Chapter XVI: Epilogue

What Sophocles could undertake alone,
Our poets found a work for more than one;
And therefore two lay tugging at the piece,
With all their force, to draw the ponderous mass from Greece;
A weight that bent even Seneca's strong muse,
And which Corneille's shoulders did refuse.
So hard it is the Athenian harp to string!
So much two consuls yield to one just king.
Terror and pity this whole poem sway;
The mightiest machines that can mount a play.
How heavy will those vulgar souls be found,
Whom two such engines cannot move from ground!
When Greece and Rome have smiled upon this birth,
You can but damn for one poor spot of earth;
And when your children find your judgment such,
They'll scorn their sires, and wish themselves born Dutch;
Each haughty poet will infer with ease,
How much his wit must under-write to please.
As some strong churl would, brandishing, advance
The monumental sword that conquered France;
So you, by judging this, your judgment teach,
Thus far you like, that is, thus far you reach.
Since then the vote of full two thousand years
Has crowned this plot, and all the dead are theirs,
Think it a debt you pay, not alms you give,
And, in your own defence, let this play live.
Think them not vain, when Sophocles is shown,
To praise his worth they humbly doubt their own.
Yet as weak states each other's power assure,
Weak poets by conjunction are secure.
Their treat is what your palates relish most,
Charm! song! and show! a murder and a ghost!
We know not what you can desire or hope,
To please you more, but burning of a Pope.[1]

Footnote:
1. The burning a Pope in effigy, was a ceremony performed upon the
anniversary of queen Elizabeth's coronation. When parties ran high
betwixt the courtiers and opposition, in the latter part of Charles
the II. reign, these anti-papal solemnities were conducted by the
latter, with great state and expence, and employed as engines to
excite the popular resentment against the duke of York, and his
religion. The following curious description of one of these
tumultuary processions, in 1679, was extracted by Ralph, from a
very scarce pamphlet; it is the ceremony referred to in the
epilogue; and it shall be given at length, as the subject is
frequently alluded to by Dryden.

London Published January 1808 by William Miller, Albemarle Street.
Dryden Works to face Vol 6th page 223]

"On the said 17th of November, 1679, the bells, generally, about
the town, began to ring at three o'clock in the morning. At the
approach of the evening, (all things being in readiness) the solemn
procession began, setting forth from Moregate, and so passed, first
to Aldgate, and thence through Leadenhall-street, by the Royal
Exchange, through Cheapside, and so to Temple-bar in the ensuing
order, viz.

"1. Came six whifflers, to clear the way, in pioneer caps, and red
waistcoats.

"2. A bellman ringing, and with a loud (but doleful) voice, crying
out all the way, remember Justice Godfrey.

"3. A dead body, representing justice Godfrey, in a decent black
habit, carried before a jesuit, in black, on horse-back, in
like manner as he was carried by the assassins to Primrose
Hill.

"4. Next after Sir Edmonbury, so mounted, came a priest in a
surplice, with a cope embroidered with dead bones, skeletons,
skulls, and the like, giving pardons very plentifully to all
those who should murder protestants; and proclaiming it
meritorious.

"5. Then a priest in black alone, with a great silver cross.

"6. Four carmelites, in white and black habits.

"7. Four grey-friars, in the proper habits of their order.

"8. Six jesuits, with bloody daggers.

"9. A concert of wind music.

"10. Four bishops, in purple, and lawn sleeves, with a golden
crosier on their breast, and crosier-staves in their hands.

"11. Four other bishops, in _Pontificalibus_, with surplices, and
rich embroidered copes, and golden mitres on their heads.

"12. Six cardinals, in scarlet robes and caps.

"13. The Pope's doctor, _i.e._ Wakeman,[a] with jesuits-powder in
one hand, and an urinal in the other.

"14. Two priests in surplices, with two golden crosses.

"Lastly, The Pope, in a lofty, glorious pageant, representing a
chair of state, covered with scarlet, richly embroidered and
fringed, and bedecked with golden balls and crosses: At his feet a
cushion of state, and two boys in surplices with white silk
banners, and bloody crucifixes and daggers with an incense pot
before them, censing his holiness, who was arrayed in a splendid
scarlet gown, lined through with ermin, and richly daubed with gold
and silver lace; on his head a triple crown of gold, and a glorious
collar of gold and precious stones, St Peter's keys, a number of
beads, agnus deis, and other catholic trumpery. At his back, his
holiness's privy counsellor, the degraded Seraphim, (_anglice_ the
devil,) frequently caressing, hugging, and whispering him, and oft
times instructing him aloud to destroy his majesty, to forge a
protestant plot, and to fire the city again, to which purpose he
held an infernal torch in his hand.

"The whole procession was attended with 150 flambeaux and lights,
by order; but so many more came in volunteers, as made up some
thousands.

"Never were the balconies, windows, and houses more numerously
lined, or the streets closer throng'd with multitudes of people,
all expressing their abhorrence of Popery, with continual shouts
and exclamations; so that 'tis modestly computed, that, in the
whole progress, there could not be fewer than two hundred thousand
spectators.

"Thus with a slow, and solemn state, they proceeded to Temple Bar;
where with innumerable swarms, the houses seemed to be converted
into heaps of men, and women, and children, for whose diversion
there were provided great variety of excellent fireworks.

"Temple Bar being, since its rebuilding, adorned with four stately
statues, viz. those of Queen Elizabeth and King James, on the
inward, or eastern side, fronting the city; and those of King
Charles the I. of blessed memory, and our present gracious
sovereign, (whom God, in mercy to these nations, long preserve!) on
the outside, facing towards Westminster; and the statue of Queen
Elizabeth in regard to the day, having on a crown of gilded laurel,
and in her hand a golden shield, with this motto inscribed: _The
Protestant Religion, and Magna Charta_, and flambeaux placed before
it. The Pope being brought up near thereunto, the following song,
alluding to the posture of those statues, was sung in parts,
between one representing the English Cardinal (_Howard_)[b] and
others acting the people:

CARDINAL NORFOLK.

From York to London town we come,
To talk of Popish ire,
To reconcile you all to Rome,
And prevent Smithfield fire.

PLEBEIANS.

Cease, cease, thou Norfolk Cardinal,
See yonder stands Queen Bess;
Who sav'd our souls from Popish thrall:
O Queen Bess, Queen Bess, Queen Bess!

Your Popish plot, and Smithfield threat,
We do not fear at all;
For lo! beneath Queen Bess's feet,
You fall, you fall, you fall.

"'Tis true, our King's on t'other side,
A looking tow'rds Whitehall:
But could we bring him round about;
He'd counterplot you all.

"Then down with James, and set up Charles,
On good Queen Bess's side;
That all true Commons, Lords, and Earls,
May wish him a fruitfull bride."

Now God preserve great Charles our King,
And eke all honest men;
And traitors all to justice bring:
Amen, Amen, Amen.

"Then having entertained the thronging spectators for some time,
with the ingenious fireworks, a vast bonfire being prepared, just
over against the inner temple gate, his holiness, after some
compliments and reluctancies, was decently toppled from all his
grandeur, into the impartial flames; the crafty devil leaving his
infallibilityship in the lurch, and laughing as heartily at his
deserved ignominious end, as subtle jesuits do at the ruin of
bigotted Lay Catholics, whom themselves have drawn in; or, as
credulous Coleman's abettors did, when, with pretences of a
reprieve at last gasp, they had made him vomit up his soul with a
lye, and sealed his dangerous chops with a halter. This justice was
attended with a prodigious shout, that might be heard far beyond
Somerset-house; and 'twas believed the echo, by continued
reverberations, before it ceased, reached _Scotland_, (the Duke was
then there;) France, and even Rome, itself, damping them all with a
dreadfull astonishment."

From a very rare broadside, in the collection made by Narcissus
Luttrell.

Footnotes:
a. Sir George Wakeman was physician to the queen, and a catholic.
He was tried for the memorable Popish plot and acquitted, the
credit of the witnesses being now blasted, by the dying
declarations of those who suffered.

b. Philip, the 3d son of Henry Earl of Arundel, and brother to the
Duke of Norfolk, created a Cardinal in 1675. He was a second
cousin of Lady Elizabeth Howard, afterwards the wife of our
poet.

* * * * *

TROILUS AND CRESSIDA:

OR,

TRUTH FOUND TOO LATE.

A

TRAGEDY.

_Rectius Iliacum carmen deducis in actus,
Quam si proferres ignota indictaque primus._
HOR.

TROILUS AND CRESSIDA.

The story of Troilus and Cressida was one of the more modern fables, engrafted, during the dark ages, on "the tale of Troy divine." Chaucer, who made it the subject of a long and somewhat dull poem, professes to have derived his facts from an author of the middle ages, called Lollius, to whom he often refers, and who he states to have written in Latin. Tyrwhitt disputes the existence of this personage, and supposes Chaucer's original to have been the _Philostrato dell' amorose fatiche de Troilo,_ a work of Boccacio. But Chaucer was never reluctant in acknowledging obligations to his contemporaries, when such really existed; and Mr Tyrwhitt's opinion seems to be successfully combated by Mr Godwin, in his "Life of Chaucer." The subject, whencesoever derived, was deemed by Shakespeare worthy of the stage; and his tragedy, of Troilus and Cressida, contains so many scenes of distinguished excellence, that it could have been wished our author had mentioned it with more veneration. In truth, even the partiality of an editor must admit, that on this occasion, the modern improvements of Dryden shew to very little advantage beside the venerable structure to which they have been attached. The arrangement of the plot is, indeed, more artificially modelled; but the preceding age, during which the infidelity of Cressida was proverbially current, could as little have endured a catastrophe turning upon the discovery of her innocence, as one which should have exhibited Helen chaste, or Hector a coward. In Dryden's time, the prejudice against this unfortunate female was probably forgotten, as her history had become less popular. There appears, however, something too nice and fastidious in the critical rule, which exacts that the hero and heroine of the drama shall be models of virtuous perfection. In the most interesting of the ancient plays we find this limitation neglected, with great success; and it would have been more natural to have brought about the catastrophe on the plan of Shakespeare and Chaucer, than by the forced mistake in which Dryden's lovers are involved, and the stale expedient of Cressida's killing herself, to evince her innocence. For the superior order, and regard to the unity of place, with which Dryden has new-modelled the scenes and entries, he must be allowed the full praise which he claims in the preface.

In the dialogue, considered as distinct from the plot, Dryden appears not to have availed himself fully of the treasures of his predecessor. He has pitilessly retrenched the whole scene, in the 3d act, between Ulysses and Achilles, full of the purest and most admirable moral precept, expressed in the most poetical and dignified language[1]. Probably this omission arose from Dryden's desire to simplify the plot, by leaving out the intrigues of the Grecian chiefs, and limiting the interest to the amours of Troilus and Cressida. But he could not be insensible to the merit of this scene, though he has supplied it by one far inferior, in which Ulysses is introduced, using gross flattery to the buffoon Thersites. In the latter part of the play, Dryden has successfully exerted his own inventive powers. The quarrelling scene between Hector and Troilus is very impressive, and no bad imitation of that betwixt Brutus and Cassius, with which Dryden seems to have been so much charmed, and which he has repeatedly striven to emulate. The parting of Hector and Andromache contains some affecting passages, some of which may be traced back to Homer; although the pathos, upon the whole, is far inferior to that of the noted scene in the Iliad, and destitute of the noble simplicity of the Grecian bard.

Mr Godwin has justly remarked, that the delicacy of Chaucer's ancient tale has suffered even in the hands of Shakespeare; but in those of Dryden it has undergone a far deeper deterioration. Whatever is coarse and naked in Shakespeare, has been dilated into ribaldry by the poet laureat of Charles the second; and the character of Pandarus, in particular, is so grossly heightened, as to disgrace even the obliging class to whom that unfortunate procurer has bequeathed his name. So far as this play is to be considered as an alteration of Shakespeare, I fear it must be allowed, that our author has suppressed some of his finest poetry, and exaggerated some of his worst faults.

Troilus and Cressida was published in 1679.

Footnote:
1. I need only recall to the reader's remembrance the following
beautiful passage, inculcating the unabating energy necessary to
maintain, in the race of life, the ground which has been already
gained.

_Ulys._ Time hath, my lord, a wallet at his back,
Wherein he puts alms for oblivion,
A great-siz'd monster of ingratitudes:
These scraps are good deeds past; which are devour'd
As fast as they are made, forgot as soon
As done: Perséverance, dear my lord,
Keeps honour bright: To have done, is to hang
Quite out of fashion, like a rusty mail
In monumental mockery. Take the instant way;
For honour travels in a strait so narrow,
Where one but goes abreast: keep then the path;
For emulation hath a thousand sons,
That one by one pursue: If you give way,
Or hedge aside from the direct forthright,
Like to an enter'd tide, they all rush by,
And leave you hindmost.--
Or, like a gallant horse fallen in first rank,
Lie there for pavement to the abject rear,
O'er run and trampled on: Then what they do in present,
Though less than yours in past, must o'ertop yours:
For time is like a fashionable host,
That slightly shakes his parting guest by the hand;
And with his arms out stretch'd, as he would fly,
Grasps-in the comer: Welcome ever smiles,
And Farewel goes out sighing. O, let not virtue seek
Remuneration for the thing it was;
For beauty, wit,
High birth, vigour of bone, desert in service,
Love, friendship, charity, are subjects all
To envious and calumniating time.
One touch of nature makes the whole world kin,--
That all, with one consent, praise new-born gawds,
Though they are made and moulded of things past;
And give to dust, that is a little gilt,
More laud than gilt o'er-dusted.
The present eye praises the present object:
Then marvel not, thou great and complete man,
That all the Greeks begin to worship Ajax;
Since things in motion sooner catch the eye,
Than what not stirs. The cry went once on thee,
And still it might, and yet it may again,
If thou would'st not entomb thyself alive,
And case thy reputation in thy tent;
Whose glorious deeds, but in these fields of late,
Made emulous missions 'mongst the gods themselves,
And drave great Mars to faction.

TO

THE RIGHT HONOURABLE

ROBERT,

EARL OF SUNDERLAND[1],

PRINCIPAL SECRETARY OF STATE, ONE OF HIS MAJESTY'S
MOST HONOURABLE PRIVY-COUNCIL, &C.

MY LORD,

Since I cannot promise you much of poetry in my play, it is but reasonable that I should secure you from any part of it in my dedication. And indeed I cannot better distinguish the exactness of your taste from that of other men, than by the plainness and sincerity of my address. I must keep my hyperboles in reserve for men of other understandings. An hungry appetite after praise, and a strong digestion of it, will bear the grossness of that diet; but one of so critical a judgment as your lordship, who can set the bounds of just and proper in every subject, would give me small encouragement for so bold an undertaking. I more than suspect, my lord, that you would not do common justice to yourself; and, therefore, were I to give that character of you, which I think you truly merit, I would make my appeal from your lordship to the reader, and would justify myself from flattery by the public voice, whatever protestation you might enter to the contrary. But I find I am to take other measures with your lordship; I am to stand upon my guard with you, and to approach you as warily as Horace did Augustus:

_Cui malè si palpere, recalcitrat undique tutus._

An ill-timed, or an extravagant commendation, would not pass upon you; but you would keep off such a dedicator at arms-end, and send him back with his encomiums to this lord, or that lady, who stood in need of such trifling merchandise. You see, my lord, what an awe you have upon me, when I dare not offer you that incense which would be acceptable to other patrons; but am forced to curb myself from ascribing to you those honours, which even an enemy could not deny you. Yet I must confess, I never practised that virtue of moderation (which is properly your character) with so much reluctancy as now: for it hinders me from being true to my own knowledge, in not witnessing your worth, and deprives me of the only means which I had left, to shew the world that true honour and uninterested respect which I have always paid you. I would say somewhat, if it were possible which might distinguish that veneration I have for you, from the flatteries of those who adore your fortune. But the eminence of your condition, in this particular, is my unhappiness; for it renders whatever I would say suspected. Professions of service, submissions, and attendance, are the practice of all men to the great; and commonly they, who have the least sincerity, perform them best; as they, who are least engaged in love, have their tongues the freest to counterfeit a passion. For my own part, I never could shake off the rustic bashfulness which hangs upon my nature; but, valuing myself at as little as I am worth, have been afraid to render even the common duties of respect to those who are in power. The ceremonious visits, which are generally paid on such occasions, are not my talent. They may be real even in courtiers, but they appear with such a face of interest, that a modest man would think himself in danger of having his sincerity mistaken for his design. My congratulations keep their distance, and pass no farther than my heart. There it is that I have all the joy imaginable, when I see true worth rewarded, and virtue uppermost in the world.

If, therefore, there were one to whom I had the honour to be known; and to know him so perfectly, that I could say, without flattery, he had all the depth of understanding that was requisite in an able statesman, and all that honesty which commonly is wanting; that he was brave without vanity, and knowing without positiveness; that he was loyal to his prince, and a lover of his country; that his principles were full of moderation, and all his counsels such as tended to heal, and not to widen, the breaches of the nation: that in all his conversation there appeared a native candour, and a desire of doing good in all his actions: if such an one, whom I have described, were at the helm; if he had risen by his merits, and were chosen out in the necessity and pressures of affairs, to remedy our confusions by the seasonableness of his advice, and to put a stop to our ruin, when we were just rolling downward to the precipice; I should then congratulate the age in which I live, for the common safety; I should not despair of the republic, though Hannibal were at the gates; I should send up my vows for the success of such an action, as Virgil did, on the like occasion, for his patron, when he was raising up his country from the desolations of a civil war:

_Hunc saltem everso juvenem succurrere seclo
Ne, superi, prohibete._

I know not whither I am running, in this extacy which is now upon me: I am almost ready to re-assume the ancient rights of poetry; to point out, and prophecy the man, who was born for no less an undertaking, and whom posterity shall bless for its accomplishment. Methinks, I am already taking fire from such a character, and making room for him, under a borrowed name, amongst the heroes of an epic poem. Neither could mine, or some more happy genius, want encouragement under such a patron:

_Pollio amat nostram, quamvis sit rustica, musam._

But these are considerations afar off, my lord: the former part of the prophecy must be first accomplished; the quiet of the nation must be secured; and a mutual trust, betwixt prince and people, be renewed; and then this great and good man will have leisure for the ornaments of peace; and make our language as much indebted to his care, as the French is to the memory of their famous Richelieu[2]. You know, my lord, how low he laid the foundations of so great a work; that he began it with a grammar and a dictionary; without which all those remarks and observations, which have since been made, had been performed to as little purpose, as it would be to consider the furniture of the rooms, before the contrivance of the house. Propriety must first be stated, ere any measures of elegance can be taken. Neither is one Vaugelas sufficient for such a work[3]. It was the employment of the whole academy for many years; for the perfect knowledge of a tongue was never attained by any single person. The court, the college, and the town, must be joined in it. And as our English is a composition of the dead and living tongues, there is required a perfect knowledge, not only of the Greek and Latin, but of the old German, the French, and the Italian; and, to help all these, a conversation with those authors of our own, who have written with the fewest faults in prose and verse. But how barbarously we yet write and speak, your lordship knows, and I am sufficiently sensible in my own English. For I am often put to a stand, in considering whether what I write be the idiom of the tongue, or false grammar, and nonsense couched beneath that specious name of Anglicism; and have no other way to clear my doubts, but by translating my English into Latin, and thereby trying what sense the words will bear in a more stable language. I am desirous, if it were possible, that we might all write with the same certainty of words, and purity of phrase, to which the Italians first arrived, and after them the French; at least that we might advance so far, as our tongue is capable of such a standard. It would mortify an Englishman to consider, that from the time of Boccace and of Petrarch, the Italian has varied very little; and that the English of Chaucer, their contemporary, is not to be understood without the help of an old dictionary. But their Goth and Vandal had the fortune to be grafted on a Roman stock; ours has the disadvantage to be founded on the Dutch[4]. We are full of monosyllables, and those clogged with consonants, and our pronunciation is effeminate; all which are enemies to a sounding language. It is true, that to supply our poverty, we have trafficked with our neighbour nations; by which means we abound as much in words, as Amsterdam does in religions; but to order them, and make them useful after their admission, is the difficulty. A greater progress has been made in this, since his majesty's return, than, perhaps, since the conquest to his time. But the better part of the work remains unfinished; and that which has been done already, since it has only been in the practice of some few writers, must be digested into rules and method, before it can be profitable to the general. Will your lordship give me leave to speak out at last? and to acquaint the world, that from your encouragement and patronage, we may one day expect to speak and write a language, worthy of the English wit, and which foreigners may not disdain to learn? Your birth, your education, your natural endowments, the former employments which you have had abroad, and that which, to the joy of good men you now exercise at home, seem all to conspire to this design: the genius of the nation seems to call you out as it were by name, to polish and adorn your native language, and to take from it the reproach of its barbarity. It is upon this encouragement that I have adventured on the following critique, which I humbly present you, together with the play; in which, though I have not had the leisure, nor indeed the encouragement, to proceed to the principal subject of it, which is the words and thoughts that are suitable to tragedy; yet the whole discourse has a tendency that way, and is preliminary to it. In what I have already done, I doubt not but I have contradicted some of my former opinions, in my loose essays of the like nature; but of this, I dare affirm, that it is the fruit of my riper age and experience, and that self-love, or envy have no part in it. The application to English authors is my own, and therein, perhaps, I may have erred unknowingly; but the foundation of the rules is reason, and the authority of those living critics who have had the honour to be known to you abroad, as well as of the ancients, who are not less of your acquaintance. Whatsoever it be, I submit it to your lordship's judgment, from which I never will appeal, unless it be to your good nature, and your candour. If you can allow an hour of leisure to the perusal of it, I shall be fortunate that I could so long entertain you; if not, I shall at least have the satisfaction to know, that your time was more usefully employed upon the public. I am,

MY LORD,

Your Lordship's most Obedient,
Humble Servant,
JOHN DRYDEN.

Footnotes:
1. This was the famous Earl of Sunderland, who, being a Tory under the
reign of Charles, a Papist in that of his successor, and a Whig in
that of William, was a favourite minister of all these monarchs. He
was a man of eminent abilities; and our author shews a high opinion
of his taste, by abstaining from the gross flattery, which was then
the fashionable stile of dedication.

2. Alluding to the institution of an academy for fixing the language,
often proposed about this period.

3. Author of a treatise on the French language.

4. Dutch is here used generally for the High Dutch or German.

THE