derive from the study of Horace and of Juvenal; owing, as he expresses himself, more to the earlier writer for his instruction, to the later poet for his pleasure. But we cannot fail to see criticism of the highest class in the differences which he points out between the powers and style of Virgil and Ovid, and, among our own writers, to his comments on Spenser, Waller, and Milton, showing, in his remarks on all, whether ancient or modern, his keen and unvarying sense of the superiority of Homer to all, though it did not lie within his plan to discuss the points in which that superiority consists. He even proposed, after he had completed his Virgil, and perhaps encouraged by the praises bestowed on that performance, to have followed it up by a translation of the 'Iliad ;' and in the last volume he ever published he inserted a translation of the first book, and of one of the most exquisite passages in the whole poem, the parting of Hector and Andromache in the sixth. In this latter, few probably will deny his inferiority to Pope (though Pope falls miserably short of the delicacy and pathos of the great original). In the first book, and especially in the speeches of Achilles and Agamemnon, that inferiority is perhaps not so clear; though we may suppose that Johnson saw it, since he only honours it with the passing remark that, "Considering into whose hands Homer was to fall, the reader cannot but rejoice that Dryden's project went no further."

The prefaces, and prefatory essays of Dryden are so numerous and so generally valuable, that it is not very easy to make a selection. The principle which has guided the present editor has been, to select such as were the most characteristic of the

author, and most varied in their kind. That on Satire seemed to meet the first requirement, because satire was evidently a favourite class of composition with him, and that too in which he has always been held to excel pre-eminently. The "Essay on Translation" appeared to partake of both principles; all his latter works were translations of one kind or another; while an essay on original composition, like that on Satire, must evidently proceed, in many respects, on different lines from one on works which make no pretence to originality. And the subject of the third, the "Parallel between Poetry and Painting," is one which will probably have interest for a wider circle of readers than could be attracted by purely literary criticism.

ESSAY ON SATIRE.

TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE

CHARLES,

EARL OF DORSET AND MIDDLESEX,

LORD CHAMBERLAIN OF HIS MAJESTY'S HOUSEHOLD,

KNIGHT OF THE MOST NOBLE ORDER OF THE GARTER, ETC.

MY LORD,

THE wishes and desires of all good men, which have attended your Lordship from your first appearance in the world, are at length accomplished in your obtaining those honours and dignities which you have so long deserved. There are no factions. though irreconcileable to one another, that are not united in their affection to you, and the respect they pay you. They are equally pleased in your prosperity, and would be equally concerned in your affliction. Titus Vespasian was not more the delight of human-kind. The universal empire made him only more known, and more powerful, but could not make him more beloved. He had greater ability of doing good, but your inclination to it is not less: and, though you could not extend your beneficence to so many persons, yet you have lost as few days as that excellent emperor, and never had his complaint to make when you went to bed, that the sun had shone upon you in vain, when you had the oppor

This, my

tunity of relieving some unhappy man. Lord, has justly acquired you as many friends as there are persons who have the honour to be known to you: mere acquaintance you have none; you have drawn them all into a nearer line; and they who have conversed with you are for ever after inviolably yours. This is a truth so generally acknowledged that it needs no proof: it is of the nature of a first principle, which is received as soon as it is proposed, and needs not the reformation which Descartes used to his for we doubt not, neither can we properly say, we think we admire and love you, above all other men there is a certainty in the proposition, and we know it. With the same assurance can I say, you neither have enemies, nor can scarce have any; for they who have never heard of you can neither love or hate you; and they who have, can have no other notion of you than that which they receive from the public, that you are the best of men. After this, my testimony can be of no farther use, than to declare it to be day-light at high-noon; and all who have the benefit of sight can look well, and see the sun.

up as

It is true I have one privilege which is almost particular to myself, that I saw you in the east at your first arising above the hemisphere; I was as soon sensible as any man of that light, when it was but just shooting out, and beginning to travel upward to the meridian. I made my early addresses to your Lordship, in my essay of Dramatic Poetry; and therein bespoke you to the world, wherein I have the right of a first discoverer. When I was myself in the rudiments of my poetry, without name or reputation in the world, having rather the am