follies of my life, building and planting have not been the least, and have cost me more than I have the confidence to own; yet they have been fully recompensed by the sweetness and satisfaction of this retreat, where, since my resolution taken of never entering again into any public employments, I have passed five years without ever going once to town, though I am almost in sight of it, and have a house there always ready to receive me. Nor has this been any sort of affectation, as some have thought it, but a meer want of desire or humour to make so small a remove; for when I am in this corner, I can truly say with Horace : Me quoties reficit gelidus Digentia rivus, Quid sentire putas, quid credis amice precare? * Miscellanea, part ii. p. 137, 138, 139, 140, 8vo. edit. 1705. It is a difficult task in a writer who cultivates simplicity, to avoid occasionally deviating into a lax and feeble manner; nor are there wanting passages in the works of Sir William Temple which betray a remission and negligence of style. These, however, are not frequent, nor would it be doing him justice to quote them as detracting considerably from the merits of his general diction. We shall therefore select the following piece of criticism, as a fair example of his usual tone of composition: "Homer was, without dispute, the most universal genius that has been known in the world, and Virgil the most accomplished. To the first must be allowed the most fertile invention, the richest vein, the most general knowledge, and the most lively expression: to the last, the noblest ideas, the justest institution, the wisest conduct, and the choicest elocution. To speak in the painter's terms, we find in the works of Homer, the most spirit, force, and life; in those of Virgil, the best design, the truest proportions, and the greatest grace; the colouring in both seems equal, and, indeed, is in both admirable. Homer had more fire and rapture, Virgil more light and swiftness; or, at least, the poetical fire was more raging in one, but clearer in the other, which makes the first more amazing, and the latter more agreeable. The ore was heavier in one, but in the other more refined, and better allayed to make up excellent work. Upon the whole, I think it must be confessed, that Homer was of the two, and perhaps of all others, the vastest, the sublimest, and the most wonderful genius; and that he has been generally so esteemed, there cannot be a greater testimony given, than what has been by some observed, that not only the greatest masters have found in his works the best and truest principles of all their sciences or arts, but that the noblest nations have derived from them the original, or their several races, though it be hardly yet agreed, whether his story be true, or fiction. In short, these two immortal poets must be allowed to have so much excelled in their kinds, as to have exceeded all comparison, to have even extinguished emulation, and in a manner confined true poetry, not only to their two languages, but to their very persons. And I am apt to believe so much of the true genius of poetry in general, and of its elevation in these two particulars, that I know not, whether of all the numbers of mankind, that live within the compass of a thousand years, for one man that is born capable of making such a poet as Homer or Virgil, there may not be a thousand born capable of making as great generals of ar mies, or ministers of state, as any the most renowned in story *.” We now approach an author of distinguished fame. DRYDEN, in prose as in verse, has attained to great excellence. No writer, indeed, seems to have studied the genius of our language with happier success. If in elegance and grammatical precision he has since been exceeded, to none need he give way, in point of vigour, variety, richness, and spirit. There is a raciness and a mellow tinting in his composition, which, with a felicitous selection of vernacular idiom, stamp upon his style a peculiar and pleasing originality. "His prose," observes Congreve, "had all the clearness imaginable, together with all the nobleness of expression; all the graces and ornaments proper and peculiar to it, without deviating into the language or diction of poetry. I make this observation only to distinguish his style from that of many poetical writers, who, meaning to write harmoniously in prose, do in truth often write mere blank verse. "I have heard him frequently own with pleasure, that if he had any talent for English prose, it was owing to his having often read the writings of the great Archbishop Tillotson." To Tillotson, however, he is, in many respects, far superior; in fact, there is little similarity be* Miscellanea, p. 320, 321, 322. tween their styles; for whilst the Archbishop, as we have already remarked, is frequently remiss and feeble, nothing languid or nerveless can be found in Dryden. 66 The highest compliment ever paid to his diction has been recorded by Mr. Malone; namely, the imitation of Edmund Burke, who," says the critic," had very diligently read all his miscellaneous essays, which he held in high estimation, not only for the instruction which they contain, but on acount of the rich and numerous prose in which that instruction is conveyed. On the language of Dryden, on which, perhaps, his own style was originally in some measure formed, I have often heard him expatiate with great admiration; and if the works of Burke be examined with this view, he will, I believe, be found more nearly to resemble this great author than any other English writer *." In confirmation of this idea, Mr. Malone appeals to a passage in the beginning of Dryden's Discourse on Satire, and which, therefore, it will be necessary to quote: "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, * Malone's Dryden, vol. i. Advertisement, p. 7. |