SHADWELL.

(From "Mac Flecknoe "—1682.)

ALL human things are subject to decay,

And, when Fate summons, monarchs must obey.
This Flecknoe found, who, like Augustus, young
Was called to empire and had governed long,
In prose and verse was owned without dispute
Through all the realms of nonsense absolute.
This aged prince, now flourishing in peace,
And blest with issue of a large increase,
Worn out with business, did at length debate
To settle the succession of the state;
And pondering which of all his sons was fit
To reign and wage immortal war with wit,
Cried, "Tis resolved, for nature pleads that he
Should only rule who most resembles me.
Shadwell alone my perfect image bears,
Mature in dulness from his tender years;
Shadwell alone of all my sons is he
Who stands confirmed in full stupidity.
The rest to some faint meaning make pretence,
But Shadwell never deviates into sense.
Some beams of wit on other souls may fall,
Strike through and make a lucid interval;
But Shadwell's genuine night admits no ray,
His rising fogs prevail upon the day.
Besides, his goodly fabric fills the eye,
And seems designed for thoughtless majesty.
Thoughtless as monarch oaks that shade the plain,
And, spread in solemn state, supinely reign.
Heywood and Shirley were but types of thee,
Thou last great prophet of tautology.
Even I, a dunce of more renown than they,
Was sent before but to prepare thy way,
And coarsely clad in Norwich drugget came
To teach the nations in thy greater name.'

STRAY LINES FROM DRYDEN.

For truth has such a face and such a mien,
As to be loved needs only to be seen.

-Hind and Panther.

Thus all below is strength and all above is grace.
-Epistle to Congreve.

Better to hunt in fields for health unbought,
Than fee the doctor for a nauseous draught.
The wise for cure on exercise depend;
God never made his work for man to mend.

-Epistle to John Dryden.

Wit will shine
Through the harsh cadence of a rugged line.

-To the Memory of Mr. Oldham.

Defend against your judgment your departed friend.

-The Spanish Friar.

-Epistle to Congreve.

As sure as a gun.

Bless the hand that gave the blow.

-The Spanish Friar.

- The Spanish Friar.

Second thoughts, they say, are best.

I have a soul, that like an ample shield
Can take in all.

-Don Sebastian.

O gracious God! how far have we
Profaned thy heavenly gift of poesy!

-Elegy on Mrs. Killigrew.

For art may err, but Nature cannot miss.

The sweet civilities of life.

-

- The Cock and the Fox.

-Cymon and Iphigenia.

Happy who in his verse can steer, gently steer
From grave to light, from pleasant to severe.

-The Art of Poetry.

Happy the man and happy he alone,
He who can call to-day his own;

He, who, secure within can say

To-morrow do thy worst, for I have lived to-day.

-Imitations of Horace.

He's a sure card.

-The Spanish Friar.

Not Heaven itself upon the past has power;
But what has been, has been.

-Imitations of Horace.

Virtue though in rags will keep me warm.

-Imitations of Horace.

Errors like straws upon the surface flow,

He who would search for pearls must dive below.

-All for Love.

Your ignorance is the mother of your devotion to me. The Maiden Queen.

But Shakespeare's magic could not copied be;
Within that circle none durst walk but he.

-Prologue to The Tempest.

Forgiveness to the injured does belong;

But they ne'er pardon who have done the wrong.

-Conquest of Granada.

All delays are dangerous in war.

-Tyrannic Love.

Whatever is, is in its causes just.

-Edipus.

THOMAS SHADWELL.

Born at Lanton Hall, Norfolk, in 1640. Made laureate in 1689, after the Revolution. Died in 1692.

(Reign of William III.)

WHEN Southey said that of all his predecessors Nahum Tate would rank the lowest of the laureates if he had not succeeded Shadwell, he was scarcely just; though as a poet Shadwell does not take high rank. He was a true son of his age, and he belonged to the artificial school that prevailed. That school, as we have seen, dealt only with the surfaces of things, ignored the depths of life, the mysteries of human existence, and had little appreciation of the sublime loveliness of the outward world; and when it did seek to describe or interpret that beauty in nature, it did so “under the guidance of sentiments put on for the most part like a stage dress, and in language which seemed not to belong to the world which we know."

As a writer of plays which mirrored the fashions and ideas of his time Shadwell did good work. But Shadwell had not that perseverance in detail which attains perfection. His plays, with all their unmistakable cleverness, are not symmetrical. He began well, but much of his work was either left unfinished, or finished so hastily that it is far from artistic. Wycherley used to say of him that "he knew how to start a fool very well, but that he was never able to run him down." And Rochester alluded to the same defect in the lines:

"Of all our modern wits none seems to me
Once to have touched upon true comedy,
But hasty Shadwell and slow Wycherley.
Shadwell's unfinished works do yet impart

Great proofs of nature's force, though none of art ;
With just, bold strokes he dashes here and there
Showing great mastery."

It is one proof of a man's power if his peculiarites of style, or his methods of delineating character or social conditions, are imitated by his successors. One of Scott's novels is obviously modelled upon Shadwell's "Squire of Alsatia," and Scott never hesitated to express his admiration of Shadwell's talents. It is a significant fact that Macaulay in “seeking illustrations of the times and occurrences of which he writes, cites Shadwell five