BOOKS.

DRYDEN'S POEMS.*

THOUGH it is impossible that Dryden should be to us all that he was to his own generation, or that any one should now subscribe to his latest disciple Churchill's extravagant eulogy of him as the one supreme master of the whole art of poetry, a good reprint of such solid and vigorous work in verse as his is not likely to be thought ill-timed or superfluous by any lover of the nobler literature of the past.

Dryden had not, it may at once be admitted, the complete equipment of an indubitable poet ; he lacked more than one quality which, to nineteenth-century readers at least, seems essential to that character, and which, if we may judge from what we find in earlier poetry, and from Jonson's well-known verdict on Daniel—a writer who presents several points of resemblance to " glorious John "—would even have been deemed equally essential in other times, though Mr. Saintsbury appears to think otherwise ; yet the glow, the impetuosity, the dignity, and the strong, sweet flow of his verse, certainly entitle him to be regarded as something more than the mere "classic of our prose," as he has been styled by one of the most influential of modern critics. If Dryden was not wholly, he was in part a poet ; while as a man of letters he ranks with the very greatest that this island has produced. He was the most versatile and variously gifted writer of his age, and, with one exception, was also the most virile and graceful. His services to our language have been somewhat exaggerated, but he certainly deserves the praise of having smoothed away for all succeeding times many of its asperities, and this without in any degree impairing its force. The melody of his verse is inferior in compass, variety, and subtlety to that of the verse of some other English poets, but it is rich, strong, conformable to the sense, and not casual but always at command ; and of all Dryden's most suc- cessful poems it may be said with truth, that they have this at least in common with what is perhaps the most wonderful piece of sustained verbal music in our language, Coleridge's Christabel,—their melody can only be appreciated to the full by reading them aloud from the beginning to the end. Such a volume of sound may well have ravished the ears of Dryden's contemporaries, wounded as they had been so long by the dissonant and semi-barbarous strains of small satirists and the so-called metaphysical poets. Mellifluous, however, as is his versification, it has not the delicate witchery which belongs to the song of some other bards ; there is nothing aerial or elusive in his note, nor is it ever of that penetrating kind which excites thoughts and feelings profounder than, though still consonant to the strict and obvious sense of the words. And, like his strain, his thought is ever clear, strong, and sub- stantial, while for eloquence of rhetoric, and reasoning at once close and impassioned, the .Religio Laici, The Hind and the Panther, and many occasional passages in his other writings, are unmatched in English verse ; but the intuition and illuminating power of the inspired poet are wanting, and he seldom suggests more than he says, nor does he, as is the case with some of the greater poets, ever seem burdened with the weight of a message deeper in purport and more comprehensive than be himself knows, of which he can only deliver a part, and the rest must be divined, not by the common intellect, but by sympathetic and kindred minds. Yet, as Mr. Lowell says in that essay of his on our poet which is a perfect marvel of critical insight, Dryden did sometimes succeed in " carrying common-sense to a height where it catches the light of a diviner air, and warmed reason till it had well-nigh the illuminating property of intuition." This is certainly more than can be said of Pope or any writer of his school, and if taken into account with his other gifts, entitles Dryden to be ranked, as Coleridge, Scott, and Macaulay unhesitatingly have ranked him, far above the bard of Twickenham, and not greatly below our most genuine singers.

• The Poetical Works of John Dryden. Edited by the Rev. Richard Hooper, M.A. ("Aldine" Edition of the British Poets.) New edition, revised. London : George Bell and Sons. 1891.

Perhaps the most obvious and distinguishing characteristic of Dryden's verse is its splendid virility, manifest alike in his satires, his narrative and didactic poems, his lyrics, and his translations. Not only was he, with the sole exception of Milton, the strongest poet of his time, but in mere robust as distinguished from spiritual energy, he surpassed all sub- sequent English poets, and even rivalled all save one of " the giant race before the Flood," as he himself called our great elder dramatists. His energy is not violent and eruptive, as is that of more modern bards, but equable, unforced, and

apparently inexhaustible. It decayed not, but grew with years, for the most stalwart of his poetic offspring is that of his old age, the Fables. Probably the most powerful

passage he ever wrote is his description of Lycurgus, in " Palamon and Arcite." It is, or should be, familiar to every reader, but we cannot resist the temptation of quoting it here :- "With Palamon above the rest in place,

Lycurgus came, the surly King of Thrace ;

Black was his beard, and manly was his face ; The balls of his broad eyes roll'd in his head, And glar'd betwixt a yellow and a red ; He look'd a lion with a gloomy stare, And o'er his eyebrows hung his matted hair; Big-bon'd and large of limbs, with sinews strong, Broad-shoulder'd, and his arms were round and long.

Four milk-white bulls (the Thracian use of old) Were yok'd to draw his car of burnish'd gold.

Upright he stood, and bore aloft his shield, Conspicuous from afar, and overlook'd the field. His surcoat was a bear-skin on his back ; His hair hung long behind, and glossy raven-black.

His ample forehead bore a coronet, With sparkling diamonds and with rubies set ; Ten brace and more of greyhounds, snowy fair, And tall as stags, ran loose, and cours'd around his chair, A match for pards in fight, in grappling for the bear ; With golden muzzles all their mouths were bound, And collars of the same their necks surround.

Thus through the fields Lycurgus took his way ; His hundred knights attend in pomp and proud array."

As a satirist, though Pope is thought by some to contest the palm with him, Dryden seems to the present writer as in- contestably the superior, in tremendous force and weight at least, of all his English rivals in verse, as Swift is the very first of our prose satirists. Dryden's satire is not, indeed, so

polished, subtle, and envenomed as that of the author of The Dunciad, but it is equally mordant, and far less spiteful and

malignant ; it is also more appropriate, more direct, and, above all, more regal. His portraits of Achitophel, Zimri, Corah, Doeg, Og, and Mac Flecknoe are all masterly and all interesting, which is more than can fairly be claimed for Pope's dunces ; and the lines in which they are presented are among the most massive, luminous, and sonorous that even Dryden ever wrote. Yet, severely as he castigates his adver- saries, one feels that it is not done in malice, for he cannot be petty even in his wrath, but from a feeling of just indig- nation at their turpitude, or a desire to teach them to respect the powers they have scorned and vilified, for this was the offence of Settle (Doeg), and Shadwell (Og and Mac Flecknoe). Dryden's picture of Corah (the notorious Titus Oates), as it has the advantage of being both brief and characteristic, may be given, though we would hope that it is not new to many readers :—

" Yet, Corah, thou shalt from oblivion pass ; Erect thyself, thou monumental brass, High as the serpent of thy metal made, While nations stand secure beneath thy shade.

• • • • • • Sunk were his eyes, his voice was harsh and loud, Sure signs he neither choleric was, nor proud ; His long chin proved his wit ; his saint-like grace, A church-vermilion, and a Moses face."

But the most poignant of all Dryden s satires is undoubtedly Mac Flecknoe, every line of which is, as it were, a crushing blow dealt by a giant whose vast strength is equalled only by his skill and dexterity. At the same time, the overflowing wit of the satire, its mock gravity and dignity, the infinite gusto with which it is all written, its flexibility, easy vigour, and lucidity of style, its unity of purpose and largeness of utterance, and the harmony of its numbers, make it one of the most thoroughly enjoyable of all its author's masterpieces.

Dryden's lyric poetry seems to us rather rhetorically than poetically effective, but it is undoubtedly brilliant, and, in its kind, masterly, and the obvious power and beauty of such an ode as Alexander's Feast can never failLof appreciation by

all who care anything for literature. It is written with infinite spirit, and we read it with the same tingling of the veins that we experience in reading the most animated passages in Scott's or Dryden's own narrative poems ; but, though it was natural enough for Scott, who as a poet certainly owed much to his English predecessor, to rank this celebrated lyric above all other odes, most readers will hesitate to place it on a level with those of Wordsworth, Coleridge, Shelley, or Keats, and, for pure poetry, may even think those of Gray and Collins superior.

The excellences of the " Aldine Series " have been so long and so universally acknowledged, that further commendation is perhaps unnecessary. The present reprint is a considerable improvement on the former cheap issue in green cloth, and possesses all the advantages of the best edition, at only half the price. A very good portrait of Dryden is prefixed to the first volume of his poems, and another (by mistake, apparently, as it is a mere duplicate) to the second ; the type is clear and large—a great comfort to weak eyes—the paper good, and the binding tasteful and elegant. When we add that one of the volumes may easily be carried in the side-pocket---that is, supposing it to be the pocket of a student, which is usually, we believe, somewhat more capacious than that of a non- reader—nothing more, we hope, need be said in their favour. Though we have noticed a few slight misprints, and the punctuation is here and there defective, the poems appear, on the whole, to have been carefully edited, and Mr. Hooper's prefatory memoir and notes give the reader all the informa- tion he will require about the poet and his works.

The present edition of the poems is completer than any other with which we are acquainted. It includes all Dryden's translations, with the exception of his Virgil, some short lyrics only to be found elsewhere in complete copies of his works, and a little-known translation, or rather paraphrase, of Boileau's Art of Poetry, which, though written by Sir William Soame, is said to have been revised by Dryden. It does not appear to us to have much merit, though the verse is sufficiently easy and lucid, and there is occasionally a vigorous couplet which may have been interpolated by our poet ; but, on the whole, it is a lax and feeble production, and the satirical allusions to English versifiers, substituted by Dryden himself for the French ones of the original, are hardly more effective than the satirical strokes of his friend Garth, in the almost forgotten poem of The Dispensary.

We cannot conclude this brief notice of one of the very sanest and manliest of our poets better than with the admirable advice of Gray : " Remember Dryden, and forget all his faults."