As he had ftudied with great diligence the art of poetry, and enlarged or rectified his notions, by ex-. perience perpetually increafing, he had his mind ftored with principles and obfervations; he poured out his knowledge with little labour; for of labour, notwithstanding the multiplicity of his productions, there is fufficient reafon to fufpect that he was not a lover. To write con amore, with fondness for the employment, with perpetual touches and retouches, with unwillingness to take leave of his own idea, and an unwearied purfuit of unattainable perfection, was, I think, no part of his character.

His criticism may be confidered as general or occafional. In his general precepts, which depend upon the nature of things, and the ftructure of the human mind, he may doubtlefs be fafely recommended to the confidence of the reader; but his occafional and particular pofitions were fometimes interested, fometimes negligent, and fometimes capricious. It is not without reafon that Trapp, fpeaking of the praifes which he beftows on Palamon and Arcite, fays, "Novimus judicium Drydeni de poemate quodam Chauceri, pulchro fane illo, et admodum laudando, nimirum "quod non modo vere epicum fit, fed Iliada etiam

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atque Eneada æquet, imo fuperet. Sed novimus "eodem tempore viri illius maximi non femper ac"curatiffimas effe cenfuras, nec ad feveriffimam critices. "normam exactas: illo judice id plerumque optimum eft, quod nunc præ manibus habet, & in quo nunc "occupatur."

He is therefore by no means conftant to himself. His defence and desertion of dramatick rhyme is generally known. Spence, in his remarks on Pope's Odyffey,

produces

produces what he thinks an unconquerable quotation from Dryden's preface to the Eneid, in favour of tranflating an epic poem into blank verfe; but he forgets that when his author attempted the Iliad, fome years afterwards, he departed from his own decifion, and tranflated into rhyme.

When he has any objection to obviate, or any licenfe to defend, he is not very fcrupulous about what he afferts, nor very cautious, if the prefent purpose be served, not to entangle himself in his own sophistries. But when all arts are exhausted, like other hunted animals, he fometimes ftands at bay; when he cannot difown the groffness of one of his plays, he declares that he knows not any law that prescribes morality to a comick poet.

. His remarks on ancient or modern writers are not always to be trufted. His parallel of the verfification of Ovid with that of Claudian has been very juftly cenfured by Sewel *. His comparison of the first line of Virgil with the firft of Statius is not happier. Virgil, he says, is foft and gentle, and would have thought Statius mad, if he had heard him thundering out

Quae fuperimpofito moles geminata coloffo.

Statius perhaps heats himfelf, as he proceeds, to exaggerations fomewhat hyperbolical; but undoubtedly Virgil would have been too hafty, if he had condemned him to ftraw for one founding line. Dryden wanted an instance, and the first that occurred was impreft into the fervice.

What he wishes to fay, he fays at hazard; he cited Gorbuduc, which he had never feen; gives a falfe Preface to Ovid's Metamorphofes. Orig. Edit.

account

account of Chapman's verfification; and difcovers, in the preface to his Fables, that he translated the first book of the Iliad, without knowing what was in the fecond.

It will be difficult to prove that Dryden ever made any great advances in literature. As having diftinguished himself at Westminster under the tuition of Busby, who advanced his scholars to a height of know ledge very rarely attained in grammar-fchools, he refided afterwards at Cambridge, it is not to be fuppofed, that his skill in the ancient languages was deficient, compared with that of common ftudents; but his fcholaftick acquifitions feem not proportionate to his opportunities and abilities. He could not, like Milton or Cowley, have made his name illustrious merely by his learning. He mentions but few books, and thofe fuch as lie in the beaten track of regular study; from which if ever he departs, he is in danger of lofing himfelf in unknown regions.

In his Dialogue on the Drama, he pronounces with great confidence that the Latin tragedy of Medea is not Ovid's, because it is not fufficiently interesting and pathetick. He might have determined the queftion upon furer evidence; for it is quoted by Quintilian as the work of Seneca; and the only line which remains of Ovid's play, for one line is left us, is not there to be found. There was therefore no need of the gravity of conjecture, or the difcuffion of plot or fentiment, to find what was already known upon higher authority than fuch difcuffions can ever reach.

His literature, though not always free from oftentation, will be commonly found either obvious, and made his own by the art of dreffing it; or fuperficial,

which, by what he gives, fhews what he wanted; or erroneous, haftily collected, and negligently fcat

tered.

Yet it cannot be faid that his genius is ever unprovided of matter, or that his fancy languishes in penury of ideas. His works abound with knowledge, and sparkle with illuftrations. There is fcarcely any science or faculty that does not fupply him with occafional images and lucky fimilitudes; every page difcovers a mind very widely acquainted both with art and nature, and in full poffeffion of great ftores of intellectual wealth. Of him that knows much, it is natural to fuppofe that he has read with diligence; yet I rather believe that the knowledge of Dryden was gleaned from accidental intelligence and various converfation, by a quick apprehenfion, a judicious felection, and a happy memory, a keen appetite of knowledge, and a powerful digeftion; by vigilance that permitted nothing to pafs without notice, and a habit of reflection that fuffered nothing ufeful to be loft. A mind like Dryden's, always curious, always active, to which every understanding was proud to be affociated, and of which every one folicited the regard, by an ambitious difplay of himself, had a more pleafant, perhaps a nearer way to knowledge than by the filent progrefs of folitary reading. I do not fuppofe that he defpifed books, or intentionally neglected them; but that he was carried out, by the impetuofity of his genius, to more vivid and fpeedy inftructors; and that his studies were rather defultory and fortuitous than conftant and systematical.

It must be confeffed that he fcarcely ever appears to want book-learning but when he mentions books;

and

and to him may be transferred the praife which he gives his mafter Charles :

His converfation, wit, and parts,

His knowledge in the nobleft ufeful arts,
Were fuch, dead authors could not give,
But habitudes of thofe that live;

Who lighting him, did greater lights receive;
He drain'd from all, and all they knew,
His apprehenfions quick, his judgement true:
That the moft learn'd with fhame confefs
His knowledge more, his reading only lefs.

Of all this, however, if the proof be demanded, I will not undertake to give it; the atoms of probability of which my opinion has been formed, lie fcattered over all his works; and by him who thinks the question worth his notice, his works must be perufed with very clofe attention.

Criticism, either didactick or defenfive, occupies almost all his profe, except thofe pages which he has devoted to his patrons; but none of his prefaces were ever thought tedious. They have not the formality of a fettled ftyle, in which the first half of the fentence betrays the other. The claufes are never balanced, nor the periods modelled; every word feems to drop by chance, though it falls into its proper place. Nothing is cold or languid; the whole is airy, animated, and vigorous; what is little, is gay; what is great, is fplendid. He may be thought to mention himself too frequently; but while he forces himfelf upon our esteem, we cannot refufe him to stand high in his own. Every thing is excufed by the play of images and the fpritelinefs of expreffion. Though all is eafy, nothing is feeble; though all feems careless, there is nothing harfh; and though, fince his earlier works, more than

a century