(Vol. ii., pp. 422. 462.)
The Query proposed by your correspondent, as to the authorship of the
_Essay on Satire_, is a very interesting one, and I am rather surprised
that it has not yet been replied to. In favour of your correspondent's
view, and I think it is perhaps the strongest argument which can be
alleged, is Dean Lockier's remark:--
"Could anything be more impudent than his (Sheffield's) publishing that
satire, for writing which Dryden was beaten in Rose Alley (and which
was so remarkably known by the name of the 'Rose Alley Satire') as his
own? Indeed he made a few alterations in it, but these were only
verbal, and generally for the worse."--Spence's _Anecdotes_, edit.
Singer, p. 64.
Dean Lockier, it must be observed, was well acquainted with Dryden from
1685 to the time of his death; and appears to speak so positively that he
would seem to have acquired his knowledge from Dryden's own information.
His first introduction to that great poet arose from an observation made in
Dryden's hearing about his Mac Fleckno; and it is therefore the more likely
that he would be correctly informed as to the author's other satires. Dean
Lockier was, it may be added, a good critic; and his opinions on literary
subjects are so just, that it is to be regretted we have only very few of
them.
I confess I do not attach much weight to the argument arising from the
lines on the Earl of Mulgrave himself contained in the poem. To transfer
suspicion from himself, in so general a satire, it was necessary to include
his own name amongst the rest; but, though the lines are somewhat obscure,
it is, after all, as respects him, compared with the other persons
mentioned, a very gentle flagellation, and something like what children
call a make-believe. Indeed Rochester, in a letter to his friend Henry
Saville (21st Nov. 1679), speaks of it as a panegyric.
On the other hand, Mulgrave expressly denied Dryden's being the author, in
the lines in his _Essay on Poetry_,--
"Tho' praised and punished for another's rhymes."
and by inference claimed the poem, or at least the lines on Rochester, as
his own. Dryden, in the Preface to his Virgil, praises the _Essay on
Poetry_ in the highest terms; but says not a word to dispute Mulgrave's
statement, though he might then have safely claimed the _Essay on Satire_,
if his own; and though he must have been aware that, by his silence, he was
virtually resigning his sole claim to its authorship. It was subsequently
included in Mulgrave's works, and has ever since gone under the joint names
of himself and Dryden.
On the question of internal evidence critics differ. Your correspondent can
see in it no hand but Dryden's; while Malone will scarcely allow that
Dryden made even a few verbal alterations in it (Life, p. 130.); and Sir
Walter Scott is not inclined to admit any further participation on the part
of the great poet than "a few hints for revision," and denies its merit
altogether--a position in which I think very few, who carefully peruse it,
will agree with him.
I am disposed to take a middle course between your correspondent and
Dryden's two biographers, and submit that there is quite sufficient
internal evidence of joint ownership. I cannot think such lines as--
"I, who so wise and humble seem to be,
Now my own vanity and pride can't see;"
or,--
"I, who have all this while been finding fault,
E'en with my master who first satire taught,
And did by that describe the task so hard,
It seems stupendious, and above reward."
or,--
"To tell men freely of their foulest faults,
To laugh at their vain deeds and vainer thoughts:"
would proceed from Dryden, while it is to be noticed that the inharmonious
rhymes "faults" and "thoughts" were favourites of Mulgrave, and occur twice
in his _Essay on Poetry_.
Neither can I doubt that the verses on Shaftesbury,--the four "will any
dog;" the four "For words and wit did anciently agree," the four "Mean in
each action;" the two "Each pleasure has its price"--are Dryden's
additions, with many others, which a careful reader will instantly
appropriate.
I can find no sufficient authority for the statement of Malone and Sir W.
Scott, that Pope revised the _Essay on Satire_. It is well known he
corrected that on Poetry.