults; but I should much abhor\n    To choose a husband for my confessor.\n    You see what fate followed the saint-like fool,\n    For telling tales from out the nuptial school.\n    Our play a merry comedy had proved,\n    Had she confessed so much to him she loved.\n    True Presbyterian wives the means would try;\n    But damned confessing is flat Popery.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 399: The Princess of Cleves, in the play, confesses to her\nhusband her love for Nemours.]\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nTO\n\nARVIRAGUS AND PHILICIA.\n\nBY LODOWICK CARLELL, ESQ.\n\nSPOKEN BY MR HART.\n\n\n    _Lodowick Carlell, according to Langbaine, was an ancient courtier,\n    being gentleman of the bows to King Charles I., groom of the king\n    and queen's privy chamber, and servant to the queen-mother many\n    years. His plays, the same author adds, were well esteemed of, and\n    acted chiefly at the private house in Blackfriars. They were seven\n    in number. \"Arviragus and Philicia\" consisted of two parts, and was\n    first printed in 8vo, 1639. The prologue, which was spoken upon\n    the revival of the piece, turns upon the caprice of the town, in\n    preferring, to the plays of their own poets, the performances of\n    a troop of French comedians, who, it seems, were then acting both\n    tragedies and comedies in their own language._\n\n    With sickly actors, and an old house too,\n    We're matched with glorious theatres, and new;\n    And with our alehouse scenes, and clothes bare worn,\n    Can neither raise old plays, nor new adorn.\n    If all these ills could not undo us quite,\n    A brisk French troop is grown your dear delight;\n    Who with broad bloody bills call you each day,\n    To laugh and break your buttons at their play;\n    Or see some serious piece, which, we presume,\n    Is fallen from some incomparable _plume_;\n    \"And therefore, Messieurs, if you'll do us grace,\n    Send lacquies early to preserve your place.\"\n    We dare not on your privilege intrench,\n    Or ask you, why you like them?--they are French.\n    Therefore, some go with courtesy exceeding,\n    Neither to hear nor see, but show their breeding;\n    Each lady striving to outlaugh the rest,\n    To make it seem they understood the jest.\n    Their countrymen come in, and nothing pay,\n    To teach us English were to clap the play:\n    Civil, egad! our hospitable land\n    Bears all the charge for them to understand:\n    Mean time we languish, and neglected lie,\n    Like wives, while you keep better company;\n    And wish for your own sakes, without a satire,\n    You'd less good breeding, or had more good nature.\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nTO\n\nTHE PROPHETESS.\n\nBY\n\nBEAUMONT AND FLETCHER.\n\nREVIVED\n\nBy DRYDEN.\n\nSPOKEN BY MR BETTERTON.\n\n\n    _\"The Prophetess\" of Beaumont and Fletcher, even in its original\n    state, required a good deal of machinery; for it contains stage\n    directions for thunder-bolts brandished from on high, and for a\n    chariot drawn through mid air by flying dragons; but it was now\n    altered into an opera, with the addition of songs and scenical\n    decorations, by Betterton, in 1690. Our author wrote the following\n    prologue, to introduce it upon the stage in its altered state. The\n    music was by Henry Purcell, and is said to have merited applause.\n    Rich, whose attachment to scenery and decoration is ridiculed by\n    Pope, revived this piece, and piqued himself particularly upon a\n    set of dancing chairs, which he devised for the nonce._\n\n    _The prologue gave offence to the court, and was prohibited by\n    the Earl of Dorset, Lord Chamberlain, after the first day's\n    representation. It contains, Cibber remarks, some familiar\n    metaphorical sneers at the Revolution itself; and as the poetry is\n    good, the offence was less pardonable. King William was at this\n    time prosecuting his campaigns in Ireland; and the author not only\n    ridicules the warfare in which he was engaged, and the English\n    volunteers who attended him, but even the government of Queen Mary\n    in his absence._\n\n    What Nostradame, with all his art, can guess\n    The fate of our approaching Prophetess?\n    A play, which, like a perspective set right,\n    Presents our vast expences close to sight;\n    But turn the tube, and there we sadly view\n    Our distant gains, and those uncertain too;\n    A sweeping tax, which on ourselves we raise,\n    And all, like you, in hopes of better days.\n    When will our losses warn us to be wise?\n    Our wealth decreases, and our charges rise.\n    Money, the sweet allurer of our hopes,\n    Ebbs out in oceans, and comes in by drops.\n    We raise new objects to provoke delight,\n    But you grow sated ere the second sight.\n    False men, even so you serve your mistresses;\n    They rise three stories in their towering dress;\n    And, after all, you love not long enough\n    To pay the rigging, ere you leave them off.\n    Never content with what you had before,\n    But true to change, and Englishmen all o'er.\n    Now honour calls you hence; and all your care\n    Is to provide the horrid pomp of war.\n    In plume and scarf, jack-boots, and Bilbo blade,\n    Your silver goes, that should support our trade.\n    Go, unkind heroes! leave our stage to mourn,\n    Till rich from vanquished rebels you return;\n    And the fat spoils of Teague in triumph draw,\n    His firkin butter, and his usquebaugh.\n    Go, conquerors of your male and female foes;\n    Men without hearts, and women without hose.\n    Each bring his love a Bogland captive home;\n    Such proper pages will long trains become;\n    With copper collars, and with brawny backs,\n    Quite to put down the fashion of our blacks.[400]\n    Then shall the pious Muses pay their vows,\n    And furnish all their laurels for your brows;\n    Their tuneful voice shall raise for your delights;\n    We want not poets fit to sing your flights.\n    But you, bright beauties, for whose only sake\n    Those doughty knights such dangers undertake,\n    When they with happy gales are gone away,     }\n    With your propitious presence grace our play, }\n    And with a sigh their empty seats survey;     }\n    Then think,--On that bare bench my servant sat!\n    I see him ogle still, and hear him chat;\n    Selling facetious bargains, and propounding\n    That witty recreation, called dum-founding.[401]--\n    Their loss with patience we will try to bear,\n    And would do more, to see you often here;\n    That our dead stage, revived by your fair eyes,\n    Under a female regency may rise.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 400: It was the fashion, at this time, to have black boys\nin attendance, decorated with silver collars. See the following\nadvertisement: \"A black boy, about fifteen years of age, named John\nWhite, ran away from Colonel Kirke, the 15th inst.; he has a silver\ncollar about his neck, upon which is the Colonel's arms and cipher.\"\nGazette, March 18th, 1685.]\n\n[Footnote 401: _Selling bargains_, a species of wit common, according\nto Swift, among Queen Anne's maids of honour, consisted in leading\nsome innocent soul to ask a question, which was answered by the\nbargain-seller's naming his, or her, sitting part, by its broadest\nappellation. _Dum-founding_ is explained by a stage direction in\nBury-fair, where \"Sir Humphrey dum-founds the Count with a rap betwixt\nthe shoulders.\" The humour seems to have consisted in doing this with\nsuch dexterity, that the party dum-founded should be unable to discover\nto whom he was indebted for the favour.]\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nTO\n\nTHE MISTAKES.\n\n\n    _This play was brought forward by Joseph Harris, a comedian, as his\n    own, although it is said to have been chiefly written by another\n    person. It was acted in_ 1690.\n\n    _Enter_ MR BRIGHT.\n\nGentlemen, we must beg your pardon; here's no prologue to be had\nto-day. Our new play is like to come on, without a frontispiece; as\nbald as one of you young beaux without your periwig. I left our young\npoet, snivelling and sobbing behind the scenes, and cursing somebody\nthat has deceived him.\n\n    _Enter_ MR BOWEN.\n\nHold your prating to the audience; here's honest Mr Williams just come\nin, half mellow, from the Rose-Tavern.[402] He swears he is inspired\nwith claret, and will come on, and that extempore too, either with\na prologue of his own, or something like one. O here he comes to his\ntrial, at all adventures; for my part, I wish him a good deliverance.\n\n[_Exeunt Mr_ BRIGHT _and Mr_ BOWEN.\n\n_Enter Mr_ WILLIAMS.\n\n      Save ye, sirs, save ye! I am in a hopeful way.      }\n    I should speak something, in rhyme, now, for the play }\n    But the deuce take me, if I know what to say.         }\n    I'll stick to my friend the author, that I can tell ye,\n    To the last drop of claret in my belly.\n    So far I'm sure 'tis rhyme--that needs no granting;\n    And, if my verses' feet stumble--you see my own are wanting.\n    Our young poet has brought a piece of work,                  }\n    In which though much of art there does not lurk,             }\n    It may hold out three days--and that's as long as Cork.[403] }\n    But, for this play--(which till I have done, we show not)\n    What may be its fortune--by the Lord--I know not.\n    This I dare swear, no malice here is writ;\n    'Tis innocent of all things----even of wit.\n    He's no high-flyer----he makes no sky-rockets,\n    His squibs are only levelled at your pockets;\n    And if his crackers light among your pelf,\n    You are blown up; if not, then he's blown up himself.\n    By this time, I'm something recovered of my flustered madness;\n    And now, a word or two in sober sadness.\n    Ours is a common play; and you pay down\n    A common harlot's price--just half a crown.\n    You'll say, I play the pimp, on my friend's score; }\n    But since 'tis for a friend your gibes give o'er,  }\n    For many a mother has done that before.            }\n    How's this? you cry: an actor write?--we know it;\n    But Shakespeare was an actor, and a poet.\n    Has not great Jonson's learning often failed?\n    But Shakespeare's greater genius still prevailed.\n    Have not some writing actors, in this age,\n    Deserved and found success upon the stage?\n    To tell the truth, when our old wits are tired,\n    Not one of us but means to be inspired.\n    Let your kind presence grace our homely cheer;    }\n    Peace and the butt[404] is all our business here; }\n    So much for that--and the devil take small beer.  }\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 402: This was quite in character. Cibber says of Williams,\nthat his industry was not equal to his capacity, for he loved his\nbottle better than his business. _Apology_, p. 115.]\n\n[Footnote 403: The taking of Cork was one of the first exploits of the\nrenowned Marlborough. The besieging army was disembarked on the 23d\nSeptember, 1690, and the garrison, amounting to four thousand men,\nsurrendered on the 28th of the same month.]\n\n[Footnote 404: A phrase in the \"Tempest\" as altered by Dryden, which\nseems to have become proverbial.]\n\n\n\n\nEPILOGUE\n\nTO\n\nHENRY II.\n\nBY JOHN BANCROFT,\n\nAND PUBLISHED BY MR MOUNTFORT, 1693.\n\nSPOKEN BY MRS BRACEGIRDLE.\n\n\n    _This play is founded on the amours of Henry II. and the death\n    of fair Rosamond. John Bancroft, the author, was a surgeon, and\n    wrote another play called \"Sertorius.\" He gave both the reputation\n    and the profits of \"Henry II.\" to Mountfort, the comedian; and\n    probably made him no great compliment in the former particular,\n    though, as the piece was well received, the latter might be of some\n    consequence. Mountfort was an actor of great eminence. Cibber says,\n    that he was the most affecting lover within his memory._\n\n    Thus you the sad catastrophe have seen,\n    Occasioned by a mistress and a queen.\n    Queen Eleanor the proud was French, they say;\n    But English manufacture got the day.\n    Jane Clifford was her name, as books aver;\n    Fair Rosamond was but her _nom de guerre_.\n    Now tell me, gallants, would you lead your life\n    With such a mistress, or with such a wife?\n    If one must be your choice, which d'ye approve,\n    The curtain lecture, or the curtain love?\n    Would ye be godly with perpetual strife,\n    Still drudging on with homely Joan, your wife\n    Or take your pleasure in a wicked way,\n    Like honest whoring Harry in the play?\n    I guess your minds; the mistress would be taken,\n    And nauseous matrimony sent a packing.\n    The devil's in you all; mankind's a rogue;\n    You love the bride, but you detest the clog.\n    After a year, poor spouse is left i'the lurch,\n    And you, like Haynes,[405] return to mother-church.\n    Or, if the name of Church comes cross your mind,\n    Chapels-of-ease behind our scenes you find.\n    The playhouse is a kind of market-place;\n    One chaffers for a voice, another for a face;\n    Nay, some of you,--I dare not say how many,--\n    Would buy of me a pen'worth for your penny.\n    E'en this poor face, which with my fan I hide,}\n    Would make a shift my portion to provide,     }\n    With some small perquisites I have beside.    }\n    Though for your love, perhaps, I should not care,\n    I could not hate a man that bids me fair.\n    What might ensue, 'tis hard for me to tell;  }\n    But I was drenched to-day for loving well,   }\n    And fear the poison that would make me swell.}\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 405: The facetious Joe Haynes became a Catholic in the latter\npart of James the Second's reign. But after the Revolution, he read his\nrecantation of the errors of Rome in a penitentiary prologue, which he\ndelivered in a suit of mourning.]\n\n\n\n\nA\n\nPROLOGUE.\n\n\n    Gallants, a bashful poet bids me say,\n    He's come to lose his maidenhead to-day.\n    Be not too fierce; for he's but green of age,\n    And ne'er, till now, debauched upon the stage.\n    He wants the suffering part of resolution,\n    And comes with blushes to his execution.\n    Ere you deflower his Muse, he hopes the pit\n    Will make some settlement upon his wit.\n    Promise him well, before the play begin;\n    For he would fain be cozened into sin.\n    'Tis not but that he knows you mean to fail;   }\n    But, if you leave him after being frail,       }\n    He'll have, at least, a fair pretence to rail; }\n    To call you base, and swear you used him ill,\n    And put you in the new Deserters' bill.\n    Lord, what a troop of perjured men we see;\n    Enow to fill another Mercury!\n    But this the ladies may with patience brook;\n    Theirs are not the first colours you forsook.\n    He would be loth the beauties to offend;\n    But, if he should, he's not too old to mend.\n    He's a young plant, in his first year of bearing;\n    But his friend swears, he will be worth the rearing.\n    His gloss is still upon him; though 'tis true\n    He's yet unripe, yet take him for the blue.\n    You think an apricot half green is best;\n    There's sweet and sour, and one side good at least.\n    Mangos and limes, whose nourishment is little,\n    Though not for food, are yet preserved for pickle.\n    So this green writer may pretend, at least,\n    To whet your stomachs for a better feast.\n    He makes this difference in the sexes too;\n    He sells to men, he gives himself to you.\n    To both he would contribute some delight;\n    A meer poetical hermaphrodite.\n    Thus he's equipped, both to be wooed, and woo; }\n    With arms offensive, and defensive too;        }\n    'Tis hard, he thinks, if neither part will do. }\n\n\n\n\nPROLOGUE\n\nTO\n\nALBUMAZAR.\n\n\n    _The old Play, to which this prologue was prefixed upon its\n    revival, was originally acted in_ 1634, _three or four years after\n    the appearance of Jonson's_ \"_Alchemist;_\" _to which, therefore,\n    it could not possibly afford any hint. Dryden, observing the\n    resemblance between the plays, took the plagiarism for granted,\n    because the style of \"Albumazar\" is certainly the most antiquated.\n    This appearance of antiquity is, however, only a consequence of\n    the vein of pedantry which runs through the whole piece. It was\n    written by ---- Tomkins, a scholar of Trinity College, and acted\n    before King James VI. by the gentlemen of that house, 9th March_,\n    1614. _It is, upon the whole, a very excellent play; yet the author,\n    whether consulting his own taste, or that of our British Solomon,\n    before whom it was to be represented, has contrived to give it an\n    air of such learned stiffness, that it much more resembles the\n    translation of a play from Terence or Plautus, than an original\n    English composition. By this pedantic affectation, the humour of\n    the play is completely smothered; and although there are several\n    very excellent comic situations in the action_, _yet neither the\n    attempt to revive it in Dryden's time_, _nor those which followed\n    in_ 1748 _and_ 1773, _met with any success_.\n\n    _As Dryden had imputed, very rashly, however, and groundlessly,\n    the guilt of plagiarism to Jonson, he made this supposed crime\n    the introduction to a similar slur on Shadwell, who at that\n    time seems to have been possessed of the laurel; a circumstance\n    which ascertains the date of the prologue to be posterior to the\n    Revolution._\n\n    To say this comedy pleased long ago,\n    Is not enough to make it pass you now.\n    Yet, gentlemen, your ancestors had wit,\n    When few men censured, and when fewer writ.\n    And Jonson, of those few the best, chose this,\n    As the best model of his master-piece:\n    Subtle was got by our Albumazar,\n    That Alchymist by this Astrologer;\n    Here he was fashioned, and we may suppose,\n    He liked the fashion well, who wore the clothes.\n    But Ben made nobly his what he did mould;\n    What was another's lead, becomes his gold:\n    Like an unrighteous conqueror he reigns,\n    Yet rules that well, which he unjustly gains.\n    But this our age such authors does afford,\n    As make whole plays, and yet scarce write one word;\n    Who, in this anarchy of wit, rob all,\n    And what's their plunder, their possession call;\n    Who, like bold padders, scorn by night to prey,\n    But rob by sun-shine, in the face of day:\n    Nay, scarce the common ceremony use\n    Of, \"Stand, Sir, and deliver up your Muse;\"\n    But knock the poet down, and, with a grace,\n    Mount Pegasus before the owner's face.\n    Faith, if you have such country Toms abroad,[406]\n    'Tis time for all true men to leave that road.\n    Yet it were modest, could it but be said,\n    They strip the living, but these rob the dead;\n    Dare with the mummies of the Muses play,\n    And make love to them the Egyptian way;\n    Or, as a rhiming author would have said,\n    Join the dead living to the living dead.\n    Such men in poetry may claim some part,\n    They have the license, though they want the art;\n    And might, where theft was praised, for laureats stand;[407]\n    Poets, not of the head, but of the hand.\n    They make the benefits of others studying,\n    Much like the meals of politic Jack-Pudding,\n    Whose dish to challenge no man has the courage;\n    'Tis all his own, when once he has spit i'the porridge.\n    But, gentlemen, you're all concerned in this;\n    You are in fault for what they do amiss;\n    For they their thefts still undiscovered think,\n    And durst not steal, unless you please to wink.\n    Perhaps, you may award by your decree,\n    They should refund,--but that can never be;\n    For, should you letters of reprisal seal,\n    These men write that which no man else would steal.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 406: This seems to have been a cant name for highwaymen.\nShadwell's christian name was Thomas.]\n\n[Footnote 407: Shadwell succeeded to our author's post of laureat,\nafter the Revolution. I am not able to discover, if Shadwell had\ngiven any very recent cause for this charge of plagiarism. In the\n\"Libertine,\" \"The Miser,\" \"Bury-fair,\" and \"The Sullen Lovers,\" he has\nborrowed, or rather translated, from Moliere. The \"Squire of Alsatia\"\ncontains some imitations of Terence's \"Adelphi.\" \"Psyche\" is taken\nfrom the French, and \"Timon of Athens\" from Shakespeare, although\nShadwell has the assurance to claim the merit of having made it into a\nplay. He was also under obligations to his contemporaries. The \"Royal\nShepherdess\" was originally written by one Mr Fountain of Devonshire.\nDryden, in \"Mac-Flecnoe,\" intimates, that Sedley \"larded with wit\"\nhis play of \"Epsom Wells;\" and in the Dedication to the \"True Widow,\"\nShadwell himself acknowledges obligations to that gentleman's revision\nof some of his pieces. Langbaine, who hated Dryden, and professed an\nesteem for Shadwell, expresses himself thus, on the latter's claim to\noriginality:\n\n\"But I am willing to say the less of Mr Shadwell, because I have\npublicly professed a friendship for him; and though it be not of\nso long date as some former intimacy with others, so neither is it\nblemished with some unhandsome dealings I have met with from persons\nwhere I least expected it. I shall therefore speak of him with the\nimpartiality that becomes a critic, and own I like his comedies better\nthan Mr Dryden's, as having more variety of characters, and those drawn\nfrom the life; I mean men's converse and manners, and not from other\nmen's ideas, copied out of their public writings: though indeed I\ncannot wholly acquit our present laureat from borrowing; his plagiaries\nbeing in some places too bold and open to be disguised, of which I\nshall take notice, as I go along; though with this remark, that several\nof them are observed to my hand, and in great measure excused by\nhimself, in the public acknowledgment he makes in his several prefaces,\nto the persons to whom he was obliged for what he borrowed.\"\n\nShadwell in the following lines, which occur in the prologue to the\n\"Scowerers,\" seems to retort on Dryden the accusation here brought\nagainst him:\n\n    You have been kind to many of his plays,\n    And should not leave him in his latter days.\n    Though loyal writers of the last two reigns,}\n    Who tired their pens for Popery and chains, }\n    Grumble at the reward of all his pains;     }\n    They would, like some, the benefit enjoy\n    Of what they vilely laboured to destroy.\n    They cry him down as for his place unfit,     }\n    Since they have all the humour and the wit;   }\n    They must write better e'er he fears them yet.}\n    'Till they have shewn you more variety }\n    Of natural, unstolen comedy than he,   }\n    By you at least he should protected be.}\n    'Till then, may he that mark of bounty have,}\n    Which his renowned and royal master gave,   }\n    Who loves a subject, and contemns a slave;  }\n    Whom heaven, in spite of hellish plots, designed\n    To humble tyrants, and exalt mankind.\n]\n\n\n\n\nAN\n\nEPILOGUE.\n\n\n    You saw our wife was chaste, yet throughly tried,\n    And, without doubt, you are hugely edified;\n    For, like our hero, whom we showed to-day,\n    You think no woman true, but in a play.\n    Love once did make a pretty kind of show;    }\n    Esteem and kindness in one breast would grow;}\n    But 'twas heaven knows how many years ago.   }\n    Now some small chat, and guinea expectation,\n    Gets all the pretty creatures in the nation.\n    In comedy your little selves you meet;\n    'Tis Covent Garden drawn in Bridges-street.\n    Smile on our author then, if he has shown\n    A jolly nut-brown bastard of your own.\n    Ah! happy you, with ease and with delight,\n    Who act those follies, poets toil to write!\n    The sweating Muse does almost leave the chace;\n    She puffs, and hardly keeps your Protean vices pace.\n    Pinch you but in one vice, away you fly\n    To some new frisk of contrariety.\n    You roll like snow-balls, gathering as you run,\n    And get seven devils, when dispossessed of one.\n    Your Venus once was a Platonic queen,\n    Nothing of love beside the face was seen;\n    But every inch of her you now uncase,\n    And clap a vizard-mask upon the face;\n    For sins like these, the zealous of the land,\n    With little hair, and little or no band,\n    Declare how circulating pestilences\n    Watch, every twenty years, to snap offences.\n    Saturn, e'en now, takes doctoral degrees;[408]\n    He'll do your work this summer without fees.\n    Let all the boxes, Ph\u0153bus, find thy grace,\n    And, ah, preserve the eighteen-penny place![409]\n    But for the pit confounders, let them go,\n    And find as little mercy as they show!\n    The actors thus, and thus thy poets pray;\n    For every critic saved, thou damn'st a play.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 408: Perhaps our author had in view the three oppositions\nof Saturn and Jupiter in June and December 1692, and in April 1693,\nwhich are thus feelingly descanted upon by John Silvester: \"It hath\nbeen long observed, that the most remarkable mutations of a kingdom, or\nnation, have chiefly depended on the conjunctions or aspects of those\ntwo superior planets, Saturn and Jupiter; and by their effects past, we\nperceive that the most wise Creator first placed them higher than all\nthe other planets, that they should respect, chiefly, the highest and\nmost durable affairs and concerns of men on earth.\n\n\"And if one opposition of Saturn and Jupiter produceth much, how\nthen can those three oppositions to come do any less than cause some\nremarkable changes and alterations of laws, or religious orders, in\nEngland's chief and most renowned city? because Saturn then will be\nstronger than Jupiter, who also, at his second opposition, will be near\nunto the body of Mars, (the planet of war;) and having took possession\nof religious Jupiter, should contend with him, (with a frowning lofty\ncountenance,) in London's ascendant, from whence I fear some religious\ndisturbances, if not some warlike violence, by insurrections, or\notherwise, occasioned by some frowning dissatisfied minds, which will\nthen happen in some part of Britain, or take its beginning there to the\npurpose in those years.\n\n\"Ah poor Jupiter in Gemini! (London,) I fear thou wilt then be so much\nhumbled against thy will, that thou wilt think thou hast a sufficient\noccasion to bewail thy condition; and if so, God will suffer this,\nthat thou mayest humbly endeavour to forsake thy accustomed sins, and\nthat thou mayest know power is not in thee to help thyself. But yet I\nthink thou wilt then have no need to fear that God hath wholly forsaken\nthee; for look but a little back unto the years 1682 and 1683, where\nJupiter was three times in conjunction with Saturn, in a sign of his\nown triplicity, and consider, was not he then stronger than Saturn, and\nhast not thou been victorious ever since, throughout all those great\nchanges and alterations? And when thou hast thus considered, perhaps\nthou wilt believe, that that which begins well will end well; and\nindeed perhaps it may so happen; but be not too proud of this, a word\nis enough to the wise.\"--_Astrological Observations and Predictions for\nthe year of our Lord 1691, by John Silvester._ London, 1690, 4to.]\n\n[Footnote 409: The Gallery.]\n\n\n\n\nEPILOGUE\n\nTO THE\n\nHUSBAND HIS OWN CUCKOLD.\n\n\n    _This play was written by John Dryden, Junior, son to our poet. See\n    the preface among our author's prose works. It was dedicated to Sir\n    Robert Howard, and acted in_ 1696.\n\n    Like some raw sophister that mounts the pulpit,\n    So trembles a young poet at a full pit.\n    Unused to crowds, the parson quakes for fear,\n    And wonders how the devil he durst come there;\n    Wanting three talents needful for the place,\n    Some beard, some learning, and some little grace.\n    Nor is the puny poet void of care;             }\n    For authors, such as our new authors are,      }\n    Have not much learning, nor much wit to spare; }\n    And as for grace, to tell the truth, there's scarce one,\n    But has as little as the very parson:\n    Both say, they preach and write for your instruction;\n    But 'tis for a third day, and for induction.\n    The difference is, that though you like the play,\n    The poet's gain is ne'er beyond his day;\n    But with the parson 'tis another case,\n    He, without holiness, may rise to grace;\n    The poet has one disadvantage more,             }\n    That if his play be dull, he's damn'd all o'er, }\n    Not only a damn'd blockhead, but damn'd poor.   }\n    But dulness well becomes the sable garment;\n    I warrant that ne'er spoiled a priest's preferment;\n    Wit's not his business, and as wit now goes, }\n    Sirs, 'tis not so much yours as you suppose, }\n    For you like nothing now but nauseous beaux. }\n    You laugh not, gallants, as by proof appears, }\n    At what his beauship says, but what he wears; }\n    So 'tis your eyes are tickled, not your ears. }\n    The tailor and the furrier find the stuff,\n    The wit lies in the dress, and monstrous muff.\n    The truth on't is, the payment of the pit\n    Is like for like, clipt money for clipt wit.\n    You cannot from our absent author[410] hope,\n    He should equip the stage with such a fop.\n    Fools change in England, and new fools arise; }\n    For, though the immortal species never dies,  }\n    Yet every year new maggots make new flies.    }\n    But where he lives abroad, he scarce can find\n    One fool, for million that he left behind.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 410: Young Dryden was then in Rome with his brother Charles,\nwho was gentleman-usher to the Pope.]\n\n\n\n\nMAC-FLECNOE,\n\nA SATIRE\n\nAGAINST\n\nTHOMAS SHADWELL.\n\n\n\n\nMAC-FLECNOE.\n\n\nThe enmity between Dryden and Shadwell at first probably only sprung\nfrom some of those temporary causes of disgust, which must frequently\ndivide persons whose lives are spent in a competition for public\napplause. That they were occasionally upon tolerable terms is certain,\nfor Dryden has told us so; and Shadwell, in 1676, when expressing\nhis dissent from one of our author's rules of theatrical criticism,\nindustriously and anxiously qualifies his opinion, with the highest\ncompliments to our author's genius.[411] They had formerly even\njoined forces, and called in the aid of another wit, to overwhelm the\nreputation of no less a person than Elkanah Settle.[412] But, between\nthe politics of the stage and of the nation, the friendship of these\nbards, which probably never had a very solid foundation, was at length\ntotally overthrown. It is not very easy to discover who struck the\nfirst blow; but it may be suspected, that Dryden was displeased to\nsee Shadwell not only dispute his canons of criticism in print, but\nseem to establish himself as an imitator of the old school of dramatic\ncomposition, and particularly of Jonson, on whom Dryden had thrown\nsome censure in his epilogue to \"The Conquest of Grenada,\" and in the\nDefence of these verses. It seems certain, that the feud had broke out\nin 1675-6; for Shadwell has not only made some invidious allusions to\nthe success of \"Aureng-Zebe,\" which was represented that season, but\nhas plainly intimated, that he needed only a pension to enable him to\nwrite as well as Dryden himself.[413] This assault, however, seems to\nhave been forgiven; for Dryden obliged Shadwell with an epilogue to the\n\"True Widow,\" acted in 1678. But their precarious reconcilement did not\nlong subsist, when political animosity was added to literary rivalry.\nShadwell not only wrote the \"Lancashire Witches,\" in ridicule of the\nTory party, but entered into a personal contest with our author on the\nsubject of \"The Medal,\" which he answered by a clumsy, though venomous,\nretort, called \"The Medal of John Bayes.\" In the preface he asserts,\nthat no one can think Dryden \"hardly dealt with, since he knows, and\nso do all his old acquaintance, that there is not one untrue word\nspoke of him.\" Neither was this a single offence; for Dryden, in his\n\"Vindication of the Duke of Guise,\" says, that Shadwell has repeatedly\ncalled him Atheist in print. These reiterated insults at length drew\ndown the vengeance of our poet, who seems to have singled Shadwell\nfrom the herd of those who had libelled him, to be gibbetted in rhyme\nwhile the English language shall last. Neither was Dryden satisfied\nwith a single attack upon this obnoxious bard; but, having divided his\npoetical character from that which he held as a political writer, he\ndiscussed the first in the satire which follows, and the last, with\nequal severity, in the Second Part of \"Absalom and Achitophel.\" These\ntwo admirable pieces of satire appeared within less than a month of\neach other; and leave it a matter of doubt, whether the bitter ridicule\nof the anointed Prince of Dulness, or the sarcastic description of Og,\nthe seditious poetaster, be most cruelly severe.\n\n\"Mac-Flecnoe\" must be allowed to be one of the keenest satires in the\nEnglish language. It is what Dryden has elsewhere termed a Varronian\nsatire;[414] that is, as he seems to use the phrase, one in which the\nauthor is not contented with general sarcasm upon the object of attack,\nbut where he has woven his piece into a sort of imaginary story, or\nscene, in which he introduces the person, whom he ridicules, as a\nprincipal actor. The position in which Dryden has placed Shadwell is\nthe most mortifying to literary vanity which can possibly be imagined,\nand is hardly excelled by the device of Pope in the \"Dunciad,\" who\nhas obviously followed the steps of his predecessor. Flecnoe, who\nseems to have been universally acknowledged as the very lowest of\nall poetasters, and whose name had passed into a proverb for doggrel\nverse and stupid prose, is represented as devolving upon Shadwell that\npre-eminence over the realms of Dulness, which he had himself possessed\nwithout a rival. The spot chosen for this devolution of empire is\nthe Barbican, an obscure suburb, in which it would seem that there\nwere temporary theatrical representations of the lowest order, among\nother receptacles of vulgar dissipation, for the amusement of the very\nlowest of the vulgar. Here the ceremony of Shadwell's coronation is\nsupposed to be performed with an inaugural oration by Flecnoe, his\npredecessor, in which all his pretensions to wit and to literary fame\nare sarcastically enumerated and confuted, by a counter-statement of\nhis claims to distinction by pre-eminent and unrivalled stupidity. In\nthis satire, the shafts of the poet are directed with an aim acutely\nmalignant. The inference drawn concerning Shadwell's talents is\ngeneral and absolute; but in the proof, Dryden appeals with triumph\nto those parts only of his literary character which are obviously\nvulnerable. He reckons up among his titles to the throne of Flecnoe,\nhis desperate and unsuccessful attempts at lyrical composition, in\nthe opera of \"Psyche;\" the clumsy and coarse limning of those whom\nhe designed to figure as fine gentlemen in his comedies; the false\nand florid taste of his dedications; his presumptuous imitation of\nJonson in composition, and his absurd resemblance to him in person.\nBut the satirist industriously keeps out of view those points, in\nwhich perhaps he internally felt some inferiority to the object of\nhis wrath. He mentions nothing that could recal to the reader's\nrecollection that insight into human life, that acquaintance with the\nfoibles and absurdities displayed in individual pursuits, that bold\nthough coarse delineation of character, which gave fame to Shadwell's\ncomedies in the last century, and renders them amusing even at the\npresent day. This discrimination is an excellent proof of the exquisite\naddress with which Dryden wielded the satirical weapon, and managed\nthe feelings of his readers. We never find him attempting a desperate\nor impossible task; at least in a way which seems, in the moment of\nperusal, desperate or impossible. He never wastes his powder against\nthe impregnable part of a fortress, but directs all his battery\nagainst some weaker spot, where a breach may be rendered practicable.\nIn short, by convincing his reader that he is right in the examples\nwhich he quotes, he puts the question at issue upon the ground most\ndisadvantageous for his antagonist, and renders it very difficult for\none who has been proved a dunce in one instance to establish his credit\nin any other.\n\nI have had so frequently to call the attention of my reader to the\nsonorous and emphatic effect of Dryden's versification, that it is\nalmost ridiculous to repeat epithets which apply to every poem which\nsucceeded his _Annus Mirabilis_; yet I cannot but remark, that the mock\nheroic may be said to have owed its rise to our author, and that there\nis hardly any poem, before \"Mac-Flecnoe,\" in which it has been employed\nwith all its qualities of grave and pompous irony, expressed in solemn\nand sounding verse.\n\nIt is no inconsiderable part of the merit of \"Mac-Flecnoe,\" that it\nled the way to the \"Dunciad:\" yet, while we acknowledge the more\ncopious and variegated flow of Pope's satire, we must not forget,\nthat, independent of the merit of originality, always inestimable,\nDryden's poem claims that of a close and more compact fable, of a\nsingle and undisturbed aim. Pope's ridicule and sarcasm is scattered\nso wide, and among such a number of authors, that it resembles small\nshot discharged at random among a crowd; while that of Dryden, like a\nsingle well-directed bullet, prostrates the individual object against\nwhom it was directed. Besides, the reader is apt to sympathise with\nthe degree of the satirist's provocation, which, in Dryden's case,\ncannot be disputed; whereas Pope sometimes confounds those, from whom\nhe had received gross incivility, with others who had given him no\noffence, and with some whose characters were above his accusation. To\nposterity, the \"Mac-Flecnoe\" possesses a decided superiority over the\n\"Dunciad,\" for a very few facts make us master of the argument; while\nthat of the latter poem, excepting the Sixth Book, where the satire is\nmore general, requires a note at every tenth line to render it even\nintelligible.\n\nMr Malone has given us the title of the first edition of \"Mac-Flecnoe,\"\nwhich the present Editor has never seen, as indeed it is of the last\ndegree of rarity. It was published not by Tonson, but by D. Green, and\nentitled, \"Mac-Flecnoe, or a Satire on the True-blue[415] Protestant\nPoet, T. S.; by the Author of Absalom and Achitophel.\" It consisted\nonly of one sheet and a half, and was sold for twopence. The satire\nwas too personal, and too poignant, to fail in attracting immediate\nattention, and accordingly the poem was quickly sold off. It was not\nrepublished until it appeared in Tonson's first Miscellany, in 1684,\nwith a few slight alterations, intended either to point particular\nverses, or to correct errors of the press, or pen. It must have been\ngenerally known, that Dryden was the author of this satire, both\nbecause it is stated in the title-page to be by the author of \"Absalom\nand Achitophel,\" and because there existed no contemporary poet to whom\nso masterly a production could have been ascribed, even with remote\nprobability; yet Shadwell, in his dedication of the tenth satire of\nJuvenal, (a most miserable performance,) says, that Dryden, when he\ntaxed him with being the author, \"denied it with all the execrations\nhe could think of;\" an accusation which was echoed by Brown, though\napparently upon the authority of Shadwell alone.[416] From this\naverment, which is probably made far too broadly, we can only infer,\nthat Dryden, like Swift in the same predicament, left his adversary\nto prove what he had no title to call upon him to confess; for that\nhe seriously meant to disavow a performance, of which he had from the\nvery beginning sufficiently avouched himself the author, can hardly\nbe supposed for a moment. It has indeed been noticed, that our author\nhas omitted this poem, as well as the \"Eulogy on Cromwell,\" in a list\nof his plays and poems subjoined to one of his plays; but Dryden might\nnot think fit to admit a personal, and what he probably considered\nas a fugitive satire, into a formal list of his poetry. We know he\nentertained a conscious sense of his dignity in this respect; for,\nexcepting in a slight and passing sarcasm, he never deigned to answer\nany of his literary adversaries, excepting Settle and Shadwell; and he\nmight possibly think, on reflection, that he had done the latter too\nmuch honour in making him the subject of a separate and laboured poem.\nMr Malone also conceives, that he might be with-held from inserting\nthis poem in an authoritative list of his works, by delicacy towards\nDorset, his recent benefactor, who had thought Shadwell worthy of the\nlaurel of which our poet had been divested at the Revolution. Be it\nas it may, he was afterwards so far from disowning the poem, that, in\nthe Essay on Satire, he gives it, with \"Absalom and Achitophel,\" as\ninstances of his own attempts at the Varronian satire.\n\nThe purpose and scope of \"Mac-Flecnoe\" was strangely misconstrued by\nthe object of it, and by our poet's editors. Shadwell took it into his\nhead, that Dryden meant seriously to tax him with being an Irishman;\na charge which he seems more anxious to refute than seems necessary.\nCibber, or whoever wrote Dryden's Life in the collection bearing his\nname, supposes, that Flecnoe, who died in 1678, had actually succeeded\nour author in the office of poet-laureat. Derrick, though he corrects\nthis error, has fallen into another, in which he is followed by Dr\nJohnson, who considers \"Mac-Flecnoe\" as written in express ridicule\nof Shadwell's inauguration as court poet. The scarcity of the first\nedition of \"Mac-Flecnoe\" might have been some excuse for these errors,\nhad not the piece been printed in the first Miscellany, in 1684, four\nyears before Dryden's being deposed, and Shadwell succeeding him.\nCertainly the two events tallied strangely; and the friends of Shadwell\nmight have considered the substantial office which he gained by the\ndownfall of Dryden, as a just compensation for the ludicrous and mock\ndignity with which his foe had invested him.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 411: See the whole passage, Vol. VII. p. 141. note.]\n\n[Footnote 412: See the Remarks on the Empress of Morocco, written in\nconjunction by Dryden, Crown, and Shadwell. They were printed in 1674.]\n\n[Footnote 413: These circumstances of offence occur in the prologue,\nepilogue, and preface to the \"Virtuoso,\" which must have been acted in\nthe same season with \"Aureng-Zebe,\" as the dedication is dated 26th\nJune, 1676. The prologue commences with an irreverend allusion to that\nplay, and to our author's theatrical engagements:\n\n    You came with such an eager appetite\n    To a late play, which gave so great delight,\n    Our poet fears, that by so rich a treat\n    Your palates are become too delicate.\n    Yet since you've had rhyme for a relishing bit,\n    To give a better taste to comic wit;\n    But this requires expence of time and pains,\n    Too great, alas! for poets' slender gains.\n    For wit, like china, should long buried lie,\n    Before it ripens to good comedy;\n    A thing we ne'er have seen since Jonson's days,\n    And but a few of his were perfect plays.\n    Now drudges of the stage must oft appear,\n    They must be bound to scribble twice a year.\n\nThat these insinuations might not be mistaken, Shadwell, in the\nepilogue, severely attacks rhyming tragedies in general; the object of\nwhich diatribe, considering the late success of \"Aureng-Zebe,\" could\nnot possibly be misinterpreted:\n\n    But of those ladies he despairs to-day,\n    Who love a dull romantic whining play;\n    Where poor frail woman's made a deity,        }\n    With senseless amorous idolatry,              }\n    And snivelling heroes sigh, and pine, and cry.}\n    Though singly they beat armies, and huff kings,\n    Rant at the gods, and do impossible things;\n    Though they can laugh at danger, blood, and wounds,\n    Yet if the dame once chides, the milk-sop hero swoons.\n    These doughty things nor manners have nor wit;\n    We ne'er saw hero fit to drink with yet.\n\nThe passage in the Dedication, in which he insinuates that the\nprovision of a pension was all he wanted, to place him on a level with\nthe proudest of his rivals, is as follows: \"That there are a great many\nfaults in the conduct of this play, I am not ignorant; but I (having\nno pension but from the theatre, which is either unwilling, or unable,\nto reward a man sufficiently for so much pains as correct comedies\nrequire) cannot allot my whole time to the writing of plays, but am\nforced to mind some other business of advantage. Had I as much money,\nand as much time for it, I might perhaps write as correct a comedy as\nany of my contemporaries.\"]\n\n[Footnote 414: See Essay on Satire, Vol. XIII. p. 65.]\n\n[Footnote 415: This epithet preceded the nickname of Whig. See Vol. IX.\np. 211.]\n\n[Footnote 416: \"I make bold to use his own expression in \"Mac-Flecnoe,\"\nif it is _his_, I say, for Mr Shadwell, in the preface before his\nTranslation of the Tenth Satire of Juvenal, has been lately pleased to\nacquaint the world, that he publicly disowned the writing it with as\nsolemn imprecations as his friend the Spanish Friar did the Cavalier\nLorenzo.\"--_Reasons_, &c.]\n\n\n\n\nMAC-FLECKNOE.\n\n\n    All human things are subject to decay,\n    And, when fate summons, monarchs must obey.\n    This Flecknoe found,[417] who, like Augustus, young\n    Was called to empire, and had governed long;\n    In prose and verse was owned, without dispute,\n    Through all the realms of Nonsense, absolute.\n    This aged prince, now flourishing in peace,\n    And blest with issue of a large increase,\n    Worn out with business, did at length debate\n    To settle the succession of the state;\n    And, pondering which of all his sons was fit\n    To reign, and wage immortal war with wit,\n    Cried,--'Tis resolved! for nature pleads, that he\n    Should only rule, who most resembles me.\n    Shadwell alone my perfect image bears,\n    Mature in dulness from his tender years;[418]\n    Shadwell alone, of all my sons, is he,\n    Who stands confirmed in full stupidity.\n    The rest to some faint meaning make pretence,\n    But Shadwell never deviates into sense;\n    Some beams of wit on other souls may fall,\n    Strike through, and make a lucid interval;\n    But Shadwell's genuine night admits no ray,\n    His rising fogs prevail upon the day.\n    Besides, his goodly fabric fills the eye,\n    And seems designed for thoughtless majesty;\n    Thoughtless as monarch oaks, that shade the plain,\n    And, spread in solemn state, supinely reign.\n    Heywood and Shirley[419] were but types of thee,\n    Thou last great prophet of tautology!\n    Even I, a dunce of more renown than they,\n    Was sent before but to prepare thy way;\n    And, coarsely clad in Norwich drugget,[420] came\n    To teach the nations in thy greater name.\n    My warbling lute,--the lute I whilom strung,\n    When to king John of Portugal I sung,--\n    Was but the prelude to that glorious day,\n    When thou on silver Thames didst cut thy way,\n    With well-timed oars, before the royal barge,[421]\n    Swelled with the pride of thy celestial charge;\n    And big with hymn, commander of an host,--\n    The like was ne'er in Epsom blankets tost.[422]\n    Methinks I see the new Arion sail,\n    The lute still trembling underneath thy nail.[423]\n    At thy well-sharpened thumb, from shore to shore,\n    The trebles squeak for fear, the basses roar;\n    Echoes, from Pissing-Alley, Shadwell call,\n    And Shadwell they resound from Aston-Hall.\n    About thy boat the little fishes throng,\n    As at the morning toast that floats along.\n    Sometimes, as prince of thy harmonious band,\n    Thou weild'st thy papers in thy threshing hand;\n    St Andr\u00e9's[424] feet ne'er kept more equal time,\n    Not even the feet of thy own Psyche's rhyme,\n    Though they in number as in sense excel;[425]\n    So just, so like tautology, they fell,\n    That, pale with envy, Singleton[426] forswore   }\n    The lute and sword, which he in triumph bore, }\n    And vowed he ne'er would act Villerius more.--}\n      Here stopt the good old sire, and wept for joy,\n    In silent raptures of the hopeful boy.\n    All arguments, but most his plays, persuade,\n    That for anointed dulness he was made.\n      Close to the walls which fair Augusta bind,\n    (The fair Augusta much to fears inclined,[427])\n    An ancient fabric raised to inform the sight,\n    There stood of yore, and Barbican it hight;\n    A watch-tower once, but now, so fate ordains,\n    Of all the pile an empty name remains;\n    From its old ruins brothel-houses rise,\n    Scenes of lewd loves, and of polluted joys;\n    Where their vast courts the mother-strumpets keep,\n    And, undisturbed by watch, in silence sleep.[428]\n    Near these a nursery erects its head,\n    Where queens are formed, and future heroes bred;\n    Where unfledged actors learn to laugh and cry;}\n    Where infant punks their tender voices try,   }\n    And little Maximins the gods defy.            }\n    Great Fletcher never treads in buskins here,\n    Nor greater Jonson dares in socks appear;\n    But gentle Simkin[429] just reception finds\n    Amidst this monument of vanished minds;\n    Pure clinches the suburbian muse affords,\n    And Panton[430] waging harmless war with words.\n    Here Flecknoe, as a place to fame well known,\n    Ambitiously designed his Shadwell's throne.\n    For ancient Decker[431] prophesied long since,   }\n    That in this pile should reign a mighty prince,}\n    Born for a scourge of wit, and flail of sense; }\n    To whom true dulness should some Psyches owe,\n    But worlds of Misers from his pen should flow;\n    Humorists, and Hypocrites, it should produce,\n    Whole Raymond families, and tribes of Bruce.[432]\n      Now empress Fame had published the renown\n    Of Shadwell's coronation through the town.\n    Roused by report of fame, the nations meet,\n    From near Bunhill, and distant Watling-street.\n    No Persian carpets spread the imperial way,\n    But scattered limbs of mangled poets lay;\n    From dusty shops neglected authors come,\n    Martyrs of pies, and relics of the bum;\n    Much Heywood, Shirley, Ogleby there lay,\n    But loads of Shadwell almost choked the way;\n    Bilked stationers for yeomen stood prepared,\n    And Herringman[433] was captain of the guard.\n    The hoary prince in majesty appeared,\n    High on a throne of his own labours reared.\n    At his right hand our young Ascanius sate,\n    Rome's other hope, and pillar of the state;\n    His brows thick fogs, instead of glories, grace,\n    And lambent dulness played around his face.\n    As Hannibal did to the altars come,\n    Swore by his sire, a mortal foe to Rome,\n    So Shadwell swore, nor should his vow be vain,\n    That he till death true dulness would maintain;\n    And, in his father's right, and realm's defence,\n    Ne'er to have peace with wit, nor truce with sense.\n    The king himself the sacred unction made,\n    As king by office, and as priest by trade.\n    In his sinister hand, instead of ball,\n    He placed a mighty mug of potent ale;\n    \"Love's kingdom\"[434] to his right he did convey,\n    At once his sceptre, and his rule of sway;\n    Whose righteous lore the prince had practised young,\n    And from whose loins recorded Psyche sprung.\n    His temples, last, with poppies were o'erspread,[435]\n    That nodding seemed to consecrate his head.\n    Just at the point of time, if fame not lie,\n    On his left hand twelve reverend owls did fly;--\n    So Romulus, 'tis sung, by Tyber's brook,\n    Presage of sway from twice six vultures took.\n    The admiring throng loud acclamations make,\n    And omens of his future empire take.\n    The sire then shook the honours of his head,\n    And from his brows damps of oblivion shed\n    Full on the filial dulness: long he stood,   }\n    Repelling from his breast the raging god;    }\n    At length burst out in this prophetic mood:--}\n      Heavens bless my son! from Ireland let him reign,\n    To far Barbadoes on the western main;\n    Of his dominion may no end be known,\n    And greater than his father's be his throne;\n    Beyond love's kingdom let him stretch his pen!--\n    He paused, and all the people cried, Amen.--\n    Then thus continued he: My son, advance\n    Still in new impudence, new ignorance.\n    Success let others teach, learn thou from me\n    Pangs without birth, and fruitless industry.\n    Let Virtuosos in five years be writ,\n    Yet not one thought accuse thy toil of wit.[436]\n    Let gentle George in triumph tread the stage,\n    Make Dorimant betray, and Loveit rage;\n    Let Cully, Cockwood, Fopling, charm the pit,[437]\n    And in their folly show the writer's wit;\n    Yet still thy fools shall stand in thy defence,\n    And justify their author's want of sense.\n    Let them be all by thy own model made\n    Of dulness, and desire no foreign aid;\n    That they to future ages may be known,\n    Not copies drawn, but issue of thy own:\n    Nay, let thy men of wit too be the same,\n    All full of thee, and differing but in name;\n    But let no alien Sedley interpose,\n    To lard with wit thy hungry Epsom prose.[438]\n    And when false flowers of rhetoric thou would'st cull,\n    Trust nature; do not labour to be dull,\n    But write thy best, and top; and, in each line,\n    Sir Formal's oratory will be thine:\n    Sir Formal, though unsought, attends thy quill,\n    And does thy northern dedications fill.[439]\n    Nor let false friends seduce thy mind to fame,\n    By arrogating Jonson's hostile name;[440]\n    Let father Flecknoe fire thy mind with praise,\n    And uncle Ogleby thy envy raise.\n    Thou art my blood, where Jonson has no part:\n    What share have we in nature, or in art?\n    Where did his wit on learning fix a brand,\n    And rail at arts he did not understand?\n    Where made he love in Prince Nicander's vein,\n    Or swept the dust in Psyche's humble strain?\n    Where sold he bargains, \"whip-stitch, kiss my arse,\"[441]\n    Promised a play, and dwindled to a farce?\n    When did his muse from Fletcher scenes purloin,\n    As thou whole Etheridge dost transfuse to thine?\n    But so transfused, as oil and waters flow,\n    His always floats above, thine sinks below.\n    This is thy province, this thy wonderous way,\n    New humours to invent for each new play:[442]\n    This is that boasted bias of thy mind,\n    By which one way to dulness 'tis inclined;\n    Which makes thy writings lean on one side still,\n    And, in all changes, that way bends thy will.\n    Nor let thy mountain-belly make pretence\n    Of likeness; thine's a tympany of sense.\n    A tun of man in thy large bulk is writ,\n    But sure thou'rt but a kilderkin of wit.\n    Like mine, thy gentle numbers feebly creep;\n    Thy tragic muse gives smiles, thy comic sleep.\n    With whate'er gall thou sett'st thyself to write,\n    Thy inoffensive satires never bite;\n    In thy felonious heart though venom lies,\n    It does but touch thy Irish pen, and dies.\n    Thy genius call thee not to purchase fame\n    In keen iambics, but mild anagram.\n    Leave writing plays, and choose for thy command,\n    Some peaceful province in Acrostic land.\n    There thou may'st wings display, and altars raise,[443]\n    And torture one poor word ten thousand ways;\n    Or, if thou would'st thy different talents suit,\n    Set thy own songs, and sing them to thy lute.--\n      He said:--but his last words were scarcely heard;}\n    For Bruce and Longvil had a trap prepared,         }\n    And down they sent the yet declaiming bard.[444]     }\n    Sinking he left his drugget robe behind,\n    Borne upwards by a subterranean wind.\n    The mantle fell to the young prophet's part,\n    With double portion of his father's art.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 417: Note I.]\n\n[Footnote 418: Note II.]\n\n[Footnote 419: Note III.]\n\n[Footnote 420: Note IV.]\n\n[Footnote 421: Note V.]\n\n[Footnote 422: Note VI.]\n\n[Footnote 423: Note VII.]\n\n[Footnote 424: An eminent dancing-master of the period.]\n\n[Footnote 425: Note VIII.]\n\n[Footnote 426: Note IX.]\n\n[Footnote 427: Alluding to the political apprehensions of the period,\nso universal in the city.]\n\n[Footnote 428: These lines are a parody on a passage in Cowley's\n_Davideis_, Book I.:\n\n    Beneath the dens where unfledged tempests lie,\n    And infant winds their tender voices cry;\n\n           *       *       *       *       *\n\n    Where their vast court the mother waters keep;\n    And, undisturbed by moons, in silence sleep.\n]\n\n[Footnote 429: The character of a cobler in an interlude.]\n\n[Footnote 430: A celebrated punster, according to Derrick.]\n\n[Footnote 431: Note X.]\n\n[Footnote 432: Note XI.]\n\n[Footnote 433: Henry Herringman, bookseller, published almost all the\npoems, plays, and lighter pieces of the day. He was Dryden's original\npublisher.]\n\n[Footnote 434: A play of Flecknoe's so called. See Note XII.]\n\n[Footnote 435: Perhaps in allusion to Shadwell's frequent use of opium,\nas well as to his dulness.]\n\n[Footnote 436: Note XIII.]\n\n[Footnote 437: Note XIV.]\n\n[Footnote 438: Note XV.]\n\n[Footnote 439: Note XVI.]\n\n[Footnote 440: Note XVII.]\n\n[Footnote 441: This elegant phrase is the current catch-word of Sir\nSamuel Hearty in the \"Virtuoso,\" described in the _dramatis person\u00e6_ as\n\"a brisk, amorous, adventurous, unfortunate coxcomb; one that, by the\nhelp of humorous, nonsensical bye-words, takes himself to be a great\nwit.\"]\n\n[Footnote 442: Alluding, probably, to the following vaunt of Shadwell,\nin the Dedication to the \"Virtuoso:\" \"Four of the humours are entirely\nnew; and, without vanity, I may say, I ne'er produced a comedy that\nhad not some natural humour in it not represented before, and I hope I\nnever shall.\"]\n\n[Footnote 443: Note XVIII.]\n\n[Footnote 444: Bruce and Longvil are fine gentlemen in Shadwell's\ncomedy of the \"Virtuoso;\" who, during a florid speech of Sir Formal\nTrifle, contrive to get rid of the orator, by letting go a trap-door,\nupon which he had placed himself during his declamation.]\n\n\n\n\nNOTES\n\nON\n\nMAC-FLECKNOE.\n\n\nNote I.\n\n    _This Flecknoe found._--P. 433.\n\nRichard Flecknoe, the unfortunate bard whom our author has damned to\neverlasting fame, was by birth an Irishman, and by profession a Roman\nCatholic priest. Marvel, who seems to have known him at Rome, describes\nhis person as meagre in the extreme, and his itch for scribbling as\nincessant. The poem, in which Marvel depicts him, is in the old taste\nof extravagant burlesque, and the lines are as rugged as Flecknoe\ncould himself have produced. It contains, however, some witty and some\nhumorous description, and the reader may be pleased to see a specimen:\n\n_Flecknoe, an English Priest at Rome._\n\n    Obliged by frequent visits of this man,\n    Whom, as a priest, poet, musician,\n    I for some branch of Melchizedec took,\n    Though he derives himself from my Lord Brooke,\n    I sought his lodging, which is at the sign\n    Of the sad Pelican, subject divine\n    For poetry. There, three stair-cases high,\n    Which signifies his triple property,\n    I found at last a chamber, as 'twas said,\n    But seemed a coffin set on the stair's head,\n    Not higher than seven, nor larger than three feet;\n    There neither was a ceiling, nor a sheet,\n    Save that the ingenious door did, as you come,\n    Turn in, and show to wainscot half the room;\n    Yet of his state no man could have complained,\n    There being no bed where he entertained;\n    And though within this cell so narrow pent,\n    He'd stanzas for a whole apartement.\n\n           *       *       *       *       *\n\n    ---- ----Nothing now, dinner staid,\n    But till he had himself a body made;\n    I mean till he were dressed; for else, so thin\n    He stands, as if he only fed had been\n    With consecrated wafers; and the host\n    Hath sure more flesh and blood than he can boast.\n    This basso-relievo of a man,\n    Who, as a camel tall, yet easily can\n    The needle's eye thread without any stitch;\n    His only impossible is to be rich.\n    Lest his too subtle body, growing rare,\n    Should leave his soul to wander in the air,\n    He therefore circumscribes himself in rhymes,\n    And, swaddled in's own paper seven times,\n    Wears a close jacket of poetic buff,\n    With which he doth his third dimension stuff.\n    Thus armed underneath, he over all\n    Doth make a primitive sotana fall;\n    And over that, yet casts an antique cloak,\n    Worn at the first council of Antioch,\n    Which, by the Jews long hid and disesteemed,\n    He heard of by tradition, and redeemed;\n    But were he not in this black habit decked,\n    This half transparent man would soon reflect\n    Each colour that he past by, and be seen\n    As the camelion, yellow, blue, or green.\n\nIt appears that Flecknoe either laid aside, or disguised, his spiritual\ncharacter, when he returned to England; but he still preserved\nextensive connections with the Roman Catholic nobility and gentry.[445]\nHe probably wrote upon many occasional subjects, but his poetry has\nfallen into total oblivion. I have particularly sought in vain for\nhis verses to King John of Portugal, to which Dryden alludes a little\nlower. Langbaine mentions four of his plays, namely, \"Damoiselles a la\nMode,\" \"Erminia,\" \"Love's Dominion,\" and \"Love's Kingdom,\" (of which\nmore hereafter;) but none of these were ever acted, excepting the last.\nThis gave Flecknoe great indignation, which he thus vents against the\nplayers in his preface to \"Damoiselles a la Mode.\" \"For the acting\nof this comedy, those who have the governing of the stage have their\nhumour, and would be entreated; and I have mine, and won't entreat\nthem: and were all dramatic writers of my mind, they should wear their\nold plays thread-bare before they should have any new, till they\nbetter understood their own interest, and how to distinguish betwixt\ngood and bad.\" Notwithstanding this ill usage, he honoured the players\nso far, as to prefix to each character, in the _dramatis person\u00e6_ of\nhis pieces, the name of the actor, by whom, had the managers been\nless inexorable, he meant it should have been performed. But this he\ndid for the sake of the gentle reader, whom he assures, that a lively\nimagination being thus assisted in bodying forth the character, he\nmay receive as much pleasure from the perusal as from the actual\nrepresentation of the performance. Flecknoe bore the damnation of the\nonly one of his plays which was represented, with the same valiant\nindifference with which he supported the rebuffs of the players. In\nshort, he seems to have been fitted for an incorrigible scribbler, by\na happy fund of self-satisfaction, upon which neither the censures of\ncriticism, nor the united hisses of a whole nation, could make the\nslightest impression. When or how Flecknoe died is uncertain, and of\nvery little consequence; I presume, however, that he was dead when this\nsatire was published. I am uncertain whether the reader will think,\nthat this poor poetaster merited mercy at the hands of Dryden, for the\nfollowing lines which he had written in his praise, and which, at any\nrate, may serve as a specimen of Flecknoe's poetry:\n\n    Dryden, the muses darling and delight,\n    Than whom none ever flew so high a flight:\n    Some have their veins so drossy, as from earth,\n    Their muses only seem to have ta'en their birth.\n    Other but water-poets are, have gone\n    No farther than to the fount of Helicon:\n    And they're but airy ones, whose muse soars up\n    No higher than to mount Parnassus top;\n    Whilst thou, with thine, dost seem to have mounted higher\n    Than he who fetch from heaven celestial fire;\n    And dost as far surpass all others, as\n    Fire does all other elements surpass.\n\nFlecknoe's memory being only preserved by this satire, his very name\ncame to be identified with its title. King, in \"A Dialogue in the\nShades,\" introduces him under the name of _Mac_-Flecknoe; and Derrick\nfalls into the same error.\n\n\nNote II.\n\n    _Shadwell alone my perfect image bears,\n    Mature in dulness from his tender years._--P. 433.\n\nThomas Shadwell was born at Santon-hall, in Norfolk, in which county\nhis father represented a very ancient family. He was educated at Caius\nCollege, in Cambridge, and placed in the Middle Temple to study law;\nbut, like many of the inhabitants of these buildings, he preferred the\nsmoother paths of literature. He made several essays in heroic verse,\nall of which are deplorably bad. They are chiefly occasional pieces;\nas, an Address to the Prince of Orange on his Landing, another to Queen\nMary, and a Translation of the Tenth Satire of Juvenal; which, though\nprefaced by a violent refutation of our author's attacks upon him, is\nso execrable, as fully to confirm Dryden's censures of the author's\npoetical talents. But, in comedy, he was much more successful; and, in\nthat capacity, Dryden does him great injustice in pronouncing him a\ndunce. On the contrary, I think most of Shadwell's comedies may be read\nwith great pleasure. They do not, indeed, exhibit any brilliancy of\nwit, or ingenuity of intrigue; but the characters are truly dramatic,\noriginal, and well drawn; and the picture of manners which they exhibit\ngives us a lively idea of those of the author's age. As Shadwell\nproposed Jonson for his model, peculiarity of character, or what\nwas then technically called _humour_, was what he chiefly wished to\nexhibit; and in this, it cannot be denied that he has often succeeded\nadmirably. His powers, as a dramatist, are highly rated by Rochester,\nwho imputes his coarseness to rapidity of composition:\n\n    Of all our modern wits, none seem to me}\n    Once to have touched upon true comedy, }\n    But hasty Shadwell and slow Wycherley. }\n    Shadwell's unfinished works do yet impart\n    Great proofs of force of genius, none of art;\n    With just bold strokes he dashes here and there,\n    Showing great mastery with little care;\n    Scorning to varnish his good touches o'er,\n    To make the fools and women praise them more.\n\n    _Allusion to Tenth Satire of Horace._\n\nShadwell's plays are seventeen in number, and were published, in four\nvolumes, under the inspection of his son, Sir John Shadwell, M. D.\n\nShadwell's life was chequered with misfortune. As he espoused the\nparty of the Duke of Monmouth, to whom he dedicated \"Psyche,\" and of\nShaftesbury, he thought himself obliged to draw the quill in defence\nof their cause. Accordingly, as we have seen, he attempted to answer\n\"The Medal\" on the one hand, and, on the other, accused our author of\nintending a parallel between Monmouth and the Duke of Guise, in the\nplay so entitled. This zeal seems to have cost Shadwell dear; for,\nbesides undergoing the severe flagellations administered by Dryden,\nin the \"Defence of the Duke of Guise,\" in \"Absalom and Achitophel,\"\nand in the present poem, he complains, that his ruin was designed,\nand his life sought; and that, for near ten years, he was kept from\nthe exercise of that profession which had afforded him a competent\nsubsistence.[446] It is no wonder, therefore, he was among the first\nto hail the dawn of the Revolution, by the address already mentioned,\nof which the full title is, \"A Congratulatory Poem on his Highness the\nPrince of Orange his coming into England. Written by T. S. (Thomas\nShadwell,) a True Lover of his Country, (10th January) 1689;\" and that\nKing William distinguished him by the honours of the laurel. Dorset,\nwho was high chamberlain, answered, to those who remonstrated on\nShadwell's lack of poetical talent, that, without pretending to vouch\nfor Mr Shadwell's genius, he was sure he was an honest man. Shadwell\ndid not long enjoy this triumph over his great enemy. He died 19th\nNovember, 1692,[447] in the fifty-second year of his age. It is said,\nthis event was hastened by his taking an over dose of opium, to the use\nof which he was inordinately addicted. \"His death,\" says Dr Nicholas\nBrady, who preached his funeral sermon, \"seized him suddenly; but he\ncould not be unprepared, since, to my certain knowledge, he never took\na dose of opium but he solemnly recommended himself to God by prayer.\"\nIn person, Shadwell was large, corpulent, and unwieldy; a circumstance\nwhich our author generally keeps in the eye of the reader. He seems to\nhave imitated his prototype, Ben Jonson, in gross and coarse sensual\nindulgence, and profane conversation. But, if there be truth in a\nfuneral sermon, he must have corrected these habits before his death;\nfor Dr Brady tells us, \"that our author was a man of great honesty\nand integrity, and inviolable fidelity and strictness in his word; an\nunalterable friendship wherever he professed it; and however the world\nmay be mistaken in him, he had a much deeper sense of religion than\nmany who pretended more to it. His natural and acquired abilities,\"\ncontinues the Doctor, \"made him very amiable to all who knew and\nconversed with him, a very few being equal in the becoming qualities\nwhich adorn and set off a complete gentleman; his very enemies, if he\nhas now any left, will give him this character, at least if they knew\nhim so thoroughly as I did.\"--CIBBER'S _Lives of the Poets_, Article\n_Shadwell_, Vol. III.\n\n\nNote III.\n\n    _Heywood and Shirley._--P. 434.\n\nVoluminous dramatic authors, who flourished in the beginning of the\n17th century. There were no less than four Heywoods who wrote plays;\nso that, Winstanley says, the name of Heywood seemed to be destinated\nto the stage. But he whom Dryden here means, is Thomas Heywood, a\nperson rather to be admired for the facility, than for the excellence\nof his compositions. Every place and situation was alike to him while\ncomposing; and the favourite register of his scenes was the back of\na tavern bill. Far the greater part of his labours are now lost; and\nyet there remain, in the libraries of the curious, twenty-four printed\nplays by Thomas Heywood. He was an actor by profession, and a good\nscholar, as is evinced by several of his classical allusions. His plays\nmay be examined with advantage by the antiquary, but afford slender\namusement to the lovers of poetry. The following character of him, by\nan old poet, is preserved by Langbaine:\n\n    ---- ----Heywood sage,\n    The apologetic Atlas of the stage;\n    Well of the golden age he could entreat,\n    But little of the metal he could get.\n    Threescore sweet babes be fashioned at a lump,\n    For he was christened in Parnassus pump,\n    The muses' gossip to Aurora's bed;\n    And ever since that time his face was red.\n\nIf we cannot call Heywood a second Lope de Vega, in point of the extent\nof his dramatic works, he overtops most English authors; since he\nassures us, in his preface to the \"English Traveller,\" that it was one\nreserved among two hundred and twenty plays, in which he had either\nhad \"a whole hand, or, at the least, a main finger.\" It is a pity, as\nJohnson said of Churchill, so fruitful a tree should have borne only\ncrabs.\n\nJames Shirley, whom our author most unjustly couples with Heywood,\nto whom, as well as to Shadwell, he was greatly superior, was born\nin 1594, and, although for some time a schoolmaster, appears to have\nlived chiefly by the stage. When the civil wars broke out, he followed\nthe fortune of William, Earl of Newcastle. During the usurpation, when\ntheatres were prohibited, he returned to his original profession of\na schoolmaster. He died of fatigue and distress of mind during the\ngreat fire of London, in 1666. He wrote forty-two plays, and there\nare thirty-nine in print; a complete set of which is much esteemed by\ncollectors. Dr Farmer has traced, to this neglected bard, an idea,\nwhich Milton thought not unworthy of adoption.\n\nShirley is spoken of with contempt in \"Mac-Flecknoe,\" but his\nimagination is sometimes fine to an extraordinary degree. I recollect\na passage in the Fourth Book of the \"Paradise Lost,\" which hath been\nsuspected of imitation, as a prettiness below the genius of Milton: I\nmean, where Uriel glides backward and forward to heaven on a sun-beam.\nDr Newton informs us, that this might possibly be hinted by a picture\nof Annabal Caracci, in the king of France's cabinet; but I am apt\nto believe, that Milton had been struck with a portrait in Shirley.\nFernando, in the comedy of the \"Brothers,\" 1652, describes Jacinta at\nvespers:\n\n    Her eye did seem to labour with a tear,\n    Which suddenly took birth, but overweighed\n    With its own swelling, dropped upon her bosom;\n    Which, by reflection of her light, appeared\n    As nature meant her sorrow for an ornament':\n    After, her looks grew cheerfull, and I saw\n    A smile shoot graceful upward from her eyes,\n    As if they had gained a victory o'er grief;\n    _And with it many beams twisted themselves,\n    Upon whose golden threads the angels walk\n    To and again from heaven_.\n\n    Essay on the Learning of Shakespeare.\n\n\nNote IV.\n\n    _Coarsely clad in Norwich drugget._--P. 434.\n\nThis stuff appears to have been sacred to the use of the poorer\nvotaries of Parnassus; and it is somewhat odd, that it seems to\nhave been the dress of our poet himself in the earlier stage of his\nfortunes. An old gentleman, who corresponded with the \"Gentleman's\nMagazine,\" says, he remembers our author in this dress. Vol. XV. p. 99.\n\n\nNote V.\n\n    _When thou on silver Thames didst cut thy way,\n    With well-timed oars, before the royal barge._--P. 434.\n\nI confess myself, after some research, at a loss to discover the nature\nof the procession, in which Shadwell seems to have acted as leader of\nthe band. One is at first sight led to consider the whole procession as\nimaginary, and preliminary to his supposed coronation; but, on closer\ninvestigation, it appears, that Flecknoe talks of some real occurrence,\non which Shadwell preceded the royal barge, at the head of a boat-load\nof performers. We may see, in the seventh note, that he professed to\nunderstand music, and may certainly have been called upon to assist or\ndirect the band during some entertainment upon the river, an amusement\nto which King Charles was particularly addicted.\n\n\nNote VI.\n\n    _The like was ne'er in Epsom blankets tost._--P. 434.\n\nThis seems to be in ridicule of the following elegant expression\nwhich Shadwell puts in the mouth of a fine lady: \"Such a fellow as he\ndeserves to be _tossed in a blanket_.\" This, however, does not occur\nin \"Epsom-Wells,\" but in another of Shadwell's comedies, called \"The\nSullen Lovers.\"\n\n\nNote VII.\n\n    _Methinks I see the new Arion sail,\n    The lute still trembling underneath thy nail._--P. 434.\n\nShadwell appears to have been a proficient in music, and to have\nhimself adjusted that of his opera of \"Psyche,\" which Dryden here\ntreats with such consummate contempt. Indeed, in the preface of that\nchoice piece he affected to value himself more upon the music than the\npoetry, as appears from the following passage in the preface: \"I had\nrather be author of one scene of comedy, like some of Ben Jonson's,\nthan of all the best plays of this kind, that have been, or ever shall\nbe written; good comedy requiring much more wit and judgment in the\nwriter, than any rhiming, unnatural plays can do. This I have so little\nvalued, that I have not altered six lines in it since it was first\nwritten, which (except the songs at the marriage of Psyche, in the\nlast scene) was all done sixteen months since. In all the words which\nare sung, I did not so much take care of the wit or fancy of them, as\nthe making of them proper for music; in which I cannot but have some\nlittle knowledge, having been bred, for many years of my youth, to some\nperformance in it.\n\n\"I chalked out the way to the composer, (in all but the song of Furies\nand Devils, in the fifth act,) having designed which line I would have\nsung by one, which by two, which by three, which by four voices, &c.\nand what manner of humour I would have in all the vocal music.\"\n\n\nNote VIII.\n\n    _Not even the feet of thy own Psyche's rhyme,\n    Though they in number as in sense excel._--P. 435.\n\nThis unfortunate opera was imitated from the French of Moliere, and\nfinished, as Shadwell assures us, in the space of five weeks. The\nauthor having no talents for poetry, and no ear for versification,\n\"Psyche\" is one of the most contemptible of the frivolous dramatic\nclass to which it belongs. It was, however, _got up_ with extreme\nmagnificence, and received much applause on its first appearance, in\n1675. To justify the censure of Dryden, it is only necessary to quote a\nfew of the verses, taken at random as a specimen, of what he afterwards\ncalls \"Prince Nicander's vein:\"\n\n    _Nicander._ Madam, I to this solitude am come,\n    Humbly from you to hear my latest doom.\n\n    _Psyche._ The first command which I did give,\n    Was, that you should not see me here;\n    The next command you will receive,\n    Much harsher will to you appear.\n\n    _Nic._ How long, fair Psyche, shall I sigh in vain?\n    How long of scorn and cruelty complain?\n      Your eyes enough have wounded me,\n      You need not add your cruelty.\n    You against me too many weapons chuse,\n    Who am defenceless against each you use.\n\nThe poet himself seems so conscious of the sad inferiority of his\nverses, that he makes, in the preface, a half apology, implying\na mortifying consciousness, that it was necessary to anticipate\ncondemnation, by pleading guilty. \"In a thing written in five weeks, as\nthis was, there must needs be many errors, which I desire true critics\nto pass by; and which, perhaps, I see myself, but having much business,\nand indulging myself with some pleasure too, I have not had leisure\nto mend them; nor would it indeed be worth the pains, since there are\nso many splendid objects in the play, and such variety of diversion,\nas will not give the audience leave to mind the writing; and I doubt\nnot but the candid reader will forgive the faults, when he considers,\nthat the great design was to entertain the town with variety of music,\ncurious dancing, splendid scenes, and machines; and that I do not, nor\never did intend, to value myself upon the writing of this play.\"\n\nShadwell, however, had no right to plead, that this affected contempt\nof his own lyric poetry ought to have disarmed the criticism of Dryden;\nbecause, in the very same preface, he sets out by insinuating, that he\ncould easily have beaten our author on his own strong ground of rhyme,\nhad he thought such a contest worth winning. So much, at least, may be\ninferred from the following declaration:\n\n\"In a good-natured country, I doubt not but this, my first essay in\nrhyme, would be at least forgiven, especially when I promise to offend\nno more in this kind; but I am sensible that here I must encounter a\ngreat many difficulties. In the first place, (though I expect more\ncandour from the best writers in rhyme,) the more moderate of them (who\nhave yet a numerous party, good judges being very scarce) are very\nmuch offended with me, for leaving my own province of comedy, to invade\ntheir dominion of rhyme: but, methinks, they might be satisfied, since\nI have made but a small incursion, and am resolved to retire. And, were\nI never so powerful, they should escape me, as the northern people did\nthe Romans; their craggy barren territories being not worth conquering.\"\n\n\nNote IX.\n\n    _----Pale with envy, Singleton forswore\n    The lute and sword, which he in triumph bore,\n    And vowed he ne'er would act Villerius more._--P. 435.\n\nSingleton was a musical performer of some eminence, and is mentioned as\nsuch in one of Shadwell's comedies.--\"'Sbud, they are the best music\nin England: there's the best shawm and bandore, and a fellow that acts\nTom of Bedlam to a miracle; and they sing _Charon, oh, gentle Charon!_\nand, _Come, my Daphne_, better than Singleton and Clayton did.\"--_Bury\nFair_, Act III. Scene I. Villerius, the grand master of the knights\nhospitallers, is a principal character in \"The Siege of Rhodes,\" an\nopera by Sir William D'Avenant, where great part of the dialogue is in\na sort of lyrical recitative; in the execution of which Singleton seems\nto have been celebrated. The first speech of this valorous chief of the\norder of St John runs thus:\n\n    Arm, arm! let our drums beat,\n    To all our outguards, a retreat;\n      And to our main-guards add\n    Files double lined; from the parade\n      Send horse to drive the fields,\n    Prevent what ripening summer yields;\n      To all the foe would save\n      Set fire, or give a secret grave.\n\nThe combination of the lute and sword, which Dryden alludes to,\nis ridiculed in \"The Rehearsal,\" where Bayes informs his critical\nfriends, that his whole battle is to be represented by two persons;\n\"for I make 'em both come forth in armour cap-a-pee, with their swords\ndrawn, and hung with a scarlet ribband at their wrists, (which, you\nknow, represents fighting enough,) each of them holding a lute in his\nhand.--_Smith._ How, sir; instead of a buckler?--_Bayes._ O Lord, O\nLord! instead of a buckler! Pray, sir, do you ask no more questions.\nI make 'em, sir, play the battle in _recitativo_; and here's the\nconceit: Just at the very same instant that one sings, the other,\nsir, recovers you his sword, and puts himself into a warlike posture;\nso that you have at once your ear entertained with music and good\nlanguage, and your eye satisfied with the garb and accoutrements of\nwar.\"--_Rehearsal_, Act V. The adverse generals enter accordingly,\nand perform a sort of duet, great part of which is a parody upon the\nlyrical dialogue of Villerius and the Soldan Solyman, in the \"Siege of\nRhodes.\"\n\n\nNote X.\n\n    _Ancient Decker._--P. 436.\n\nDecker, who did not altogether deserve the disgraceful classification\nwhich Dryden has here assigned to him, was a writer of the reign of\nJames I., and the antagonist of Jonson. I suspect Dryden knew, or at\nleast recollected, little more of him, than that he was ridiculed,\nby his more renowned adversary, under the character of Crispinus,\nin \"The Poetaster.\" Indeed, nothing can be more unfortunate to an\ninferior wit, than to be engaged in controversy with an author of\nestablished reputation; since, though he may maintain his ground with\nhis contemporaries, posterity will always judge of him by the character\nassigned in the writings of his antagonist. Decker was admitted to\nwrite in conjunction with Webster, Ford, Brome, and even Massinger;\nand though he was only employed to fill up the inferior scenes, he\ncertainly displays some theatrical talent. Indeed he was judged, by\nmany of his own time, to have retaliated Jonson's satire with success,\nin \"The Untrussing of the Humorous Poet;\" where Ben is designed under\nthe character of Horace Junior. Besides, Decker possessed some tragic\npowers: \"The Honest Whore,\" which is altogether his own production, has\nseveral scenes of great merit.\n\n\nNote XI.\n\n    _But worlds of Misers from his pen should flow;\n    Humorists, and Hypocrites, it should produce,\n    Whole Raymond families, and tribes of Bruce._--P. 436.\n\nShadwell translated, or rather imitated, Moliere's \"L'Avare,\" under the\ntitle of \"The Miser.\" In Langbaine's opinion, he has greatly improved\nupon his original; but in this, as in other cases, the critic is\nprobably singular. \"The Miser\" was printed in 1672.\n\n\"The Humorists\" was a play professedly written to expose the reigning\nvices of the age; but as it was supposed to contain many direct\npersonal allusions, it was unfavourably received by the audience.\nShadwell, by way, I suppose, of insinuating to the readers an accurate\nnotion of the characters, or humours, which he means to represent, is,\nin this and other pieces, at great pains to give a long and minute\naccount of each individual in the _dramatis person\u00e6_. Thus we have have\nin \"The Humorists,\"\n\n\"_Crazy,_--One that is in pox, in debt, and all the misfortunes that\ncan be; and, in the midst of all, in love with most women, and thinks\nmost women in love with him.\n\n\"_Drybob,_--A fantastic coxcomb, that makes it his business to speak\nfine things and wit, as he thinks; and always takes notice, or makes\nothers take notice, of any thing he thinks well said.\n\n\"_Brisk,_--A brisk, airy, fantastic, singing, dancing coxcomb, that\nsets up for a well-bred man, and a man of honour; but mistakes in\nevery thing, and values himself only upon the vanity and foppery of\ngentlemen.\"\n\nI do not know what to make of the \"Hypocrites.\" Shadwell wrote no play\nso entitled; nor is it likely he gave any assistance to Medbourne, who\ntranslated the famous \"Tartuffe\" of Moliere, for they were of different\nopinions in religion and politics. Perhaps Dryden means the characters\nof the Irish priest and Tory chaplain in \"The Lancashire Witches.\"\n\nRaymond is a character in \"The Humorists,\" described in the _dramatis\nperson\u00e6_ as a \"gentleman of wit and honour.\" Bruce a similar person in\n\"The Virtuoso,\" characterized as a \"gentleman of wit and sense.\" In\nthese, and in all other characters where wit and an easy style were\nrequisite, Shadwell failed totally. His forte lay in broad, strong\ncomic painting.\n\n\nNote XII.\n\n    _Ogleby._--P. 436.\n\nThis gentleman, whose name, thanks to our author and Pope, has\nbecome almost proverbial for a bad poet, was originally a Scottish\ndancing-master, when probably Scottish dancing was not so fashionable\nas at present, and afterwards master of the revels in Ireland. He\ntranslated \"The Iliad,\" \"The Odyssey,\" \"The \u00c6neid,\" and \"\u00c6sop's\nFables,\" into verse; and his versions were splendidly adorned with\nsculpture. He also wrote three epic poems, one of which was fortunately\nburned in the fire of London. Moreover, he conducted the ceremony of\nCharles the Second's coronation,[448] and erected a theatre in Dublin.\n\n\nNote XII.\n\n    \"_Love's Kingdom._\"--P. 437.\n\nThis was a play of Flecknoe's. The full title is, \"Love's Kingdom,\na Pastoral Tragi-Comedy; not as it was acted at the theatre, near\nLincoln's-Inn, but as it was written, and since corrected by Richard\nFlecknoe; with a short treatise of the English stage, &c. by the same\nauthor. London, printed by R. Wood for the author, 1664.\"\n\nThe author's account of this piece, in the advertisement, is, \"For\nthe plot, it is neat and handsome, and the language soft and gentle,\nsuitable to the persons who speak; neither on the ground, nor in the\nclouds, but just like the stage, somewhat elevated above the common. In\nneither no stiffness, and, I hope, no impertinence nor extravagance,\ninto which your young writers are too apt to run, who, whilst they\nknow not well what to do, and are anxious to do enough, most commonly\noverdo.\"\n\nTHE PROLOGUE.\n\n_Spoken by Venus from the Clouds._\n\n    If ever you have heard of Venus' name,\n    Goddess of beauty, I that Venus am;\n    Who have to day descended from my sphere,\n    To welcome you unto \"Love's Kingdom\" here;\n    Or rather to my sphere am come, since I\n    Am present no where more nor in the sky,\n    Nor any island in the world than this,\n    That wholly from the world divided is:\n    For Cupid, you behold him here in me,\n    (For there where beauty is, Love needs must be,)\n    Or you may yet more easily descry\n    Him 'mong the ladies, in each amorous eye;\n    And 'mongst the gallants may as easily trace\n    Him to their bosoms from each beauteous face.\n    May then, fair ladies, you\n    Find all your servants true;\n    And, gallants, may you find\n    The ladies all as kind,\n    As by your noble favours you declare\n    How much you friends unto \"Love's Kingdom\" are;\n    Of which yourselves compose so great a part,\n    In your fair eyes, and in your loving heart.\n\nThis specimen of \"Love's Kingdom\" is extracted from the \"_Censura\nLiteraria_,\" No. IX.; to which publication it was communicated by Mr\nPreston of Dublin. To \"Love's Kingdom\" Flecknoe subjoined a Discourse\non the English Stage, which is sometimes quoted as authority.\n\n\nNote XIII.\n\n    _Let Virtuosos in five years be writ,\n    Yet not one thought accuse thy toil of wit._--P. 438.\n\nShadwell's comedy called \"The Virtuoso,\" was first acted in 1676 with\ngreat applause. It is by no means destitute of merit; though, as in all\nhis other pieces, it is to be found rather in the walk of coarse humour\nthan of elegance, or wit.\n\nThe character of Sir Nicholas Gimcrack, the Virtuoso, whose time was\nspent in discoveries, although he had never invented any thing so\nuseful as an engine to pare a cream cheese with, is very ludicrous. I\ncannot, however, but notice, that some of the discoveries, which are\nridiculed with so much humour, as the composition of various kinds of\nair, for example, have been realized by the philosophers of this age.\nAs the whole piece seems intended as a satire on the researches of\nthe Royal Society, its scope could not be very pleasing to Dryden, a\nzealous member of that learned body; even if he could have forgiven\nsome hits levelled against him personally in the preface and the\nepilogue, which have been quoted in the introduction to Mac-Flecknoe.\n\n\nNote XIV.\n\n    _Let gentle George in triumph tread the stage,\n    Make Dorimant betray, and Loveit rage;\n    Let Cully, Cockwood, Fopling, charm the pit._--P. 438.\n\nThe plays of Sir George Etherege were much admired during the end of\nthe 17th and beginning of the 18th century, till the refinement of\ntaste condemned their indecency and immorality. Sir George himself was\na courtier of the first rank in the gay court of Charles II. Our author\nhas addressed an epistle to him, when he was Resident at Ratisbon.\nEtherege followed King James to France, according to one account; but\nothers say he was killed at Ratisbon by a fall down stairs, after he\nhad been drinking freely. Sir Fopling Flutter, Dorimant, and Loveit,\nare characters in his well-known comedy, \"The Man of Mode.\" Cully and\nCockwood occur in \"Love in a Tub,\" another of his plays.\n\n\nNote XV.\n\n    _But let no alien Sedley interpose,\n    To lard with wit thy hungry Epsom prose._--P. 438.\n\nThe first edition bears Sydney, which is evidently a mistake.\nShadwell's comedy of \"Epsom Wells\" was very successful; which was\nimputed by his enemies to the assistance he received from the witty\nSir Charles Sedley. This he attempts to refute in the following lines\nof the second prologue, spoken when the piece was represented before\nthe king and queen at Whitehall:\n\n    If this for him had been by others done,\n    After this honour sure they'd claim their own.\n\nBut it is nevertheless certain, that Shadwell acknowledges obligations\nof the nature supposed, in the Dedication of the \"True Widow\" to Sir\nCharles Sedley. \"No success whatever,\" he there says, \"could have made\nme alter my opinion of this comedy, which had the benefit of your\ncorrection and alteration, and the honour of your approbation. And I\nheartily wish you had given yourself the trouble to have reviewed all\nmy plays, as they came inaccurately, and in haste, from my hands: it\nwould have been more to my advantage than the assistance of Scipio and\nLelius was to Terence; and I should have thought it at least as much\nto my honour, since, by the effects, I find I cannot but esteem you\nas much above both of them in wit, as either of them was above you in\nplace of the state.\"\n\nThere was a general opinion current, that Shadwell received assistance\nin his most successful pieces. A libel of the times, the reference\nto which I have mislaid, mentions with contempt the dulness of his\n\"unassisted scenes.\"\n\n\nNote XVI.\n\n    _Sir Formal, though unsought, attends thy quill,\n    And does thy northern dedications fill._--P. 438.\n\nSir Formal Trifle is a florid conceited orator in \"The Virtuoso,\" whose\ncharacter is drawn and brought out with no inconsiderable portion of\nhumour. Dryden intimates, that his coxcomical inflated style attends\nShadwell himself upon the most serious occasions, and particularly in\nhis dedications to the Duke and Duchess of Newcastle, to whom he has\ninscribed several of his plays. Hence Dryden, in the \"Vindication of\nthe Duke of Guise,\" calls him the Northern Dedicator. The truth is,\nthat Shadwell's prose was inflated and embarrassed; and his adulation\ncomes aukwardly from him, as appears from the opening of the dedication\nof that very play, \"The Virtuoso,\" to the Duke of Newcastle.\n\n\"So long as your grace persists in obliging, I must go on in\nacknowledging; nor can I let any opportunity pass of telling the world\nhow much I am favoured by you, or any occasion slip of assuring your\ngrace, that all the actions of my life shall be dedicated to your\nservice; who, by your noble patronage, your generosity and kindness,\nand your continual bounty, have made me wholly your creature: nor can\nI forbear to declare, that I am more obliged to your grace than to\nall mankind. And my misfortune is, I can make no other return, but a\ndeclaration of my grateful attachment.\"\n\n\nNote XVII.\n\n    _Nor let false friends seduce thy mind to fame,\n    By arrogating Jonson's hostile name._--P. 439.\n\nShadwell, as appears from many passages of his prologues and prefaces,\nand as we have had repeated occasion to notice, affected to consider\nBen Jonson as the object of his emulation. There were indeed many\npoints of resemblance between them, both as authors and men. In\ntheir habits, a life spent in taverns, and in their persons, huge\ncorpulence, probably acquired by habits of sensual indulgence, much\ncoarseness of manners, and an ungentlemanly vulgarity of dialect,\nseem to have distinguished both the original and the imitator. As a\ndramatist, although Shadwell falls short of the learned vigour and deep\nerudition of Ben Jonson, his dry hard comic painting entitles him to\nbe considered as an inferior artist of the same school. Dryden more\nparticularly resented Shadwell's reiterated and affected praises of\nJonson, because he had himself censured that writer in the epilogue\nto the \"Conquest of Granada,\" and in the critical defence of that\npoem.[449] Hence he considered Shadwell's ranking himself under\nJonson's banners as a sort of personal defiance. But Dryden more\nparticularly alludes to the following ebullition of admiration, which\noccurs in the epilogue to Shadwell's \"Humorists:\"\n\n    The mighty prince of poets, learned Ben,\n    Who alone dived into the minds of men;\n    Saw all their wanderings, all their follies knew,\n    And all their vain fantastic passions drew\n    In images so lively and so true,\n    That there each humorist himself might view.\n    Yet only lashed the errors of the times,\n    And ne'er exposed the persons, but the crimes;\n    And never cared for private frowns, when he\n    Did but chastise public iniquity:\n    He feared no pimp, no pick-pocket, or drab;\n    He feared no bravo, nor no ruffian's stab:\n    'Twas he alone true humours understood,\n    And with great wit and judgment made them good.\n    A humour is the bias of the mind,\n    By which with violence 'tis one way inclined;\n    It makes our actions lean on one side still,\n    And in all changes that way bends the will.\n    This--------\n    He only knew and represented right.\n    Thus none, but mighty Jonson, e'er could write.\n    Expect not then, since that most flourishing age\n    Of Ben, to see true humour on the stage.\n    All that have since been writ, if they be scanned,\n    Are but faint copies from that master's hand.\n    Our poet now, amongst those petty things,\n    Alas! his too weak trifling humour brings;\n    As much beneath the worst in Jonson's plays,\n    As his great merit is above our praise.\n    For could he imitate that great author right,\n    He would with ease all poets else outwrite.\n    But to outgo all other men, would be,\n    O noble Ben! less than to follow thee.\n\nDryden, in the text, turns the idea of bias into ridicule; for its\noriginal application being to the leaden weight disposed in the centre\nof a bowl, which inclines its course in rolling, he alleges, that the\nonly bias which can influence Shadwell is his predominant stupidity.\n\n\nNote XIX.\n\n    _Leave writing plays, and chuse for thy command,\n    Some peaceful province in Acrostic land.\n    There thou may'st wings display, and altars raise,\n    And torture one poor word ten thousand ways._--P. 440.\n\nAmong other efforts of gentle dulness, may be noticed the singular\nfashion which prevailed during the earlier period of the 17th century,\nof writing in such changes of measure, that by the different length\nand arrangement of the lines, the poem was made to resemble an egg,\nan altar, a pair of wings, a cross, or some other fanciful figure.\nThis laborious kind of trifling was much akin to the anagrams and\nacrostics. Those who are curious to read, or rather to see, a specimen\nof such whimsies, (for they are rather addressed to the eye than the\nunderstanding,) may find a dirge of Mr George Withers, arranged into\nthe figure of a rhomboid, in Ellis's \"Specimens of the Early English\nPoets,\" Vol. III. p. 100. They are mentioned with anagrams, acrostics,\nrebuses, and other exercises of false wit, in the \"Spectator,\" No. 63.\n\n\nEND OF THE TENTH VOLUME.\n\n\n    Edinburgh,\n    Printed by James Ballantyne & Co.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 445: An anonymous poet ascribes the estimation in which he\nwas held to his poetical propensities:\n\n    Verse the famed Flecknoe raised, the muses' sport,\n    From drudging for the stage to drudge at court.\n]\n\n[Footnote 446: Epistle dedicatory to \"Bury-fair,\" addressed to the Earl\nof Dorset.]\n\n[Footnote 447: See the inscription intended for his monument in\nWestminster Abbey, by his son Sir John Shadwell, in the Life prefixed\nto _Shadwell's Works_. But it was altered before it was placed in the\nAbbey, and a blunder in the date seems to have crept in.--See CIBBER'S\n_Lives of the Poets_, Vol. III. p. 49.]\n\n[Footnote 448: See Vol. IX. p. 61.]\n\n[Footnote 449: See Vol. IV. p. 211, &c.]\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n  +-------------------------------------------------------------------+\n  |                                                                   |\n  |                         Transcriber notes:                        |\n  |                                                                   |\n  | P.46. 'priciples' chanaged to 'principles', as in other volume.   |\n  | P.78. Added footnote after 'manly train' as the anchor is missing |\n  |   and seems to go here.                                           |\n  | P.82. Note V, link should be P. 69, not P. 68 changed.            |\n  | P.82. Note VI, link should be P. 74, not P. 73 changed.           |\n  | Footnote 57: Added 'Note VI.', as the link is missing.            |\n  | Footnote 174: 'Note XI.', should read 'Note XII.', changed.       |\n  | Footnote 175: 'Note XII.', should read 'Note XIII.', changed.     |\n  | Footnote 178: 'Note XIII.', should read 'Note XIV.', changed.     |\n  | P.119. 'enequal' is 'unequal' in another volume, changed.         |\n  | P.169. 'Rosolving' is 'Resolving' in another volume, changed.     |\n  | Footnote 208: Should reaad 'Note XIII', not 'Note XII', changed.  |\n  | P.394. Footnote 'Pensylvania' changed to 'Pennsylvania'.          |\n  | P.457. Note XIX needs to be XIII, changed.                        |\n  | Footnote 60: Should read 'Note VII', not 'Note VIII', changed.    |\n  | Corrected various punctuation.                                    |\n  | Underscore indicates italics _like this_.                         |\n  |                                                                   |\n  +-------------------------------------------------------------------+","title":"The works of John Dryden, now first collected in eighteen volumes. Volume 10","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":137275}