1

triumphed greatly in the fall of this piece; and thus the dramatic career of Dryden began and closed with bad success.

This section cannot be more properly concluded than with the list which Mr Malone nas drawn out of Dryden's plays, with the respective dates of their being acted and published; wnich is a correction and enlargement of that suojomed by the author himself to the opera of " Prince Arthur." Henceforward we are to consider Dryden as unconnected with the stage.

1 For example, in a Session of the Poets, under the fictitious name of Matthew Coppinger, Dryden is thus irreverently introduced :

"A reverend grisly elder first appear'd,

With solemn pace through the divided nerd;
Apollo, laughing at his clumsy mien,
Pronounced him straight the poets' alaerman.
His labouring muse did many years exce
In ill inventing, and translating weil,

Till Love Triumphant' did the cheat reveal.

So when appears, midst sprightly births, a sot,
Whatever was the other offspring's lot,
This we are sure was lawfully begot."

SECTION VII.

State of Dryden's Connexions in Society after the Revolu tion Juvenal and Persius-Smaller Pieces-Eleonora

- Third Miscellany-Virgil-Ode to St Cecilia-Dispute with Milbourne - With Blackmore-Fables-The Author's Death and Funeral—His private Character— Notices of his Family.

THE evil consequences of the Revolution upon Dryden's character and fortunes, began to abate sensibly within a year or two after that event. It is well known, that King William's popularity was as short-lived as it had been universal. All parties gradually drew off from the king, under their ancient standards. The clergy returned to their maxims of hereditary right, the Tories to their attachment to the house of Stuart, the Whigs to their jealousy of the royal authority. Dryden. we have already observed, so lately left in a small and detested party, was now associated among multitudes, who, from whatever contradictory motives, were joined in opposition to the government. A reconciliation took place betwixt him and some of his kinsmen; particularly with John Driden of Chesterton, his first cousin; with whom, from about this period till his death, he lived upon terms

of uninterrupted friendship. The influence of Clarendon and Rochester, the queen's uncles, were, we have seen, often exerted in the poet's favour; and through them he became connected with the powerful families with which they were allied. Dorset, by whom he had been deprived of his office, seems to have softened this harsh, though indispensable exertion of authority, by a liberal present; and to his bounty Dryden had frequently recourse in cases of emergency.1 Indeed, upon one occasion it is said to have been administered in a mode savouring more of ostentation than delicacy; for there is a tradition, that Dryden and Tom Brown, being invited to dine with the lordchamberlain, found under their covers, the one a

'Such, I understand, is the general purport of some letters of Dryden's, in possession of the Dorset family, which contain certain particulars rendering them unfit for publication. Our author himself commemorates Dorset's generosity in the Essay on Satire, in the following affecting passage: "Though I must ever acknowledge to the honour of your lordship, and the eternal memory of your charity, that since this Revolu tion, wherein I have patiently suffered the ruin of my small fortune, and the loss of that poor subsistence which I had from two kings, whom I had served more faithfully than profitable to myself-then your lordship was pleased, out of no other motive but your own nobleness, without any desert of mine, or the least solicitation from me, to make me a most bountiful present, which at that time, when I was most in want of it, came most seasonably and unexpectedly to my relief. That favour, my lord, is of itself sufficient to bind any grateful man to a perpetual acknowledgment, and to all the future service which one of my mean condition can be ever able to perform. May the Almighty God return it for me, both in blessing you here, and rewarding you hereafter! Essay on Satire, vol. xii., p. 31

"

bank-note for L.100, the other for L.50. I have already noticed, that these pecuniary benefactions were not held so degrading in that age as at present; and, probably, many of Dryden's opulent and noble friends took, like Dorset, occasional opportunities of supplying wants, which neither royal munificence, nor the favour of the public, now enabled the poet fully to provide for.

If Dryden's critical empire over literature was at any time interrupted by the mischances of his political party, it was in abeyance for a very short period; since, soon after the Revolution, he appears to have regained, and maintained till his death, that sort of authority in Will's Coffee-house, to which we have frequently had occasion to allude. His supremacy, indeed, seems to have been so effectually established, that a "pinch out of Dryden's snuff-box" was equal to taking a degree in that academy of wit. Among those by whom it was frequented, Southerne and Congreve were principally distinguished by Dryden's friendship." His intimacy with the former, though oddly commenced, seems soon to have ripened into such sincere friendship, that the aged poet selected

So says Ward, in the London Spy.

. ["It was Dryden who made Will's Coffee-house the great resort for the wits of his time. After his death, Addison transferred it to Button's, (in Russell Street, Covent Garden, on the south side,) who had been a servant of his.

Addison passed each day alike, and much in the same manner as Dryden did. Dryden employed his mornings in writing, dined en famille, and then went to Will's, only he came home earlier at nights."-POPE- Spence's Anecdotes, (Malone,) p. 114.1