surprise the audience, and cast a mist upon their understandings; not unlike the cunning of a juggler, who is always staring us in the face, and overwhelming us with gibberish, only that he may gain the opportunity of making the cleaner conveyance of his trick. But these false beauties of the stage are no more lasting than a rainbow; when the actor ceases to shine upon them, when he gilds them no longer with his reflection, they vanish in a twinkling. I have sometimes wondered, in the reading, what was become of those glaring colours which amazed me in "Bussy D'Amboys" upon the theatre; but when I had taken up what I supposed a fallen star, I found I had been cozened with a jelly*; nothing but a cold, dull mass, which glittered no longer than it was shooting; a dwarfish thought, dressed up in gigantic words, repetition in abundance, looseness of expression, and gross hyperboles; the sense of one line expanded prodigiously into ten; and, to sum up all, uncorrect English, and a hideous mingle of false poetry, and true nonsense; or, at best, a scantling of wit, which lay gasping for life, and groaning beneath a heap of rubbish. A famous modern poet used to sacrifice every year a Statius to Virgil's manes †; and I have in

* See note on Edipus, p. 151.

+ Dryden appears to have alluded to the following passage in Strada, though without a very accurate recollection of its contents: "" Sane Andreas Naugerius Valerio Martiali acriter infensus, solemne jam habebat in illum aliquanto petulantius jocari. Etenim natali suo, accitis ad geniale epulum amicis, postquam prolixe de poeticæ laudibus super mensam disputaverat; ostensurum se aiebat a cœna, quo tandem modo laudari poesim deceret: Mox aferri jubebat Martialis volumen, (hæc erat mense appendix) atque igni proprior factus, illustri conflagratione absumendum flammis imponebat: addebatque eo incendio litare se Musis, Manibusque Virgilij, cujus imitatorem cultoremque prestare se melius

dignation enough to burn a D'AMBOIS annually, to the memory of Jonson*. But now, my lord, I am sensible, perhaps too late, that I have gone too far: for, I remember some verses of my own Maximin and Almanzor, which cry vengeance upon me for their extravagance, and which I wish heartily in the same fire with Statius and Chapman. All I can say for those passages, which are, I hope, not many, is, that I knew they were bad enough to please, even when I wrote them; but I repent of them amongst my sins; and, if any of their fellows intrude by chance into my present writings, I draw

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haud posset, quam si vilia poetarum capita per undas insecutus ac Aammas perpetuo perdidisset. Nec se eo loco tenuit, sed cum Silvas aliquot ab se conscriptas legisset, audissetque Statiano characteri similes videri, iratus sibi, quod a Martiale fugiens alio declinasset a Virgilio, cum primum se recessit domum, in Silvas conjecit ignem." Strada Prolusiones, Lib. II. Pro. 5. this passage, it is obvious, that it was Martial, not Statius, whom Andreas Navagero sacrificed to Virgil, although he burned his own verses when they were accused of a resemblance to the style of the author of the Thebaid. In the same prolusion, Strada quotes the "blustering" line, afterwards censured by Dryden; but erroneously reads,

Super imposito moles gemmata colosso.

"Bussy D'Ambois," a tragedy, once much applauded, was the favourite production of George Chapman. If Dryden could have exhausted every copy of this bombast performance in one holocaust, the public would have been no great losers, as may be apparent from the following quotations:

Bussy. I'll sooth his plots, and strew my hate with smiles,
Till, all at once, the close mines of my heart

Rise at full state, and rush into his blood.

I'll bind his arm in silk, and rub his flesh,

To make the veine swell, that bis soule may gush
Into some kennel, where it loves to lie;

And policy be flanked with policy.

Yet shall the feeling centre, where we meet,
Groan with the weight of my approaching feet.

a stroke over all those Dalilah's of the theatre; and am resolved I will settle myself no reputation by the applause of fools. It is not that I am mortified to all ambition, but I scorn as much to take it from half-witted judges, as I should to raise an estate by cheating of bubbles. Neither do I discommend the lofty style in tragedy, which is naturally pompous and magnificent; but nothing is truly sublime, that is not just and proper. If the antients had judged by the same measure, which a common reader takes, they had concluded Statius to have written higher than Virgil, for,

Quæ super-imposito moles geminata Colosso

I'll make the inspired threshold of his court
Sweat with the weather of my horrid steps,
Before I enter; yet, I will appear

Like calm securitie, befor a ruin.

A politician must, like lightning, melt
The very marrow, and not taint the skin;

His wayes must not be seen through, the superficies
Of the green centre must not taste his feet,

When hell is plowed up with the wounding tracts,
And all his harvest reap't by hellish facts.

Montsurry, when he discovers that the Friar had acted as confident in the intrigue betwixt his lady and d'Ambois, thus elegantly expresses the common idea of the world being turned upside down.

Now, is it true, earth moves, and heaven stands still ;
;

Even heaven itself must see and suffer ill.

The too huge bias of the world hath swayed

Her back-part upwards, and with that she braves

This hemisphere, that long her mouth hath mocked.
The gravity of her religious face,

Now grown too weighty with her sacrilege,

And here discerned sophisticate enough,

carries a more thundering kind of sound, than

Tityre, tu patula recubans sub tegmine fagi :

yet Virgil had all the majesty of a lawful prince, and Statius only the blustering of a tyrant. But when men affect a virtue which they cannot easily reach, they fall into a vice, which bears the nearest resemblance to it. Thus, an injudicious poet, who aims at loftiness, runs easily into the swelling puffy style, because it looks like greatness. I remember, when I was a boy, I thought inimitable Spencer a mean poet, in comparison of Sylvester's "Dubartas," and was wrapt into an ecstasy when I read these lines:

Now, when the winter's keener breath began
To crystalize the Baltic ocean;

To glaze the lakes, to bridle up the floods,
And periwig with snow the bald-pate woods :-

Yet, I observe, from the prologue to the edition of 1641, that the part of D'Ambois was considered as a high test of a players' talents:

-Field is gone,

Whose action first did give it name; and one
Who came the nearest to him, is denied,
By his grey-beard, to shew the height and pride
Of d'Ambois' youth and braverie. Yet to hold
Our title stili a-foot, and not grow cold,
By giving't o'er, a third man with his best
Of care and paines defends our interest.
As Richard he was liked, nor do we fear,
In personating d'Ambois, heile appear

To faint, or goe lesse, so your free consent,
As heretofore, give him encouragement.

I believe the successor of Field, in this once favourite charac ter, was Hart. The piece was revived after the Restoration with great success.

Dryden has elsewhere ridiculed this absurd passage. The original has "periwig with wool."

I am much deceived if this be not abominable fustian, that is, thoughts and words ill-sorted, and without the least relation to each other; yet I dare not answer for an audience, that they would not clap it on the stage: so little value there is to be given to the common cry, that nothing but madness can please madmen, and the poet must be of a piece with the spectators, to gain a reputation with them. But, as in a room, contrived for state, the height of the roof should bear a proportion to the area; so, in the heightenings of poetry, the strength and vehemence of figures should be suited to the occasion, the subject, and the persons. All beyond this is monstrous: it is out of nature, it is an excrescence, and not a living part of poetry. I had not said thus much, if some young gallants, who pretend to criticism, had not told me, that this tragi-comedy wanted the dignity of style; but, as a man, who is charged with a crime of which he thinks himself innocent, is apt to be too eager in his own defence; so, perhaps, I have vindicated my play with more partiality than I ought, or than such a trifle can deserve. Yet, whatever beauties it may want, it is free at least from the

grossness of those faults I mentioned: what credit it has gained upon the stage, I value no farther than in reference to my profit, and the satisfaction I had, in seeing it represented with all the justness and gracefulness of action. But, as it is my interest to please my audience, so it is my ambition to be read: that I am sure is the more lasting and the nobler design: for the propriety of thoughts and words, which are the hidden beauties of a play, are but confusedly judged in the vehemence of action: all things are there beheld, as in a hasty motion, where the objects only glide before the eye, and disappear. The most discerning critic can judge no more of these

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