dency of one line must be a rule to that of the next; and the sound of the former must slide gently into that which follows, without leaping from one extreme into another. It must be done like the shadowings of a picture, which fall by degrees into a darker colour. I shall be glad if I have so explained myself as to be understood, but if I have not, quod nequeo dicere, et sentio tantùm, must be my excuse.

There remains much more to be said on this subject; but to avoid envy, I will be silent. What I have said is the general opinion of the best judges, and in a manner has been forced from me, by seeing a noble sort of poetry so happily restored by one man, and so grossly copied by almost all the rest. A musical ear, and a great genius, if another Mr. Cowley could arise, in another age may bring it to perfection in the mean time,

-fungar vice cotis, acutum

Reddere quæ ferrum valet, expers ipsa secandi.s

I hope it will not be expected from me, that I should say anything of my fellow undertakers in this Miscellany. Some of them are too nearly related to me, to be commended without sus

5 Here, as usual, our author has quoted from memory. Horace's words are exors ipsa secandi. So above, Juvenal has-nequeo monstrare, et sentio tantùm.

6 Dryden's eldest son, Charles, contributed a Latin poem to this Miscellany, entitled HORTI ARLINGTO

picion of partiality: others I am sure need it not; and the rest I have not perused.-To conclude, I am sensible that I have written this too hastily and too loosely; I fear I have been tedious, and which is worse, it comes out from the first draught, and uncorrected. This I grant is no excuse; for it may be reasonably urged, why did he not write with more leisure, or, if he had it not (which was certainly my case) why did he attempt to write on so nice a subject? The objection is unanswerable; but in part of recompense, let me assure the reader, that in hasty productions he is sure to meet with an author's present sense, which cooler thoughts would possibly have disguised. There is undoubtedly more of spirit, though not of judgment, in these uncorrect essays, and consequently though my hazard be the greater, yet the reader's pleasure is not the less. *

JOHN DRYDEN.

NIANI. Mr. William Bowles, and Mr. Stafford, are the only other contributors, whose names are given, and I know not whether either of them was related to our author.

*The dates of our author's smaller poems are not generally known. It may not be improper therefore to observe, that the pieces written by him, which appeared in the second Miscellany, are the Episode of Nisus and Euryalus, that of Lausus and Mezentius, and the Speech of Venus to Vulcan, (book viii.) from Virgil; various portions of the first five books of Lucretius; three Idylliums of

spoken of with great. the Rased

M. Stafford is spoken kindnes in the Notes on

Past & brother of de Vis! Shafferd.

Theocritus; the third Ode of the first book of Horace inscribed to the Earl of Roscommon, on his intended voyage to Ireland; the 29th Ode of the third book, inscribed to Laurence Hyde, Earl of Rochester; the second Epode; and two songs,-Sylvia the fair, and Go tell Amynta, &c.

The collection of the preceding year (1684) contained MAC FLECKNOE, ABSALOM AND ACHITOPHEL, THE MEDAL, the third Idyllium of Theocritus, paraphrased, several prologues and epilogues, the fourth Eclogue of Virgil, translated, and the Tears of Amynta for the Death of Damon; most of which had previously been published.

THE perusal of this dialogue in defence of the fair sex, written by a gentleman of

my ac

7 A Dialogue concerning Women, being a Defence of the Sex, addressed to Eugenia, was written by William Walsh, Esq. and published in 8vo. in 1691.

Mr. Walsh, who is pronounced by Dryden, in his Postscript to the translation of Virgil, to have been “the best critick in the nation," and had the honour to be highly commended by Pope, was the son of Joseph Walsh, of Abberley, in Worcestershire, Esq., and was born in 1663. At the time, therefore, of the publication of this piece, he was twenty-eight years old. He lived in much intimacy with our author, who corresponded with him; and some of Dryden's letters to Walsh are yet extant in manuscript. Mr. Walsh represented the county of Worcester, in parliament, in the years 1698 and 1699, and afterwards, in 1707, he was member for Richmond, in Yorkshire. He died in 1708.

Dennis, who tells us he knew Walsh very well, says, " he was a learned, candid, judicious gentleman. . . . He loved to be well dressed,—and thought it no disparagement of his understanding."

Aprily

Ice London Gazettee Aprel 20, of that year.

an allusion to his dress in the Gent, Journ.

k. 21.

quaintance, much surprised mc; for it was not
easy for me to imagine, that one so young could
have treated so nice a subject with so much judg-
ment. It is true, I was not ignorant that he was
naturally ingenious, and that he had improved
himself by travelling; and from thence I might
reasonably have expected that air of gallantry,
which is so visibly diffused through the body of
the work, and is indeed the soul that animates all
things of this nature: but so much variety of
reading, both in ancient and modern authors, such
digestion of that reading, so much justness of
thought, that it leaves no room for affectation, or
pedantry, I may venture to say, are not over-
common amongst practised writers, and very rarely
to be found amongst beginners. It puts me in
said of Mr. Waller, the father
of our English numbers, upon the sight of his first
verses by the wits of the last age, that he came
A
out into the world forty thousand strong, before
they heard of him.* Here in imitation of my

Mar woh mind of what was

According to Antony Wood (ATH. OXON, ii. 423,) this was not said of Waller, but by that poet, of Sir John Denham. "In the latter end of the year 1641, he published the tragedy called THE SOPHY, which took extremely much, and was admired by all ingenious men, particularly by Edmund Waller, of Beaconsfield, who then said of the author, that he broke out, like the Irish rebellion, threescore thousand strong, before any body was aware, or the least suspected it."-The observation is more applicable to Denham, than to Waller; for Den

Our author's memory for according

has here deceividhing