a tide of words that comes in upon the English Poet, and overflows whatever he builds: but this was lefs His cafe than any man's that ever wrote; and the mifchief of it is, this very complaint will last long enough to confute itself: for, though English be mouldering stone, as he tells us there, yet he has certainly picked the best out of a bad quarry. We are no lefs beholden to Him for the new turn of Verfe, which he brought in, and the improvement he made in our Numbers. Before His time, men rhymed indeed, and that was all: as for the harmony of meafure, and that dance of words, which good ears are fo much pleased with, they knew nothing of it. Their Poetry then was made up almost entirely of monofyllables; which when they come together in any cluster, are certainly the most harsh untuneable things in the world. If any man doubts of this, let him read ten lines in Donne, and he will be quickly convinced. Befides, their verses ran all into one another; and hung together, throughout a whole copy, like the hooked Atoms that compofe a Body in Defcartes. There was no diftinction of parts, no regular stops, nothing for the ear to rest upon: but, as foon as the copy began, down it went, like a larum, inceffantly; and the reader was fure to be out of breath, before he got to the end of it. So that really Verse in those days was but down-right profe, tagged with rhymes. Mr. Waller removed all these faults; brought in more polysyllables, and smoother measures; bound up his thoughts better; and in a cadence more agreeable to the nature of the Verse He wrote wrote in fo that where-ever the natural stops of that were, He contrived the little breakings of His sense so as to fall in with them. And for that reason, fince the ftrefs of our Verfe lies commonly upon the last fyllable, you will hardly ever find Him using a word of no force there. I would fay, if I were not afraid the reader would think me too nice, that He commonly clofes with Verbs; in which we know the life of language confifts. Among other improvements, we may reckon that of his rhymes which are always good, and very often the better for being new. He had a fine ear, and knew how quickly that fenfe was cloyed by the fame round of chiming words still returning upon it. It is a decided cafe by the Great Master of writing, * "Quæ funt "ampla, & pulchra, diu placere poffunt; quæ lepida " & concinna," (amongst which Rhyme muft, whether it will or no, take its place)" cito fatietate afficiunt "aurium fenfum faftidiofiffimum." This he underftood very well: and therefore, to take off the danger of a furfeit that way, ftrove to please by variety, and new founds. Had he carried this obfervation, among others, as far as it would go, it must, methinks, have fhown him the incurable fault of this jingling kind of Poetry; and have led his later judgment to Blank Verfe. But, He continued an obftinate lover of Rhyme to the very laft: it was a mistress that never appeared unhandsome in His eyes; and was courted by Him Cicero ad Herennium, 1. iv. long long after Sacharissa was forsaken. He had raised it, and brought it to that perfection we now enjoy it in; and the Poet's temper (which has always a little vanity in it) would not suffer Him ever to flight a thing He had taken fo much pains to adorn. My Lord Rofcommon was more impartial: no man ever rhymed truer and evener than he: yet, he is so just as to confess, that it is but a trifle; and to wish the tyrant dethroned, and Blank Verse fet up in its room. There is a third perfon, the living glory of our English Poetry, who has difclaimed the use of it upon the Stage: though no man ever employed it there fo happily as he. It was the ftrength of his Genius, that first brought it into credit in Plays; and it is the force of his example that has thrown it out again. In other kinds of writing, it continues ftill; and will do fo, till fome excellent fpirit arifes, that has leifure enough, and resolution to break the Charm, and free us from the troublesome bondage of rhyming, as Mr. Milton very well calls it; and has proved it as well, by what he has wrote in another way. But, this is a thought for times at fome distance; the present age is a little too warlike; it may perhaps furnish out matter for a good Poem in the next, but it will hardly encourage one now: without prophefying, a man may easily know what fort of laurels are like to be in request. Whilft I am talking of Verse, I find myself, I do not know how, betrayed into a great deal of profe. I in Mr. Dryden. tended 2 tended no more than to put the Reader in mind what refpect was due to any thing that fell from the pen of Mr. Waller. I have heard his laft printed copies, which are added in the feveral editions of his poems, very flightly spoken of; but certainly they do not deferve it. They do indeed discover themfelves to be his last, and that is the worft we can fay of them. He is there * Jam fenior; fed cruda Deo viridisque senectus. The fame cenfure perhaps will be passed on the pieces of this Second Part. I fhall not fo far engage for them, as to pretend they are all equal to whatever he wrote in the vigor of his youth: yet, they are so much of a piece with the reft, that any man will at first fight know them to be Mr. Waller's. Some of them were wrote very early, but not put into former collections, for reasons obvious enough, but which are now ceased. The play † was altered to please the Court: it is not to be doubted who fat for the Two Brothers characters. It was agreeable to the sweetness of Mr. Waller's temper, to soften the rigor of the Tragedy, as he expreffes it: but, whether it be so agreeable to the nature of Tragedy itself, to make every thing comeoff easily, I leave to the Critics. In the Prologue, and Epilogue, there are a few verses that he has made use of upon another occasion: but, the Reader may be pleased to allow that in Him, that has been allowed so long in Homer, and Lucretius. Exact writers dress up their * Virg. Æn. vi. 304. + "The Maid's Tragedy;" which does not come within the plan of the prefent publication. thoughts thoughts fo very well always, that, when they have need of the fame fenfe, they cannot put it into other words, but it must be to its prejudice. Care has been taken in this Book to get together every thing of Mr. Waller's that is not put into the former collection: fo that between both, the Reader may make the fet complete. It will perhaps be contended after all, that fome of these ought not to have been published: and Mr. * Cowley's decision will be urged, that a neat tomb of marble is a better monument than a great pile of rubbish. It might be answered to this, that the Pictures, and Poems, of great Masters have been always valued, though the laft hand were not put to them. And I believe none of thofe Gentlemen that will make the objection, would refuse a sketch of Raphael's, or one of Titian's draughts of the first sitting. I might tell them too, what care has been taken by the learned, to preferve the fragments of the antient Greek and Latin Poets there has been thought to be a Divinity in what they faid; and therefore the least pieces of it have been kept up, and reverenced like religious reliques. And, I am sure, take away the "† mille anni;” and impar *In the Preface to his Works. ***Et uni cedit Homero Propter mille annos * * * And yields to Homer on no other score, Than that he liv'd a thousand years before. tial Sat. vii. Mr. C. Dryden, |