The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Vol II | Page 7

reconcile us to a story so monstrous, and
to reasoning so palpably one-sided and weak.
His Epistles are of divers merit, but all discover Dryden's usual sense,
sarcastic observation, and sweeping force of style. The best are that to
Sir Godfrey Kneller--remarkable for its knowledge of, and graceful
tribute to, the "serene and silent art" of painting; and the very noble
epistle addressed to Congreve, which reminds you of one giant hand of
genius held out to welcome and embrace another. Gross flatterer as
Dryden often was, there is something in this epistle that rings true, and
the emotion in it you feel even all his powers could never have enabled
him to counterfeit. Such generous patronage of rising, by
acknowledged merit, was as rare then as it is still. The envy of the
literary man too often crowns his gray hairs with a chaplet of
nightshade, and pours its dark poison into the latest cup of existence.

His "Annus Mirabilis" is another instance of perverted power, and
ingenuity astray. Written in that bad style he found prevalent in his
early days--the style of the metaphysical poets, Cowley, Donne, and
Drayton--the author ever and anon soars out of his trammels into strong
and simple poetry, fervid description, and in one passage--that about
the future fortunes of London--into eloquent prophecy. The fire of
London is vigorously pictured, but its breath of flame should have
burned up petty conceit and tawdry ornament. He should have sternly
daguerreotyped the spectacle of the capital of the civilised world
burning--a spectacle awful, not only in the sight of men, but, as Hall
says of the French Revolution, in that of superior beings. We need not
dwell on the far-famed absurdities which the poem contains--about God
turning a "crystal pyramid into a broad extinguisher" to put out the
fire--of the ship compared to a sea-wasp floating on the waves--and of
men in the fight killed by "aromatic splinters" from the Spice Islands!
Criticism has long ago said its best and its worst about these early
escapades of a writer whose taste, to the last, was never commensurate
with his genius.
His Translations we have not included in this edition, as we reserve
them, along with other masterpieces of translated verse, for a separate
issue afterwards. That of the "Art of Poetry," sometimes included in
editions of his works, was not his, but only revised by him. We may
say here, in general, however, that although there are more learned and
more correct translators than Dryden, there are few who have produced
versions so vigorous, so full of exuberant life, and, in those parts of the
authors suitable to the peculiarities of the translator's own genius, so
faithful to their spirit and soul, if not to their letter and their body, as he.
Parts of Virgil he does not translate well; he has no sympathy with
Maro's elegance, concinnitas, chaste grandeur, and minute knowledge
of nature; but wherever Virgil begins to glow and gallop, Dryden glows
and gallops with him; and wherever Virgil is nearest Homer, Dryden is
nearest him.
We have reserved to the close his Fables, as, on the whole, forming the
culmination of Dryden the artist, if not, perhaps, of Dryden the poet. In
preparing his poems for publication, how refreshing we found it to pass

from a needful although cursory perusal of his plays, and a revision of
his prologues, to these comparatively pure, right-manly, and eloquent
compositions--the fables of Dryden! We do not, because it would be
hardly fair, with Wordsworth, seek to compare them with the
Chaucerian originals--a comparison under which they would be
infallibly crushed. We prefer looking at them as bearing only the
relation to Chaucer which Macpherson's, did to the original, Ossian.
And regarding them in this light, as adaptations, where the original
author furnishes only the ground-work, they are surely masterpieces
and models of composition, if not exemplars of creative power and
genius. How free and majestic their numbers! How bold and buoyant
their language! How interesting the stories they tell! How perfect the
preservation, and artful the presentment, of the various characters!
What a fine chivalrous spirit breathes in "Palamon and Arcite!" What a
soft yet purple, pure yet gorgeous, light of love hovers over the "Flower
and the Leaf!"--the only poem of Dryden's in which--thanks perhaps to
his master, Chaucer--the poet discovers the slightest perception of that
"Love which spirits feel
In climes where all is equable and pure."
What gay and gallant badinage, exquisite irony, and interesting
narrative, in the story of "The Cock and Fox!" And what knowledge of
human nature and skilful construction in "The Wife of Bath's Tale!"
We are half inclined, with George Ellis, to call these fables the "noblest
specimen of versification to be found in any modern language." We
gather, too,