The Dramatic Works of John Dryden Part 17

Thee, Sovereign G.o.d, our grateful accents praise; We own thee Lord, and bless thy wondrous ways; To thee, Eternal Father, earth's whole frame With loudest trumpets sounds immortal fame.

Lord G.o.d of Hosts! for thee the heavenly powers, With sounding anthems, fill the vaulted towers.

Thy Cherubims thee Holy, Holy, Holy, cry; Thrice Holy, all the Seraphims reply, And thrice returning echoes endless songs supply.

Both heaven and earth thy majesty display; They owe their beauty to thy glorious ray.

Thy praises fill the loud apostles' quire: The train of prophets in the song conspire.

Legions of martyrs in the chorus s.h.i.+ne, And vocal blood with vocal music join.[24]

By these thy church, inspired by heavenly art, Around the world maintains a second part, And tunes her sweetest notes, O G.o.d, to thee, The Father of unbounded majesty; The Son, adored co-partner of thy seat, And equal everlasting Paraclete.

Thou King of Glory, Christ, of the Most High, Thou co-eternal filial Deity; Thou who, to save the world's impending doom, Vouchsafst to dwell within a virgin's womb; Old tyrant Death disarmed, before thee flew The bolts of heaven, and back the foldings drew, To give access, and make thy faithful way; From G.o.d's right hand thy filial beams display.

Thou art to judge the living and the dead; Then spare those souls for whom thy veins have bled.

O take us up amongst thy bless'd above, To share with them thy everlasting love.

Preserve, O Lord! thy people, and enhance Thy blessing on thine own inheritance.

For ever raise their hearts, and rule their ways, Each day we bless thee, and proclaim thy praise; No age shall fail to celebrate thy name, No hour neglect thy everlasting fame.

Preserve our souls, O Lord, this day from ill; Have mercy on us, Lord, have mercy still: As we have hoped, do thou reward our pain; We've hoped in thee--let not our hope be vain.

HYMN FOR ST. JOHN'S EVE.[25]

(29th June.)

O sylvan prophet! whose eternal fame Echoes from Judah's hills and Jordan's stream; The music of our numbers raise, And tune our voices to thy praise.

A messenger from high Olympus came To bear the tidings of thy life and name, And told thy sire each prodigy That Heaven designed to work in thee.

Hearing the news, and doubting in surprise, His falt'ring speech in fettered accent dies; But Providence, with happy choice, In thee restored thy father's voice.

In the recess of Nature's dark abode, Though still enclosed, yet knewest thou thy G.o.d; Whilst each glad parent told and blessed The secrets of each other's breast.

A characteristic of James's administration was rigid economy, not only in ordinary matters, but towards his own partisans;--a wretched quality in a prince, who was attempting a great and unpopular revolution both in religion and politics, and ought, by his liberality, and even profusion, to have attached the hearts and excited the hopes of those fiery and unsettled spirits, who are ever foremost in times of national tumult.

Dryden, one of his most efficient and zealous supporters, and who had taken the step which of all others was calculated to please James, received only, as we have seen, after the interval of nearly a year from that prince's accession, an addition of 100 to his yearly pension.

There may, however, on occasion of "The Hind and the Panther," the controversy with Stillingfleet, and other works undertaken with an express view to the royal interest, have been private communications of James's favour. But Dryden, always ready to supply with hope the deficiency of present possession, went on his literary course rejoicing.

A lively epistle to his friend Etherege, then envoy for James at Ratisbon, shows the lightness and buoyancy of his spirits at this supposed auspicious period.[26]

An event, deemed of the utmost and most beneficial importance to the family of Stuart, but which, according to their usual ill-fortune, helped to precipitate their ruin, next called forth the public gratulation of the poet-laureate. This was the birth of that "son of prayers" prophesied in the dedication to Xavier, whom the English, with obstinate incredulity, long chose to consider as an impostor, grafted upon the royal line to the prejudice of the Protestant succession.

Dryden's "Britannia Rediviva" hailed, with the enthusiasm of a Catholic and a poet, the very event which, removing all hope of succession in the course of nature, precipitated the measures of the Prince of Orange, exhausted the patience of the exasperated people, and led them violently to extirpate a hated dynasty, which seemed likely to be protracted by a new reign. The merits of the poem have been considered in the introductory remarks prefixed in this edition.[27]

Whatever hopes Dryden may have conceived in consequence of "The Hind and the Panther," "Britannia Rediviva," and other works favourable to the cause of James and of his religion, they were suddenly and for ever blighted by the REVOLUTION. It cannot be supposed that the poet viewed without anxiety the crisis while yet at a distance; and perhaps his own tale of the Swallows may have begun to bear, even to the author, the air of a prophecy. He is said, in an obscure libel, to have been among those courtiers who encouraged, by frequent visits, the camp on Hounslow Heath,[28] upon which the king had grounded his hopes of subduing the contumacy of his subjects, and repelling the invasion of the Prince of Orange. If so, he must there have learned how unwilling the troops were to second their monarch in his unpopular and unconst.i.tutional attempts; and must have sadly antic.i.p.ated the event of a struggle between a king and his whole people. When this memorable catastrophe had taken place, our author found himself at once exposed to all the insult, calumny, and sarcasm with which a successful party in politics never fail to overwhelm their discomfited adversaries But, what he must have felt yet more severely, the unpopularity of his religion and principles rendered it not merely unsafe, but absolutely impossible, for him to make retaliation His powers of satire, at this period, were of no more use to Dryden than a sword to a man who cannot draw it; only serving to render the pleasure of insulting him more poignant to his enemies, and the necessity of pa.s.sive submission more bitter to himself. Of the numerous satires, libels, songs, parodies, and pasquinades, which solemnised the downfall of Popery and of James, Dryden had not only some exclusively dedicated to his case, but engaged a portion, more or less, of almost every one which appeared. Scarce Father Petre, or the Papal envoy Adda, themselves, were more distinguished, by these lampoons, than the poet-laureate; the unsparing exertion of whose satirical powers, as well as his unrivalled literary pre-eminence, had excited a strong party against him among the inferior wits, whose political antipathy was aggravated by ancient resentment and literary envy. An extract from one of each kind may serve to show how very little wit was judged necessary by Dryden's contemporaries to a successful attack upon him.[29] Nor was the "pelting of this pitiless storm" of abusive raillery the worst evil to which our author was subjected. The religion which he professed rendered him incapable of holding any office under the new government, even if he could have bended his political principles to take the oaths to William and Mary. We may easily believe that Dryden's old friend Dorset, now lord high-chamberlain, felt repugnance to vacate the places of poet-laureate and royal historiographer by removing the man in England most capable of filling them; but the sacrifice was inevitable.

Dryden's own feelings, on losing the situation of poet-laureate, must have been greatly aggravated by the selection of his despised opponent Shadwell as his successor; a scribbler whom, in "Mac-Flecknoe," he had himself placed pre-eminent in the regions of dulness, being now, so far as royal mandate can arrange such precedence, raised in his stead as chief among English poets. This very remarkable coincidence has led several of Dryden's biographers, and Dr. Johnson among others, to suppose, that the satire was actually written to ridicule Shadwell's elevation to the honours of the laurel; though nothing is more certain than that it was published while Dryden was himself laureate, and could be hardly supposed to antic.i.p.ate the object of his satire becoming his successor. Shadwell, however, possessed merits with King William, which were probably deemed by that prince of more importance than all the genius of Shakespeare, Milton, and Dryden if it could have been combined in one individual. He was a staunch Whig, and had suffered under the former government, being "silenced as a non-conforming poet;" the doors of the theatre closed against his plays; and, if he may himself be believed, even his life endangered, not only by the slow process of starving, but some more active proceeding of his powerful enemies.[30]

Shadwell, moreover, had not failed to hail the dawn of the Revolution by a congratulatory poem to the Prince of Orange, and to gratulate its completion by another inscribed to Queen Mary on her arrival. In every point of view, his principles, fidelity, and alacrity, claimed William's countenance; he was presented to him by Dorset, not as the best poet, but as the most honest man, politically speaking, among the compet.i.tors;[31] and accordingly succeeded to Dryden's situation as poet-laureate and royal historiographer, with the appointment of 300 a year. Shadwell, as might have been expected, triumphed in his success over his great antagonist; but his triumph was expressed in strains which showed he was totally unworthy of it.[32]

Dryden, deprived by the Revolution of present possession and future hope, was now reduced to the same, or a worse situation, than he had occupied in the year of the Restoration, his income resting almost entirely upon his literary exertions, his expenses increased by the necessity of providing and educating his family, and the advantage of his high reputation perhaps more than counterbalanced by the popular prejudice against his religion and party. So situated, he patiently and prudently bent to the storm which he could not resist; and though he might privately circulate a few light pieces in favour of the exiled family, as the "Lady's Song,"[33] and the translation of Pitcairn's beautiful Epitaph[34] on the Viscount of Dundee, it seems certain that he made no formal attack on the government either in verse or prose.

Those who imputed to him the satires on the Revolution, called "_Suum Cuique_," and "Tarquin and Tullia," did injustice both to his prudence and his poetry. The last, and probably both satires, were written by Mainwaring, who lived to be sorry for what he had done.

The theatre again became Dryden's immediate resource. Indeed, the very first play Queen Mary attended was one of our poet's, which had been prohibited during the reign of James II. But the revival of the "Spanish Friar" could afford but little gratification to the author, whose newly-adopted religion is so severely satirised in the person of Father Dominic. Nor was this ill-fated representation doomed to afford more pleasure to the personage by whom it was appointed. For the audience applied the numerous pa.s.sages, concerning the deposing the old king and planting a female usurper on the throne, to the memorable change which had just taken place; and all eyes were fixed upon Queen Mary, with an expression which threw her into extreme confusion.[35]

Dryden, after the Revolution, began to lay the foundation for a new structure of fame and popularity in the tragedy of "Don Sebastian." This tragedy, which has been justly regarded as the _chef-d'oeuvre_ of his plays, was not, he has informed us, "huddled up in haste." The author knew the circ.u.mstances in which he stood, while, as he expresses it, his ungenerous enemies were taking advantage of the times to ruin his reputation; and was conscious, that the full exertion of his genius was necessary to secure a favourable reception from an audience prepossessed against him and his tenets. Nor did he neglect to smooth the way, by inscribing the piece to the Earl of Leicester, brother of Algernon Sidney, who had borne arms against Charles in the civil war; and yet, Whig or republican as he was, had taste and feeling enough to patronise the degraded laureate and proscribed Catholic. The dedication turns upon the philosophical and moderate use of political victory, the liberality of considering the friend rather than the cause, the dignity of forgiving and relieving the fallen adversary; themes, upon which the eloquence of the suffering party is usually unbounded although sometimes forgotten when they come again into power. With all this deprecatory reasoning, Dryden does not recede, or hint at receding, one inch from his principles, but concludes his preface with a resolution to adopt the counsel of the cla.s.sic:

"_Tu ne cede malis, sed contra audentior ito._"

The merits of this beautiful tragedy I have attempted to a.n.a.lyse in another place,[36] and at considerable length. It was brought forward in 1690 with great theatrical pomp.[37] But with all these advantages, the first reception of "Don Sebastian" was but cool; nor was it until several retrenchments and alterations had been made, that it rose to the high pitch in public favour which it maintained for many years, and deserved to maintain for ever.

In the same year, "Amphitryon," in which Dryden displays his comic powers to more advantage than anywhere, excepting in the "Spanish Friar," was acted with great applause, calling forth the gratulations even of Milbourne, who afterwards made so violent an attack upon the translation of Virgil. The comedy was inscribed to Sir William Leveson Gower, whose name, well known in the history of the Revolution, may be supposed to have been invoked as a talisman against misconstructions, to which Dryden's situation so peculiarly exposed him, and to which he plainly alludes in the prologue.[38] Our author's choice of this patron was probably dictated by Sir William Gower's connection with the Earl of Rochester, whose grand-daughter he had married.

Encouraged by the revival of his popularity, Dryden now ventured to bring forward the opera of "King Arthur," originally designed as an entertainment to Charles II; "Albion and Albanius" being written as a sort of introductory masque upon the occasion.[39] When we consider the strong and even violent political tendency of that prefatory piece, we may readily suppose, that the opera was originally written in a strain very different from the present; and that much must have been softened, altered, and erased, ere a play, designed to gratulate the discovery of the Rye-house Plot, could, without hazard, be acted after the Revolution. The odious, though necessary, task of defacing his own labours, was sufficiently disgusting to the poet, who complains, that "not to offend the present times, nor a government which has. .h.i.therto protected me, I have been obliged so much to alter the first design, and take away so many beauties from the writing, that it is now no more what it was formerly, than the present s.h.i.+p of the Royal Sovereign, after so often taking down and altering is the vessel it was at the first building." Persevering in the prudent system of seeking patrons among those whose patronage was rendered effectual by their influence with the prevailing party, Dryden prefixed to "King Arthur" a beautiful dedication to the Marquis of Halifax, to whose cautious and nice policy he ascribes the nation's escape from the horrors of civil war, which seemed impending in the latter years of Charles II; and he has not failed, at the same time, to pay a pa.s.sing tribute to the merits of his original and good-humoured master. The music of "King Arthur" being composed by Purcel, gave Dryden occasion to make that eminent musician some well-deserved compliments which were probably designed as a peace-offering for the injudicious preference given to Grabut in the introduction to "Albion and Albanius."[40] The dances were composed by Priest; and the whole piece was eminently successful. Its good fortune, however, was imputed, by the envious, to a lively song in the last act,[41] which had little or nothing to do with the business of the piece. In this opera ended all the hopes which the world might entertain of an epic poem from Dryden on the subject of King Arthur.

Our author was by no means so fortunate in "Cleomenes," his next dramatic effort. The times were something changed since the Revolution The Tories, who had originally contributed greatly to that event, had repented them of abandoning the Stuart family, and, one after another, were returning to their attachment to James. It is probable that this gave new courage to Dryden, who although upon the accession of King William he saw himself a member of an odious and proscribed sect, now belonged to a broad political faction, which a variety of events was daily increasing. Hence his former caution was diminished, and the suspicion of his enemies increased in proportion. The choice of the subject, the history of a Spartan prince exiled from his kingdom, and waiting the a.s.sistance of a foreign monarch to regain it, corresponded too nearly with that of the unfortunate James. The scene of a popular insurrection, where the minds of a whole people were inflamed, was liable to misinterpretation. In short, the whole story of the Spartan Cleomenes was capable of being wrested to political and Jacobitic purposes; and there wanted not many to aver, that to such purposes it had been actually applied by Dryden. Neither was the state of our author such at the time as to permit his pleading his own cause. The completion of the piece having been interrupted by indisposition, was devolved upon his friend Southerne, who revised and concluded the last act. The whispers of the author's enemies in the meantime procured a prohibition, at least a suspension, of the representation of "Cleomenes" from the lord chamberlain. The exertions of Hyde, Earl of Rochester, who, although a Tory, was possessed necessarily of some influence as maternal uncle to the queen, procured a recall of this award against a play which was in every respect truly inoffensive. But there was still a more insuperable obstacle to its success. The plot is flat and unsatisfactory involving no great event, and in truth being only the question, whether Cleomenes should or should not depart upon an expedition, which appears far more hazardous than remaining where he was. The grave and stoical character of the hero is more suitable to the French than the English stage; nor had the general conduct of the play that interest, or perhaps bustle, which is necessary to fix the attention of the promiscuous audience of London. In a theatre, where every man may, if he will, express his dissatisfaction, in defiance of _beaux-esprits, n.o.bles_, or _mousquetaires_, that which is dull will seldom be long fas.h.i.+onable: "Cleomenes" was accordingly coldly received. Dryden published it with a dedication to Lord Rochester, and the Life of Cleomenes prefixed, as translated from Plutarch by Creech, that it might appear how false those reports were, which imputed to him the composing a Jacobite play.

Omitting, for the present, Dryden's intermediate employments, I hasten to close his dramatic career, by mentioning, that "Love Triumphant," his last play, was acted in 1692 with very bad success. Those who look over this piece, which is in truth one of the worst our author ever wrote, can be at no loss to discover sufficient reason for its condemnation.

The comic part approaches to farce, and the tragic unites the wild and unnatural changes and counter-changes of the Spanish tragedy, with the involutions of unnatural and incestuous pa.s.sion, which the British audience has been always averse to admit as a legitimate subject of dramatic pity or terror. But it cannot be supposed that Dryden received the failure with anything like an admission of its justice. He was a veteran foiled in the last of his theatrical trials of skill, and retreated forever from the stage, with expressions which transferred the blame from himself to his judges; for, in the dedication to James, the fourth Earl of Salisbury, a relation of Lady Elizabeth, and connected with the poet by a similarity of religious and political opinions, he declares, that the characters of the persons in the drama are truly drawn, the fable not injudiciously contrived, the changes of fortune not unartfully managed, and the catastrophe happily introduced: thus leaving, were the author's opinion to be admitted as decisive, no grounds upon which the critics could ground their opposition. The enemies of Dryden, as usual, triumphed greatly in the fall of this piece;[42] and thus the dramatic career of Dryden began and closed with bad success.

This Section cannot be more properly concluded than with the list[43]

which Mr. Malone has drawn out of Dryden's plays, with the respective dates of their being acted and published; which is a correction and enlargement of that subjoined by the author himself to the opera of "Prince Arthur." Henceforward we are to consider Dryden as unconnected with the stage.

PLAYS. Acted by Entered at Published Stationers' in Hall.

1. THE WILD GALLANT. C. The King's Aug. 7, 1667. 1669.

Servants

2. THE RIVAL LADIES. T.C. K.S. June 27, 1661. 1664.

3. THE INDIAN EMPEROR. T. K.S. May 26, 1665. 1667.

4. SECRET LOVE, OR K.S. Aug. 7, 1667. 1668.

THE MAIDEN QUEEN. C.

5. SIR MARTIN MAR-ALL. C. The Duke June 24, 1668. 1668.

of York's Servants

6. THE TEMPEST. C. D.S. Jan. 8, 1669-70. 1670.

1671.

7. AN EVENING'S LOVE, OR K.S. Nov. 20, 1668. Q also THE MOCK ASTROLOGER. C. 1668.

8. TYRANNIC LOVE, OR K.S. July 14, 1669 1670.

THE ROYAL MARTYR, T.

9.} THE CONQUEST OF K.S. Feb. 20, 1670-1 1672.

10.} GRANADA, TWO PARTS. T.

11. MARRIAGE A-LA-MODE. C. K.S. Mar. 18, 1672-3. 1673.

12. THE a.s.sIGNATION OR, K.S. Mar. 18, 1672-3. 1673.

LOVE IN A NUNNERY. C.

13. AMBOYNA. T. K.S. June 26, 1673. 1673.

14. The State of Innocence. O. April 17, 1674. 1674.

15. Aureng-Zebe T. K.S. Nov. 29, 1675. 1676.