On Mr. ELIJAH FENTON,
At EAST-HAMPSTEAD in BERKS, 1730.
This modest stone, what few vain marbles can,
May truly say, here lies an honest man:
A Poet, bless'd beyond a Poet's fate,
Whom Heav'n kept sacred from the proud and great:
Foe to loud praise, and friend to learned ease,
Content with science in the vale of peace.
Calmly he look'd on either life, and here
Saw nothing to regret, or there to fear;
From nature's temp'rate feast rose satisfy'd
Thank'd Heav'n, that he had liv'd, and that he died.
[Footnote A: See Jacob, p. 55.]
[Footnote B: Venus.]
* * * * *
BARTON BOOTH, Esq;
It[A] is but justice to the memory of this great actor to give him
a place among the poets, if he had been less considerable in that
province than he really was; for he appears early to have understood
the Latin classics, and to have succeeded in occasional pieces, and
little odes, beyond many persons of higher name in poetry. Mr. Booth
was descended from a very ancient, and honourable family, originally
seated in the County Palatine of Lancaster. His father, John Booth,
esq; was a man of great worth and honour; and though his fortune was
not very considerable, he was extremely attentive to the education of
his children, of whom Barton (the third) was born in 1681.
When about nine years of age, he was put under the tuition of the
famous Dr. Busby, head-master of Westminster school, under whom some
of the ablest men have been educated, that in the last and present
age have done honour to the nation. The sprightliness of Booth's parts
early recommended him to the notice of Dr. Busby: he had a strong
passion for learning, and a peculiar turn for Latin poetry, and by
studying the best authors in it, he fixed many of the finest passages
so firmly in his memory, that he was able to repeat them with such
propriety, and graceful action, with so fine a tone of voice, and
peculiar emphasis, that it was taken notice of by the whole school.
In consequence of this happy talent, when, according to the custom of
the school, a Latin play was to be acted, a considerable part thereof
was given to young Booth, who drew by the melody of his voice, and
the gracefulness of his action, the applause of all the spectators,
a circumstance which first fired him with theatrical ambition, much
against the inclination of his father, who intended him for the
church, and was therefore careful of his education. This propension
in our young Roscius, recommended him still more to the favour of
Dr. Busby, who bestowed the most lavish encomiums upon him: Busby was
himself a great admirer of theatrical elocution, and admirably fitted
by nature for the stage; when he was young, he obtained great applause
in a part he performed in a play of Cartwright's, and from that moment
held theatrical accomplishments in the highest esteem.
When Booth had reached the age of eighteen, and the time approached
when he was to have been sent to the university, he resolved to run
any risk, rather than enter upon a course of life inconsistent
with the liveliness of his temper, and the natural bent of his
inclinations. It happened that there was then in London one Mr.
Ashbury, who had been long master of a company at Dublin, with whom
young Booth became acquainted, and finding that under his direction
there was no danger of his getting a livelihood, he quitted all other
views, stole away from school, and went over to Ireland with Mr.
Ashbury in 1698.[B]
He very soon distinguished himself on the stage at Dublin, where
he had great natural advantages over most of his cotemporaries,
especially in tragedy; he had a grave countenance, a good person, an
air of dignity, a melodious voice, and a very manly action. He spoke
justly, his cadence was grateful to the ear, and his pronunciation was
scholastically correct and proper. He so far insinuated himself into
the favour of English gentlemen in Ireland, and found his reputation
growing to so great a heighth, that he returned home in 1701, to make
a trial of his talents on the British stage. He accordingly applied to
lord Fitzharding, of the bedchamber to Prince George of Denmark, and
was by him recommended to Mr. Betterton, who took him under his care,
and gave him all the assistance in his power, of which Mr. Booth
greatly profited.
Never were a tutor and pupil better met; the one was capable of giving
the best instructions in his own performance, and the other had a
promptness of conception, a violent propensity, and a great genius.
The first part Booth performed in London was Maximus in Valentinian,
a play of Beaumont and Fletcher's originally, but altered, and brought
upon the stage by the earl of Rochester. The reception he met with
exceeded his warmest hopes, and the favour of the town had a happy
effect upon him, in inspiring him with a proper degree of confidence
without vanity. The Ambitious Step-mother, a tragedy written by Mr.
Rowe, in which that author has thrown out more fire, and heat of
poetry, than in any other of his plays, was about this time introduced
upon the stage; the part of Artaban was assigned to Booth, in which he
raised his character to such a heighth, as to be reckoned only second
to his great master.
In the year 1704 he married Miss Barkham, daughter to Sir William
Barkham of Norfolk, bart. who lived with him six years, and died
without issue. In the theatrical revolutions which happened in those
days, Mr. Booth, notwithstanding his great capacity, and reputation
with the town, had very little share. He adhered constantly to Mr.
Betterton, while he could be of any service to him, and when his tutor
retired from the management of the stage, he trusted to his merit, and
the taste of the public, in which he was never deceived.
Mr. Booth was particularly turned for tragedy, he never could bear
those parts which had not strong passion to inspire him; and Mr.
Cibber observes, that he could not so well melt in the lover, as rage
in the jealous husband. Othello was his master-piece, but in all his
parts he was often subject to a kind of indolence, which some people
imagined he affected, to shew that even in his lazy fits he was
superior to every body upon the stage; _as if secure of all beholders
hearts, neglecting he could take them._[C] The late ingenious Mr.
Whitingham, who perfectly understood theatrical excellence, and
who was, beyond any man I ever knew, distinct, and accurate in his
relations of things, often told me, that such was the dignity of
Booth's appearance, such his theatrical ease, and gracefulness, that
had he only crossed the stage without uttering a word, the house would
be in a roar of applause.
We come now to that period of time, when Mr. Booth's sole merit raised
him to the greatest height, and procured for him that reward he had
long deserved. The tragedy of Cato, which had been written in the year
1703, or at least four acts of it, was brought upon the stage in 1712,
chiefly on a political principle; the part of Cato was given to Booth,
for the managers were very well satisfied that nobody else could
perform it. As party prejudice never than higher than at that time,
the excellency of the play was distinguished by the surprizing
contests between both factions, which should applaud it most, so
the merit of the actor received the same marks of approbation, both
parties taking care to shew their satisfaction, by bestowing upon him,
most liberal presents, the particulars of which are already inserted
in the life of Addison. The run of Cato being over at London, the
managers thought fit to remove to Oxford in the summer, where the play
met with so extraordinary a reception, that they were forced to open
the doors at noon, and the house was quite full by one o'clock. The
same respect was paid it for three days together, and though the
universal applause it met with at London, surpassed any thing that had
been remembered of that kind, yet the tribute of praise it received
from this famous university, surpassed even that. Booth, whose
reputation was now at its heighth, took the advantage of it, and
making his application to lord Bolingbroke, then at the head of the
ministry, he procured a new licence, recalling all former ones, and
Mr. Booth's name was added to those of Cibber, Dogget, and Wilks.
Tho' none of the managers had occasion to be pleased with this act of
justice done to Booth's merit, at the expence of, what they deemed,
their property, yet none of them carried their resentment so high as
Mr. Dogget, who absolutely refused to accept of any consideration for
his share in the scenes and clothes; this obstinacy had however no
other effect, than depriving him of his share, which brought him in
1000 l. a year; though Mr. Cibber informs us, that this was only a
pretence, and that the true reason of quitting the stage, was,
his dislike to another of the managers, whose humour was become
insupportable. This person we conjecture to have been Mr. Wilks, who,
according to Cibber's account, was capricious in his temper, though
he had otherwise great merit as a player, and was a good man, morally
considered; some instances of the generosity and noble spirit of
Wilks, are taken notice of in the life of Farquhar.
A few years after Mr. Booth rose to the dignity of manager, he married
the celebrated Miss Santlowe, who, from her first appearance as an
actress in the character of the Fair Quaker of Deal, to the time she
quitted the stage, had always received the strongest marks of public
applause, which were repeated when after a retreat of some years, she
appeared there again. By her prudence in managing the advantages
that arose to her from her reputation as an actress, and her great
diligence in her profession, she acquired a considerable fortune,
which was very useful to Mr. Booth, who, from the natural turn of
his temper, though he had a strict regard to justice, was not much
inclined to saving.
During the few years they lived together, there was the greatest
harmony between them, and after the death of Booth, his disconsolate
widow, who is yet alive, quitted the stage, and devoted herself
entirely to a private course of life. By degrees the health of Mr.
Booth began to decline, so that it was impossible for him to continue
to act with so much diligence as usual, but at whatever time he was
able to return to the stage, the town demonstrated their respect
for him by crowding the house. Being attacked by a complication of
distempers, he paid the debt to nature May 10, 1733. A copy of his
Will was printed in the London Magazine for 1733, p. 126, in which
we find he testified his esteem for his wife, to whom he left all his
fortune, for reasons there assigned, which he declared amounted to no
more than two thirds of what he had received from her on the day of
marriage. His character as an actor, has been celebrated by the best
judges, and was never questioned by any. And here we cannot resist the
opportunity of shewing Mr. Booth in that full, and commanding light in
which he is drawn by the late ingenious Aaron Hill, esq; who had long
experience in the affairs of the stage, and could well distinguish the
true merits of an actor. His words are,
'Two advantages distinguished him in the strongest light from the rest
of his fraternity: he had learning to understand perfectly what it
was his part to speak, and judgment to know how far it agreed, or
disagreed with his character. Hence arose a peculiar grace, which was
visible to every spectator, though few were at the pains of examining
into the cause of their pleasure. He could soften, and slide over,
with a kind of elegant negligence, the improprieties in the part he
acted, while, on the contrary, he would dwell with energy upon the
beauties, as if he exerted a latent spirit which had been kept back
for such an occasion, that he might alarm, awaken, and transport in
those places only, where the dignity of his own good sense could
be supported by that of his author. A little reflexion upon this
remarkable quality, will teach us to account for that manifest
languor which has sometimes been observed in his action, and which was
generally, though I think falsly, imputed to the natural indolence of
his temper. For the same reason, though in the customary round of
his business, he would condescend to some parts in comedy; he seldom
appeared in any of them with much advantage to his character. The
passions which he found in comedy, were not strong enough to excite
his fire, and what seemed want of qualification, was only the absence
of impression. He had a talent at discovering the passions where they
lay hid in some celebrated parts, by the injudicious practice of other
actors; when he had discovered he soon grew able to express them; and
his secret of his obtaining this great lesson of the theatre, was
an adaption of his look to his voice, by which artful imitation of
nature, the variations in the sound of his words, gave propriety to
every change in his countenance, so that it was Mr. Booth's peculiar
felicity to be heard and seen the same, whether as the _pleased,_ the
_grieved,_the _pitying,_the _reproachful,_or the _angry_. One would be
almost tempted to borrow the aid of a very bold figure, and to express
this excellence more significantly, beg permission to affirm, that the
blind might have seen him in his voice, and the deaf have heard him in
his visage. His gesture, or as it is commonly called his action, was
but the result, and necessary consequence of his dominion over his
voice and countenance; for having by a concurrence of two such causes,
impressed his imagination with such a stamp, and spirit of passion, he
ever obeyed the impulse by a kind of natural dependency, and relaxed,
or braced successively into all that fine expressiveness with which he
painted what he spoke, without restraint, or affectation.'
But it was not only as a player that Mr. Booth excelled; he was a man
of letters also, and an author in more languages than one. He had a
taste for poetry which we have observed discovered itself when he was
very young, in translations of some Odes of Horace; and in his riper
years he wrote several songs, and other original poems, which did him
honour. He was also the author of a masque, or dramatic entertainment,
called Dido and Aeneas, which was very well received upon the stage,
but which however did not excite him to produce any thing of the
same kind afterwards. His master-piece was a Latin inscription to the
memory of a celebrated actor, Mr. William Smith, one of the greatest
men of his profession, and of whom Mr. Booth alway spoke in raptures.
It is a misfortune that we can give no particular account of the
person this excellent inscription referred to, but it is probable he
was of a good family, since he was a Barrister at Law of Gray's-Inn,
before he quitted that profession for the stage.
The inscription is as follows,
Scenicus eximius
Regnante Carolo secundo:
Bettertono Coaetaneus & Amicus,
Necnon propemodum Aequalis.
Haud ignobili stirpe oriundus,
Nec literarum rudis humaniorum,
Rem fenicam
Per multos feliciter annos administravit;
Justoque moderamine & morum suavitate,
Omnium intra Theatrum
Observantiam, extra Theatrum Laudem,
Ubique benevolentiam & amorem fibi conciliavit.
In English thus;
An excellent player
In the reign of Charles the Second;
The cotemporary, and friend of Betterton, and almost his equal.
Descended of no ignoble family,
Nor destitute of polite learning.
The business of the stage
He for many years happily managed,
And by his just conduct, and sweetness of manners
Obtained the respect of all within the theatre,
The applause of those without,
And the good will, and love of all mankind.
Such the life and character of Mr. Booth, who deservedly stood very
high in the esteem of mankind, both on account of the pleasure which
he gave them, and the native goodness of heart which he possessed.
Whether considered as a private gentleman, a player, a scholar, or
a poet, Mr. Booth makes a very great figure, and his extraordinary
excellence in his own profession, while it renders his memory dear to
all men of taste, will ever secure him applause amongst those
happy few, who were born to instruct, to please, and reform their
countrymen.
[Footnote A: N.B. As Mr. Theophilus Cibber is publishing (in a work
entirely undertaken by himself) The Lives, and Characters of all our
Eminent Actors, and Actresses, from Shakespear, to the present time;
he leaves to the other gentlemen, concerned in this collection, the
accounts of some players who could not be omitted herein, as Poets.]
[Footnote B: History of the English stage.]
[Footnote C: Dryden's All for Love.]
* * * * *
Dr. GEORGE SEWEL,
This ingenious gentleman was the eldest son of Mr. John Sewel,
treasurer, and chapter-clerk of the college of Windsor, in which
place our poet was born. He received his education at Eton school, was
afterwards sent to the university of Cambridge, and took the degree
of bachelor of physic at Peter-house College. He then passed over
to Leyden, and studied under the famous Boerhaave, and afterwards
returned to London, where for several years he practised as a
Physician. He had a strong propension for poetry, and has favoured
the world with many performances much applauded. In the year 1719 he
introduced upon the stage his tragedy of Sir Walter Raleigh, taken
from the historical account of that great man's fate. He was chiefly
concerned in writing the fifth volume of the Tatler, and the ninth
of the Spectator. He translated, with some other gentlemen, the
Metamorphoses of Ovid, with very great success, and rendered the Latin
poems of Mr. Addison into English. Dr. Sewel made an attempt, which he
had not leisure to execute, of translating Quillet's Callipedia, which
was afterwards done by Rowe. He is the author of several miscellanous
poems, of which the following is as accurate an account as we could
possibly obtain. On Conscience, Beauty, the Force of Music, Song of
Troilus, &c. dedicated to the Duke of Newcastle.
To his Grace the Duke of Marlborough, upon his going into Germany
1712. This poem begins thus,
Go, mighty prince, and those great nations see,
Which thy victorious arms made free;
View that fam'd column, where thy name's engrav'd,
Shall tell their children who their empire fav'd.
Point out that marble where thy worth is shewn
To every grateful country but thy own.
A Description of the Field of Battle, after Caesar was Conqueror at
Pharsalia, from the Seventh Book of Lucan.
The Patriot.
Translations from Lucan, occasioned by the Tragedy of Cato.
The Fifth Elegy of the First Book of Tibullus, translated, and
addressed to Delia.
An Apology for Loving a Widow.
The Fifth Psalm Paraphrased.
A Poetical Epistle, written from Hampstead to Mr. Thornhill, upon Mr.
Addison's Cato.
An Epistle to Mr. Addison on the Death of the Earl of Hallifax. This
poem begins thus,
And shall great Hallifax resign to fate,
And not one bard upon his ashes wait?
Or is with him all inspiration fled,
And lye the muses with their patron dead?
Convince us, Addison, his spirit reigns,
Breathing again in thy immortal strains:
To thee the list'ning world impartial bends,
Since Hallifax and envy now are friends.
Cupid's Proclamation, or a Defence of Women; a Poem from Chaucer.
Dr. Sewel, in his state principles, was inclined to the cause of
the Tories, and takes every occasion to combat with the bishop of
Salisbury, who had so eminently appeared in the cause of the Whigs.
The following is a list of his prose works, in which there are some
letters addressed to, and animadversions upon that eminent prelate's
works.
The Clergy, and the Present Ministry defended; being a Letter to the
Bishop of Salisbury, occasioned by his Lordship's new Preface to his
Pastoral Case, 8vo. 1713, third Edition that year. In a fourth Edition
(same date) this is called Mr. Sewel's First Letter to the Bishop of
Salisbury, the Clergy, &c.
A Second Letter to the Bishop of Salisbury, upon the Publication of
his new Volume of Sermons, wherein his Lordship's Preface concerning
the Revolution, and the Case of the Lord Russel are examined, &c. 8vo.
1713.
Remarks upon a Pamphlet entitled Observations upon the State of the
Nation 1712-13, third Edition; to which is added a Postscript to the
Vindicator of the Earl of Nottingham, 8vo. 1714.
An Introduction to the Life and Writings of G----t Lord Bishop of
S----m, &c. being a Third Letter to the Bishop of Salisbury, 8vo.
1716.
A Vindication of the English Stage, exemplified in the Cato of Mr.
Addison. In a Letter to a Nobleman, 8vo. 1716.
Schism destructive of the Government, both in Church and State;
being a Defence of the Bill intitled An Act to prevent the Growth of
Schism; wherein all the Objections against it, and particularly those
in 'Squire Steele's Letter are fully Refuted. Humbly offered to the
Consideration of the House of Lords, 8vo. 1714, second Edition.
More News from Salisbury, viz. I. An Examination of some Parts of the
Bishop of Sarum's Sermon and Charge, &c. 8vo. 1714.
The Reasons for writing against the Bishop of Salisbury, 8vo. 1714.
The Life of Mr. John Philips, Author of the Poem on Cyder.
Dr. Sewel died at Hampstead in Middlesex, where, in the latter part
of his life, he had practised physic, on the 8th of February 1726,
and was buried there. He seems to have been a man of an amiable
disposition, and to have possessed a very considerable genius.
* * * * *
ANTHONY HAMMOND, Esq;
This gentleman was descended from a good family, of Somersham-Place,
in the county of Huntingdon, and was born in the year 1668[A]. When he
arrived at a proper age, he was chosen member of Parliament, and did
not remain long in the house before he distinguished himself as a
very eminent speaker. Having espoused the court interest, his zeal
and merit recommended him to very considerable public employments,
particularly that of being one of the commissioners of the royal navy,
which place he quitted in the year 1712. The ingenious Mr. Southern in
his dedication of his Innocent Adultery, to Mr. Hammond, speaks thus
of him. 'If generosity with friendship, learning with good sense,
true wit and humour, with good-nature, be accomplishments to qualify a
gentleman for a patron, I am sure I have hit right in Mr. Hammond.'
Our author obliged the public with a Miscellany of Original Poems, by
the Most Eminent Hands; in which himself had no small share. In this
miscellany are several poetical performances of Mrs. Martha Fowkes,
a lady of exquisite taste in the belle accomplishments. As to Mr.
Hammond's own pieces, he acknowleges in his preface, that they were
written at very different times, and particularly owned by him, lest
they should afterwards be ascribed to other persons; as the Ode on
Solitude, was falsely ascribed to the earl of Roscommon, and other
pieces of his, were likewise given to other authors.
This author wrote the Life of Walter Moyle Esq; prefixed to his
works.----Mr. Hammond died about the year 1726.
[Footnote A: Coxeter's Miscellaneous Notes.]
* * * * *
The Revd. Mr. LAWRENCE EUSDEN.
This gentleman was descended from a very good family in the kingdom of
Leland, but received his education at Trinity college in Cambridge.
He was honoured with the encouragement of that eminent patron of the
poets the earl of Halifax, to whom he consecrated the first product of
his Muse. He enjoyed likewise the patronage of the duke of Newcastle,
who being lord chamberlain, at the death of Mr. Rowe, preferred him to
the Bays.
Mr. Eusden was for some part of his life chaplain to Richard lord
Willoughby de Brook: In this peaceful situation of life, one would not
expect Mr. Eusden should have any enemies, either of the literary, or
any other sort. But we find he has had many, amongst whom Mr. Pope is
the most formidable both in power and keenness. In his Dunciad, Book
I. Line 101. where he represents Dulness taking a view of her sons, he
says
She saw old Pryn, in restless Daniel shine,
And Eusden eke out Blackmore's endless line.
Mr. Oldmixon likewise in his Art of Logic and Rhetoric, page 413,
affirms, 'That of all the Galimatias he ever met with, none comes up
to some verses of this poet, which have as much of the ridiculum and
the fustian in them, as can well be jumbled together, and are of that
sort of nonsense, which so perfectly confounds all ideas, that there
is no distinct one left in the mind. Further he says of him, that he
hath prophesy'd his own poetry shall be sweeter than Catullus, Ovid
and Tibullus; but we have little hope of the accomplishment of it from
what he hath lately published.' Upon which Mr. Oldmixon has not spared
a reflexion, that the placing the laurel on the head of one who wrote
such verses, will give posterity a very lively idea of the justice and
judgment of those who bestowed it.
Mr. Oldmixon no doubt by this reflexion insinuates, that the laurel
would have better become his own brows than Eusden's; but it would
perhaps have been more decent for him to acquiesce in the opinion of
the duke of Buckingham (Sheffield) who in his Session of the Poets
thus mentions Eusden.
--In rush'd Eusden, and cry'd, who shall have it,
But I the true Laureat to whom the king gave it?
Apollo begg'd pardon, and granted his claim,
But vow'd that till then, he ne'er heard of his name.
The truth is, Mr. Eusden wrote an Epithalamium on the marriage of
his grace the duke of Newcastle, to the right honourable the lady
Henrietta Godolphin; which was considered as so great a compliment by
the duke, that in gratitude for it, he preferred him to the laurel.
Nor can I at present see how he could have made a better choice: We
shall have occasion to find, as we enumerate his writings, that he
was no inconsiderable versifier, and though perhaps he had not the
brightest parts; yet as we hear of no moral blemish imputed to him,
and as he was dignified with holy-orders, his grace acted a very
generous part, in providing for a man who had conferred an obligation
on him. The first rate poets were either of principles very different
from the government, or thought themselves too distinguished to
undergo the drudgery of an annual Ode; and in this case Eusden seems
to have had as fair a claim as another, at least a better than his
antagonist Oldmixon. He succeeded indeed a much greater poet than
himself, the ingenious Mr. Rowe, which might perhaps draw some
ridicule upon him.
Mr. Cooke, in his Battle of the Poets, speaks thus of our author.
Eusden, a laurel'd bard, by fortune rais'd
By very few was read, by fewer prais'd.
A fate which some critics are of opinion must befall the very poet
himself, who is thus so ready to expose his brother.
The chief of our author's poetical writings are these,
To the lord Hallifax, occasioned by the translating into Latin his
lordship's Poem on the Battle of the Boyne.
On the duke of Marlborough's victory at Oudenaid.
A Letter to Mr. Addison.
On the king's accession to the throne.
To the reverend doctor Bentley, on the opening of Trinity-College Chapel,
Cambridge.
On a Lady, who is the most beautiful and witty when she is angry.
This poem begins with these lines.
Long had I known the soft, inchanting wiles,
Which Cupid practised in Aurelia's smiles.
'Till by degrees, like the fam'd Asian taught,
Safely I drank the sweet, tho' pois'nous draught.
Love vex'd to see his favours vainly shown,
The peevish Urchin murthered with a frown.
Verses at the last public commencement at Cambridge, spoken by the
author.
The Court of Venus, from Claudian.
The Speech of Pluto to Proserpine.
Hero and Leander, translated from the Greek of Musaeus.
This Piece begins thus,
Sing Muse, the conscious torch, whose mighty flame,
(The shining signal of a brighter dame)
Thro' trackless waves, the bold Leander led,
To taste the dang'rous joys of Hero's bed:
Sing the stol'n bliss, in gloomy shades conceal'd,
And never to the blushing morn reveal'd.
A Poem on the Marriage of his grace the duke of Newcastle to the
right honourable Henrietta Godolphin, which procured him, as we have
observed already, the place of laureat. The lord Roscommon's Essay on
translated verse, rendered into Latin.
An Epistle to Sir Robert Walpole.
Three Poems; I. On the death of the late king; II. On the Accession of
his present majesty. III. On the Queen.
On the arrival of Prince Frederic.
The origin of the Knights of the Bath, inscribed to the Duke of
Cumberland.
An Ode for the Birth-Day, in Latin and English, printed at Cambridge.
He died at his rectory at Conesby in Lincolnshire, the 27th of
September, 1730.
* * * * *
The Revd. MR. LAWRENCE EACHARD,
This Gentleman, who has been more distinguished as an historian than
a poet, was the son of a clergyman, who by the death of his elder
brother, became master of a good estate in Suffolk.
He received his education at the university of Cambridge, entered into
holy-orders, and was presented to the living of Welton and Elkington
in Lincolnshire, where he spent above twenty years of his life; and
acquired a name by his writings, especially the History of England.
This history was attacked by Dr. Edmund Calamy, in a letter to the
author; in which, according to the Dr. the true principles of the
Revolution, the Whigs and the Dissenters are vindicated; and many
persons of distinction cleared from Mr. Eachard's aspersions.
Mr. John Oldmixon, who was of very opposite principles to Eachard,
severely animadverted upon him in his Critical History of England,
during the reigns of the Stuarts; but as Oldmixon was a hireling, and
a man strongly biassed by party prejudices, little credit is due to
his testimony: Which is moreover accompanied with a perpetual torrent
of abuse. Mr. Eachard's general Ecclesiastical History, from the
nativity of Christ to the first establishment of Christianity by human
laws, under the emperor Constantine the Great, has been much esteemed.
Our author was in the year 1712 installed archdeacon of Stowe, and
prebend of Lincoln. He published a translation of Terence's Comedies,
translated by himself and others; but all revised and corrected by him
and Sir Roger L'Estrange: To which is prefixed the life of Terence.
Besides these, Mr. Eachard has translated three Comedies from Plautus,
viz.
AMPHITRYON,
EPIDICUS.
RUDENS.
With critical remarks upon each play. To which he has prefixed a
judicious parallel between Terence and Plautus; and for a clearer
decision of the point, that Terence was the more polite writer of
Comedy, he produces the first act of Plautus's Aulularia, and the
first act of his Miles Gloriosus, against the third act of Terence's
Eunuch. It ought to be observed (says Mr. Eachard) 'That Plautus was
somewhat poor, and made it his principal aim to please, and tickle
the common people; and since they were almost always delighted with
something new, strange, and unusual, the better to humour them, he was
not only frequently extravagant in his expressions, but likewise in
his characters too, and drew them often more vicious, more covetous,
and more foolish than they really were, and this so set the people a
gazing and wondering. With these sort of characters many of our modern
Comedies abound, which makes them too much degenerate into farce,
which seldom fails of pleasing the mob.'
Mr. Eachard has, in justice to Mr. Dryden, given us some instances
of his improvement of Amphitryon, and concludes them with this just
remark in compliment to our nation; 'We find that many fine things of
the ancients, are like seeds, that when planted on English ground, by
a poet's skilful hand, thrive and produce excellent fruit.'
These three plays are printed in a pocket-volume, dedicated to Sir
Charles Sedley; to which is prefixed a recommendatory copy of verses,
by Mr. Tate.
Mr. Eachard died in the year 1730.
* * * * *
Mr. JOHN OLDMIXON,
Was descended from the ancient family of the Oldmixons, of Oldmixon
near Bridgewater in Somersetshire[A]. We have no account of the
education of this gentleman, nor the year in which he was born. The
first production we meet with of his was Amyntas, a pastoral, acted at
the Theatre-Royal, taken from the Amynta of Tasso. The preface informs
us, that it met with but ill success, for pastoral, though never
so well written, is not fit for a long entertainment on the English
Theatre: But the original pleased in Italy, where the performance of
the musical composer is generally more regarded than that of the poet.
The Prologue was written by Mr. Dennis. Mr. Oldmixon's next piece was
entitled the Grave, or Love's Paradise; an Opera represented at
the Theatre-Royal in Drury-Lane, 1700. In the preface, the author
acquaints the critics, 'That this play is neither translation, nor
parody; that the story is intirely new; that 'twas at first intended
for a pastoral, tho' in the three last acts the dignity of the
character raised it into the form of a tragedy.' The scene a Province
of Italy, near the Gulph of Venice. The Epilogue was written by Mr.
Farquhar.
Our author's next dramatic piece is entitled: The Governor of Cyprus,
a Tragedy, acted at the Theatre-Royal in Lincoln's-Inn-Fields,
dedicated to her grace the duchess of Bolton.
Mr. Oldmixon, in a Prose Essay on Criticism, unjustly censures Mr.
Addison, whom also, in his imitation of Bouhour's Arts of Logic and
Rhetoric, he misrepresents in plain matter of fact: For in page 45 he
cites the Spectator, as abusing Dr. Swift by name, where there is not
the least hint of it; and in page 304 is so injurious as to suggest,
that Mr. Addison himself wrote that Tatler, Numb. XLIII. which says of
his own simile, 'That it is as great as ever entered into the mind of
man.' This simile is in Addison's poem, entitled the Campaign. Where,
says the author of the Letter, 'The simile of a ministering Angel,
sets forth the most sedate and the most active courage, engaged in
an uproar of nature, a confusion of elements, and a scene of divine
vengeance.'
'Twas then great Marlbro's mighty soul was prov'd,
That, in the shock of charging hosts unmov'd,
Amidst confusion, horror, and despair,
Examin'd all the dreadful scenes of war;
In peaceful thought, the field of death survey'd
To fainting squadrons sent the timely aid,
Inspir'd repuls'd battalions to engage,
And taught the doubtful battle where to rage.
So when an Angel by divine command,
With rising tempests shakes a guilty hand,
Such as of late o'er pale Britannia past,
Calm and serene, he drives the furious blast,
And, pleas'd th' Almighty's orders to perform,
Rides in the whirlwind, and directs the storm.
That this letter could not be written by Mr. Addison, there is all the
evidence the nature of the thing will admit, to believe; for first,
Sir Richard Steele avow'd it to be his, and in the next place, it is
not probable that Mr. Addison himself had so high an opinion of this
simile, as to call it as great as ever entered into the thought of
man; for it has in reality no uncommon greatness in it. The image
occurs a thousand times in the book of Psalms; so that it has not
novelty to recommend it, and the manner of its being expressed, is no
way extraordinary. The high terms in which it is celebrated, is the
language of friendship, not of judgment. It is very probable Sir
Richard Steele, warm'd with a favourite subject, and zealous for the
fame of Addison, might express himself thus hyperbolically concerning
it; but Mr. Addison was too judicious a critic, to think or speak of
it in these terms, and was besides too cautious to run the risk of
doing it himself in so public a manner. In a word, Mr. Oldmixon was an
envious man, and we have seen with how little ground of resentment
he railed against Eusden, because that gentleman was preferred to the
Laurel.
Mr. Oldmixon joined the general cry of the underling writers against
Mr. Pope; and wrote many letters in the Flying Post, with an intention
to reduce his reputation, with as little success as his other
antagonists had done. In his prose Essay on Criticism, and in the Arts
of Logic and Rhetoric, he frequently reflects on Pope, for which he
has received a place in his Dunciad.
When that eminent satyrist in his second Book, line 270, represents
the Dunces diving for the Prize of Dulness, he in a particular manner
dignifies Oldmixon, for he makes him climb a lighter, that by leaping
from it, he may sink the deeper in the mud.
In naked majesty Oldmixon stands,
And, Milo-like, surveys his arms and hands,
Then sighing thus: 'And am I now threescore?
'Ah why, ye Gods! should two and two make 'four?
He said and climb'd a stranded lighter's height,
Shot to the black abyss, and plung'd down-right.
The Senior's judgment all the crowd admire,
Who but to sink the deeper, rose the higher.
Mr. Oldmixon wrote a history of the Stuarts in folio, and a Critical
History of England, in two volumes octavo. The former of these
pieces was undertaken to blacken the family of the Stuarts. The most
impartial writers and candid critics, on both sides, have held this
work in contempt, for in every page there breathes a malevolent
spirit, a disposition to rail and calumniate: So far from observing
that neutrality and dispassionate evenness of temper, which should
be carefully attended to by every historian, he suffers himself to
be transported with anger: He reviles, wrests particular passages and
frequently draws forced conclusions. A history written in this spirit
has no great claim to a reader's faith. The reigns of the Stuarts
in England were no doubt chequer'd with many evils; and yet it is
certainly true, that a man who can fit deliberately down to search
for errors only, must have a strong propension to calumny, or at least
take delight in triumphing over the weakness of his fellow creatures,
which is surely no indication of a good heart.
Mr. Oldmixon, being employ'd by bishop Kennet, in publishing the
Historians in his collection, he perverted Daniel's Chronicle in
numberless places. Yet this very man, in the preface to the first of
these, advanced a particular fact, to charge three eminent persons
of interpolating the lord Clarendon's History, which fact has been
disproved by the bishop of Rochester, Dr. Atterbury, then the only
survivor of them; and the particular part he pretended to be falsifed
produced since, after almost ninety years, in that noble author's own
hand.
He was all his life a virulent Party-Writer, and received his reward
in a small part in the revenue at Liverpool, where he died in an
advanced age, but in what year we cannot learn.
Mr. Oldmixon, besides the works we have mentioned, was author of a
volume of Poems, published in 1714.
The Life of Arthur Maynwaring, Esq; prefixed to the works of that
author, by Mr. Oldmixon.
England's Historical Epistles (Drayton's revived).
The Life of queen Anne.
[Footnote A: See Jacob's Lives of the Poets, p. 197.]
* * * * *
LEONARD WELSTED, Esq;
This gentleman was descended from a very good family in
Leicestershire, and received the rudiments of his education in
Westminster school. We are informed by major Cleland, author of a
Panegyric on Mr. Pope, prefixed to the Dunciad, that he was a member
of both the universities.
In a piece said to have been written by Mr. Welsted, called The
Characters of the Times, printed in 8vo. 1728, he gives this account
of himself; 'Mr. Welsted had in his youth raised so great expectations
of his future genius, that there was a kind of struggle between the
two universities, which should have the honour of his education; to
compound this, he civilly became a member of both, and after having
passed some time at the one, he removed to the other. From thence he
returned to town, where he became the darling expectation of all the
polite writers, whose encouragement he acknowledged in his occasional
poems, in a manner that will make no small part of the fame of his
protectors. It also appears from his works, that he was happy in
the patronage of the most illustrious characters of the present age.
Encouraged by such a combination in his favour, he published a book of
poems, some in the Ovidian, some in the Horatian manner, in both which
the most exquisite judges pronounced he even rivalled his masters.
His love verses have rescued that way of writing from contempt. In his
translations he has given us the very soul and spirit of his author.
His Odes; his Epistles; his Verses; his Love Tales; all are the most
perfect things in all poetry.'
If this representation of our author's abilities were just, it would
seem no wonder, if the two universities should strive with each other
for the honour of his education, but it is certain the world have
not coincided with this opinion of Mr. Welsted; who, by the way, can
hardly be thought the author of such an extravagant self-approbation,
unless it be an irony, which does not seem improbable.
Our author, however, does not appear to have been a mean poet; he had
certainly from nature an exceeding fine genius, but after he came to
town he became a votary to pleasure, and the applauses of his friends,
which taught him to overvalue his talents, perhaps slackened his
diligence, and by making him trust solely to nature, flight the
assistance of art.
In the year 1718 he wrote the Triumvirate, or a Letter in Verse from
Palemon to Celia from Bath, which was meant as a satire against Mr.
Pope. He wrote federal other occasional pieces against this gentleman,
who, in recompence of his enmity, has mentioned him twice in his
Dunciad. In book ii. 1. 200 where he represents the poets flattering
their patrons with the fulsome strains of panegyric, in order to
procure from them that which they very much wanted, viz. money, he
shews Welsted as unsuccessful.
But Welsted most the poet's healing balm,
Strives to extract from his soft giving palm;
Unlucky Welsted! thy unfeeling master,
The more thou ticklest, gripes his fist the faster.
Mr. Welsted was likewise characterised in the Treatise of the Art of
Sinking, as a Didapper, and after as an Eel. He was likewise described
under the character of another animal, a Mole, by the author of the
following simile, which was handed about at the same time.
Dear Welsted, mark in dirty hole
That painful animal a Mole:
Above ground never born to go,
What mighty stir it keeps below?
To make a molehill all this strife!
It digs, pukes, undermines for life.
How proud a little dirt to spread!
Conscious of nothing o'er its head.
'Till lab'ring on, for want of eyes,
It blunders into light--and dies.
But mentioning him once was not enough for Mr. Pope. He is again
celebrated in the third book, in that famous Parody upon Benham's
Cooper's Hill,
O could I flow like thee, and make thy stream
My great example, as it is my theme;
Tho' deep, yet clear; tho' gentle, yet not dull;
Strong without rage; without o'er flowing full.
Denham.
Which Mr. Pope has thus parodied;
Flow Welsted, flow; like thine inspirer, beer,
Tho' stale, not ripe; tho' thin, yet never clear;
So sweetly mawkish, and so smoothly dull;
Heady, not strong; and foaming, tho' not full.
How far Mr. Pope's insinuation is true, that Mr. Welsted owed his
inspiration to beer, they who read his works may determine for
themselves. Poets who write satire often strain hard for ridiculous
circumstances, in order to expose their antagonists, and it will be
no violence to truth to say, that in search of ridicule, candour is
frequently lost.
In the year 1726 Mr. Welsted brought upon the stage a comedy called
The Dissembled Wantons or My Son get Money. He met with the patronage
of the duke of Newcastle, who was a great encourager of polite
learning; and we find that our author had a very competent place in
the Ordnance-Office.
His poetical works are chiefly these,
The Duke of Marlborough's Arrival, a Poem printed in fol. 1709,
inscribed to the Right Hon the Earl of Dorset and Middlesex.
A Poem to the Memory of Mr. Philips, inscribed to Lord Bolingbroke,
printed in fol. 1710.
A Discourse to the Right Hon. Sir Robert Walpole; to which is annexed
Proposals for Translating the whole Works of Horace, with a Specimen
of the Performance, viz. Lib. Ist. Ode 1, 3, 5 and 22, printed in 4to.
1727.
An Ode to the Hon. Major General Wade, on Occasion of his disarming
the Highlands, imitated from Horace.
To the Earl of Clare, on his being created Duke of Newcastle. An Ode
on the Birth-Day of his Royal Highness the Prince of Wales. To the
Princess, a Poem. Amintor and the Nightingale, a Song. These four were
printed together in 1716.
Of False Fame, an Epistle to the Right Hon. the Earl of Pembroke, 8vo.
1732.
A Letter to his Grace the Duke of Chandois.
To the Duke of Buckingham, on his Essay on Poetry.
Several small pieces in the Free Thinker.
Epistles, Odes, &c. written on several Subjects; with a Disseration
concerning the Perfection of the English Language.
Mr. Welsted has translated Longinus's Treatise on the Sublime.
* * * * *
JAMES MORE SMYTH, Esq;
This gentleman was son of Arthur More, esq; one of the lords
commissioners of trade, in the reign of Queen Anne; his mother was the
daughter of Mr. Smyth, a man of considerable fortune, who left this
his grandson a handsome estate, on which account he obtained an Act of
Parliament to change his name to Smyth.
Our author received his education at Oxford, and while he remained
at the university he wrote a comedy called The Rival Modes, his only
dramatic performance. This play was condemned in the representation,
but he printed it in 1727, with the following motto, which the author
of the Notes to the Dunciad, by way of irony, calls modest.
Hic coestus, artemque repono.
Upon the death of our author's grandfather, he enjoyed the place of
paymaster to the band of gentlemen-pensioners, in conjunction with his
younger brother, Arthur More; of this place his mother procured the
reversion from his late Majesty during his father's lifetime. Being a
man of a gay disposition, he insinuated himself into the favour of his
grace the duke of Wharton, and being, like him, destitute of prudence,
he joined with that volatile great man in writing a paper called the
Inquisitor, which breathed so much the spirit of Jacobitism, that the
publisher thought proper to sacrifice his profit to his safety, and
discontinue it.
By using too much freedom with the character of Pope, he provoked that
gentleman, who with great spirit stigmatized him in his Dunciad.
In his second book Mr. Pope places before the eyes of the dunces
the phantom of a poet. He seems willing to give some account of the
possibility of dulness making a wit, which can be done no otherwise
than by chance. The lines which have relation to Mr. More are so
elegantly satyric, that it probably will not displease our readers to
find them inserted here.
A poet's form she plac'd before their eyes,
And bad the nimblest racer seize the prize;
No meagre muse-rid mope, adult and thin,
In a dun night gown of his own loose skin,
But such a bulk as no twelve bards could raise,
Twelve starv'ling bards of these degenerate days.
All as a partridge plump, full-fed, and fair,
She form'd this image of well-bodied air,
With pert, slat eyes, she window'd well its head,
A brain of feathers, and a heart of lead,
And empty words she gave, and sounding strain,
But senseless, lifeless! idol void and vain!
Never was dash'd out at one lucky hit,
A fool so just a copy of a wit;
So like, that critics said, and courtiers swore,
A wit it was, and call'd the phantom More.
Though these lines of Pope are sufficiently satirical, yet it seems
they very little affected Mr. More. A gentleman intimately acquainted
with him informs us, that he has heard Mr. More several times repeat
those lines, without discovering any chagrin; and he used to observe,
that he was now secure of being transmitted to posterity: an honour
which, says he, I could never have arrived at, but by Pope's means.
The cause of the quarrel between this gentleman and that great poet
seems to have been this.
In a letter published in the Daily Journal March 18, 1728, written by
Mr. More, he has the following words, 'Upon reading the third volume
of Pope's Miscellanies, I found five lines which I thought excellent,
and happening to praise them, a gentleman produced a modern comedy,
the Rival Modes, published last year, where were the same verses to
a tittle. These gentlemen are undoubtedly the first plagiaries that
pretend to make a reputation, by stealing from a man's works in his
own life-time, and out of a public print.' But it is apparent from the
notes to the Dunciad, that Mr. More himself borrowed the lines from
Pope; for in a letter dated January 27, 1726, addressed to Mr. Pope,
he observes, 'That these verses which he had before given him leave to
insert in the Rival Modes, would be known for his, some copies being
got abroad. He desires, nevertheless, that since the lines in his
comedy have been read to several, Mr. Pope would not deprive it of
them.'
As a proof of this circumstance, the testimony of lord Bolingbroke
is adduced, and the lady of Hugh Bethel, esq; to whom the verses were
originally addressed, who knew them to be Mr. Pope's long before the
Rival Modes was composed.
Our author further charges Mr. Pope with being an enemy to the church
and state. 'The Memoirs of a Parish Clerk, says he, was a very dull,
and unjust abuse of the bishop of Sarum (who wrote in defence of our
religion and constitution) who has been dead many years.' 'This also,
continues the author of the Notes to the Dunciad, is likewise untrue,
it being known to divers, that these Memoirs were written at the
seat of the lord Harcourt in Oxfordshire, before the death of bishop
Burnet, and many years before the appearance of that history, of which
they are pretended to be an abuse. Most true it is that Mr. More had
such a design, and was himself the man who pressed Dr. Arbuthnot, and
Mr. Pope to assist him therein; and that he borrowed those Memoirs of
the latter, when that history came forth, with intent to turn them to
such abuse, but being able to obtain from Pope but one single hint,
and either changing his mind, or having more mind than ability, he
contented himself to keep the said Memoirs, and read them as his own
to all his acquaintance. A noble person there is, into whose
company Pope once chanced to introduce him, who well remembered the
conversation of Mr. More to have turned upon the contempt he had for
that reverend prelate, and how full he was of a design he declared
himself to have of exposing him; this noble person is the earl of
Peterborough.'
Thus Mr. Pope was obliged to represent this gentleman as a plagiary,
or to pass for one himself. His case indeed, as the author of the
notes to the Dunciad observes, was like that of a man who, as he
was sitting in company, perceived his next neighbour had stolen his
handkerchief. 'Sir, said the thief, finding himself detected, do not
expose me, I did it for mere want; be so good but to take it privately
out of my pocket again, and say nothing.' The honest man did so, but
the other cried out, See, gentlemen! what a thief we have among us!
look, he is stealing my handkerchief.' The plagiarism of this person
gave occasion to the following epigram;
More always smiles whenever he recites;
He smiles (you think) approving what he writes;
And yet in this no vanity is shown;
A modest man may like what's not his own.
The smaller pieces which we have heard attributed to this author, are,
An Epigram on the Bridge at Blenheim, by Dr. Evans; Cosmelia, by Mr.
Pitt, Mr. Jones, &c. The Saw-Pit, a Simile, by a Friend; and some
unowned Letters, Advertisements, and Epigrams against Mr. Pope in
the Daily Journal. He died in the year 1734, and as he wrote but one
comedy unsuccessfully, and no other pieces of his meeting with any
applause, the reader will probably look upon him as a man of little
genius; he had a power however of rendering his conversation agreeable
by a facetious and gentleman-like manner, without any of the stiffness
of the scholar, or the usual petulance of a poet. He always lived in
affluent circumstances, and by mixing with genteel company, his habit
of elegance was never lost, a fate which too frequently happens to
those, who, notwithstanding the brightest parts, are excluded the
circle of politeness by the oppressions of poverty. In this light Mr.
Pope must have considered him, or he, who was one of the politest men
of the age, as well as the greatest poet, would never have introduced
him to the earl of Peterborough. It does not appear that Mr. More had
parts otherwise sufficient to entitle him to the notice of Pope, and
therefore he must have considered him only as a gentleman. Had he
possessed as much prudence, as politeness, he would have avoided
by all means incurring the displeasure of Pope, who, as he was the
warmest friend, was likewise a very powerful and implacable enemy. In
this controversy, however, it is evident enough that Mr. Moore was
the aggressor, and it is likewise certain that his punishment has been
equal to his offence.
He died October 18, 1734, at Whister, near Isleworth in Middlesex, for
which county he was a justice of peace.
* * * * *
Mr. JOHN DENNIS,
This celebrated critic was born in London in the year 1657, his father
being a Sadler, and an eminent citizen[A].
He received his early education at Harrow on the Hill, under the pious
and learned Dr. William Horn, having for his schoolfellows many young
noblemen, who afterwards made a considerable figure in the state.
He removed from Harrow to Caius College in Cambridge, where he was
admitted January 13, 1675, in the 18th year of his age. In due time
Mr. Dennis took the degree of bachelor of arts, and after quitting
the university he indulged a passion which he had entertained for
travelling, and set out for France and Italy. In the course of his
travels he, no doubt, made such observations upon the government and
genius of the people whom he visited, as enabled him to make a
just comparison between foreign states and his own country. In
all probability, while he was in France and Italy, he conceived an
abhorrence of despotic government, the effects of which he then had
an opportunity more intimately to discern; for he returned home still
more confirmed in Whig principles, by which his political conduct was
ever governed.
Our author in his early years became acquainted with some of the
brightest geniuses which then illuminated the regions of wit, such as
Dryden, Wycherly, Congreve, and Southern. Their conversation was
in itself sufficient to divert his mind from the acquisition of any
profitable art, or the exercise of any profession. He ranked himself
amongst the wits, and from that moment held every attainment in
contempt, except what related to poetry, and taste.
Mr. Dennis, by the instances of zeal which he gave for the Protestant
succession in the reign of King William, and Queen Anne, obtained the
patronage of the duke of Marlborough, who procured him the place
of one of the Queen's waiters in the Custom-house, worth 120 l.
per annum, which Mr. Dennis held for six years. During the time he
attended at the Custom-house, he lived so profusely, and managed
his affairs with so little economy, that in order to discharge some
pressing demands, he was obliged to dispose of his place. When the
earl of Hallifax, with whom he had the honour of being acquainted,
heard of Mr. Dennis's design, he sent for him, and in the most
friendly manner, expostulated with him upon the folly, and rashness
of disposing of his place, by which (says his lordship) you will
soon become a beggar. Mr. Dennis represented his exigences, and the
pressing demands that were then made upon him: which did not however
satisfy his lordship, who insisted if he did sell it, it should be
with some reversion to himself for the space of forty years, a term
which the earl had no notion Mr. Dennis could exceed. But he was
mistaken in his calculation upon our poet's constitution, who
out-lived the term of forty years stipulated when he sold his place,
and fulfilled in a very advanced age, what his lordship had prophesied
would befal him. This circumstance our author hints at in his
dedication of his poem on the Battle of Ramellies, to lord Hallifax,
'I have lately, says he, had very great obligations to your lordship,
you have been pleased to take some care of my fortune, at a time when
I most wanted it, and had the least reason to expect it from you.'
This poem on the Battle of Ramellies is a cold unspirited performance;
it has neither fire, nor elevation, and is the true poetical sister
of another poem of his, on the Battle of Blenheim, addressed to Queen
Anne, and for which the duke of Marlborough rewarded him, says Mr.
Coxeter, with a present of a hundred guineas. In these poems he
has introduced a kind of machinery; good and bad angels interest
themselves in the action, and his hero, the duke of Marlborough,
enjoys a large share of the celestial protection.
Mr. Dennis had once contracted a friendship[B] with Sir Richard
Steele, whom he afterwards severely attacked. Sir Richard had promised
that he would take some opportunity of mentioning his works in public
with advantage, and endeavour to raise his reputation. When Sir
Richard engaged in a periodical paper, there was a fair occasion
of doing it, and accordingly in one of his Spectators he quotes the
following couplet, which he is pleased to call humorous, but which
however is a translation from Boileau.
One fool lolls his tongue out at another,
And shakes his empty noddle at his brother.
The citation of this couplet Mr. Dennis imagined, was rather meant to
affront him, than pay a compliment to his genius, as he could discover
nothing excellent in the lines, and if there was, they being only a
translation, in some measure abated the merit of them. Being fired with
resentment at this affront, he immediately, in a spirit of fury, wrote
a letter to the Spectator, in which he treated him with very little
ceremony, and informed him, that if he had been sincere in paying a
compliment to him, he should have chosen a quotation from his poem on
the Battle of Ramellies; he then points out a particular passage,
of which he himself had a very high opinion, and which we shall here
insert as a specimen of that performance.
A coelestial spirit visits the duke of Marlborough the night before
the battle, and after he has said several other things to him, goes on
thus,
A wondrous victory attends thy arms,
Great in itself, and in its sequel vast;
Whose ecchoing sound thro' all the West shall run,
Transporting the glad nations all around,
Who oft shall doubt, and oft suspend their joy,
And oft imagine all an empty dream;
The conqueror himself shall cry amaz'd,
'Tis not our work, alas we did it not;
The hand of God, the hand of God is here!
For thee, so great shall be thy high renown,
That same shall think no music like thy name,
Around the circling globe it shall be spread,
And to the world's last ages shall endure;
And the most lofty, most aspiring man,
Shall want th' assurance in his secret prayers
To ask such high felicity and fame,
As Heav'n has freely granted thee; yet this
That seems so great, so glorious to thee now,
Would look how low, how vile to thy great mind,
If I could set before th' astonished eyes,
Th' excess of glory, and th' excess of bliss
That is prepar'd for thy expiring soul,
When thou arriv'st at everlasting day.
The quotation by Mr. Dennis is longer, but we are persuaded the reader
will not be displeased that we do not take the trouble to transcribe
the whole, as it does not improve, but rather grows more languid.
How strangely are people deceived in their own productions! In the
language of sincerity we cannot discover a poetical conception, one
striking image, or one animated line in the above, and yet Mr. Dennis
observes to Sir Richard Steele, that these are the lines, by quoting
which, he would really have done him honour.
But Mr. Dennis's resentment did not terminate here; he attempted to
expose a paper in the Spectator upon dramatic conduct, in which
the author endeavours to shew that a poet is not always obliged to
distribute poetical justice on this very reasonable account, that
good and evil happen alike to all men on this side the grave. To this
proposition our critic objects, 'that it is not only a very false, but
a dangerous assertion, that we neither know what men really are, nor
what they suffer. Besides, says he, let it be considered, that a man
is a creature, who is created immortal, and a creature consequently
that will find a compensation in futurity, for any seeming inequality
in his destiny here; but the creatures of a poetical creator, are
imaginary, and transitory; they have no longer duration than the
representation of their respective fables, and consequently if
they offend, they must be punished during that representation, and
therefore we are very far from pretending, that poetical justice is
an equal representation of the justice of the Almighty.' In support
of this opinion our critic produces the example of Euripides, and the
best poets amongst the ancients, who practised it, and the authority
of Aristole, who established the rule. But nature, or Shakespear,
which is another word for nature, is by no means in favour of this
equal distribution. No character can be represented in tragedy
absolutely perfect, as no such character exists; but a character which
possesses more virtues than vices, may be upon the whole amiable, and
yet with the strictest propriety may be made the chief sufferer in the
drama. If any passion strongly predominates in the heart of man,
it will often expose him to such snares, entangle him in such
difficulties, and oppress him with such wants, that in the very nature
of things, he must sink under the complicated weight of misery. This
may happen to a character extremely amiable, the passion which governs
him may be termed unhappy, but not guilty, or if it should partake the
nature of guilt, fallible creatures cannot always combat with success
against guilty passions.
The drama being an imitation of nature, the poet causes a composition
of characters formed in his imagination to be represented by players;
these characters charm, or displease, not only for what they do;
during the representation of the fable, but we love, or hate them for
what they have done before their appearance; and we dread, or warmly
expect the consequences of their resolutions after they depart the
stage. The illusion would not be sufficiently strong, if we did not
suppose the dramatic persons equally accountable to the powers above
us, as we are ourselves. This Shakespear has taken care forcibly to
impress upon his audience, in making the ghost of the murthered king
of Denmark, charge his son not to touch his mother's life, but leave
her to heaven; and the reflexions of her own conscience to goad and
sting her.
Mr. Dennis's reasoning, upon the whole amounts to this, that no
perfect character should suffer in the drama; to which it may be
answered, that no perfect character ever did suffer in the drama;
because no poet who draws from nature, ever introduced one, for this
very good reason, that there are none in existence.
Mr. Dennis, who was restless in attacking those writers, who met with
success, levelled some more criticisms against the Spectators; and
amongst the rest endeavoured to expose Mr. Addison's Illustrations of
the Old Ballad, called Chevy Chace; of which we shall only say,
that he performed this talk more successfully than he executed his
Animadversions upon Poetical Justice.
We have already taken notice of the warm attachment Mr. Dennis always
had to the Whig-Interest, and his particular zeal for the
Hanoverian succession. Ht wrote many letters and pamphlets, for the
administration of the earl of Godolphin, and the duke of Marlborough,
and never failed to lash the French with all the severity natural to
him.
When the peace (which the Whigs reckoned the most inglorious that
ever was made) was about to be ratified, Mr. Dennis, who certainly
over-rated his importance, took it into his imagination, that when the
terms of peace should be stipulated, some persons, who had been
most active against the French, would be demanded by that nation as
hostages; and he imagined himself of importance enough to be made
choice of, but dreaded his being given up to the French, as the
greatest evil that could befall him. Under the influence of this
strong delusion, he actually waited on the duke of Marlborough, and
begg'd his grace's interposition, that he might not be sacrificed to
the French, for says he, 'I have always been their enemy.' To this
strange request, his grace very gravely replied, 'Do not fear, Mr.
Dennis, you shall not be given up to the French; I have been a
greater enemy to them than you, and you see I am not afraid of being
sacrificed, nor am in the least disturbed.' Mr. Dennis upon this
retired, well satisfied with his grace's answer, but there still
remained upon his spirits a dread of his becoming a prey to some of
the enemies of Great Britain.
He soon after this retired into the country, to spend some time at a
friend's house. While he was walking one day by the sea side, he saw a
ship in full sail approaching towards the shore, which his distracted
imagination dictated, was a French ship sent to carry him off. He
hurried to the gentleman's house with the utmost precipitation,
upbraided him with treachery, as being privy to the attempts of the
French against his life, and without ceremony quitted his house, and
posted to London, as fast as he could.
Mr. Dennis, who never cared to be an unconcerned spectator, when any
business of a public or important nature was in agitation, entered
the lists with the celebrated Mr. Sacheverel, who in the year 1702
published at Oxford a piece called the Political Union, the purport
of which was to shew, that the Church and the State are invariably
connected, and that the one cannot subsist without the other. Mr.
Dennis in answer to this, in a letter to a member of parliament, with
much zeal, force of argument, and less ferocity than usual, endeavours
to overthrow the proposition, and shew the danger of priestcraft, both
to religion and government.
In this letter he very sensibly observes, 'That since the very spirit
of the christian religion, is the spirit of union and charity, it
follows by consequence, that a spirit of division, is a spirit of
malice, and of the Devil. A true son of the church, is he who appears
most for union, who breathes nothing but charity; who neglects all
worldly greatness to bear his master's yoke; and, who has learned of
him to be meek and lowly of heart.'
He shews that the moderate part of the Church of England are the
truest church; and that violent party which differs from the moderate
ought to be called Dissenters, because they are at a greater distance
from charity, which is the characteristic of a true church, than any
Dissenters. By which, says he, 'It appears that Mr. Sacheverel has
made a rod to whip himself, for if only the true Church of England
is to remain, and if the moderate part is the true church, the most
violent ought the least to be tolerated, because they differ from
charity; and consequently are more ready to disturb the public peace.'
In 1703 he published proposals for putting a speedy end to the war, by
ruining the commerce of the French and Spaniards, and securing our own
without any additional expence to the nation. This was thought a very
judicious, and well designed plan.
In 1706 our author published an Essay on the Italian Opera, in
which, with an irresistable force, he shews the extreme danger that a
generous nation is exposed to, by too much indulging effeminate
music. In the preface he quotes a passage from Boileau, in which that
satirist expresses himself with much severity against emasculating
diversions; and the Italian music in particular.
He observes, 'That the modern Italians have the very same sun and soil
with the antient Romans, and yet are their manners directly opposite.
Their men are neither virtuous, wise, or valiant, and they who have
reason to know their women, never trust them out of their sight. 'Tis
impossible to give any reason for so great a difference between the
ancient Romans, and the modern Italians, but only luxury; and the
reigning luxury of modern Italy, is that soft and effeminate music,
which abounds in the Opera.'
In this Essay Mr. Dennis remarks, that entertainments entirely made
up of music can never instruct the mind, nor promote one excellent
purpose in human nature. 'Perhaps, says he, the pride and vanity that
is in mankind, may determine the generality to give into music, at the
expence of poetry. Men love to enjoy their pleasures entirely, and not
to have them restrained by awe, or curbed by mortification. Now there
are but few judicious spectators at our dramatic representations,
since none can be so, but who with great endowments of nature have had
a very generous education; and the rest are frequently mortified, by
passing foolish judgments: But in music the case is vastly different;
to judge of that requires only use, and a fine ear, which the footman
oft has a great deal finer than his master. In short, a man without
common sense may very well judge of what a man writes without common
sense, and without common sense composes.' He then inquires what
the consequence will be if we banish poetry, which is, that taste,
politeness, erudition and public spirit will fall with it, and all for
a Song. The declension of poetry in Greece and Rome was soon followed
by that of liberty and empire; according to Roscommon in his Essay on
Translated Verse.
True poets are the guardians of a state,
And when they fail, portend approaching fate:
For that which Rome to conquest did inspire,
Was not the Vestal, but the Muses fire;
Heav'n joins the blessings, no declining age
E'er felt the raptures of poetic rage.
In 1711 Mr. Dennis published an Essay upon Public Spirit, being a
satire in prose, upon the Manners and Luxury of the Times, the chief
sources of our present Parties and Divisions. This is one of the most
finished performances of our author; the intention is laudable, and
the execution equal to the goodness of the design. He begins the
Essay, with a definition, of the love of our country, shews how
much the phrase has been prostituted, and how seldom understood, or
practised in its genuine sense. He then observes how destructive it is
to indulge an imitation of foreign fashions; that fashions are often
followed by the manners of a people from whom they are borrowed; as
in the beginning of king Charles the IId's reign. After the general
distraction which was immediately consequent upon the Restoration,
lord Halifax informs us, the people began to shake off their slavery
in point of dress, and to be ashamed of their servility in that
particular; 'and that they might look the more, says his lordship,
like a distinct people, they threw off their fashions, and put on
vests: The French did not like this independence, this slight shewn to
their taste, as they thought it portended no good to their politics,
considering that it is a natural introduction, first to make the world
their asses, that they may afterwards make them their slaves.
They sent over the duchess of Portsmouth, who, besides many other
commissions, bore one to laugh us out of our vests, which she
performed so effectually, that in a moment we were like so many
footmen, who had quitted their masters livery, we took it again, and
returned to our old service. So that the very time of doing this gave
a very critical advantage to France, since it looked like an evidence
or returning to their interests, as well as their fashions.'
After giving this quotation from the marquis of Halifax, he proceeds
to inveigh against the various kinds of luxury, in which people of
fashion indulge themselves.
He observes that luxury has in a particular manner been destructive
to the ladies: 'That artificial dainties raise in their constitutions
fierce ebullitions, and violent emotions, too rude for the delicate
texture of their fibres; and for half the year together, they
neither take any air, nor use any exercise to remove them. From hence
distempers of body and mind; from hence an infinity of irregular
desires, unlawful amours, intrigues, vapours, and whimsies, and all
the numerous, melancholy croud of deep hysterical symptoms; from
hence it comes to pass that the fruit of their bodies lie in them like
plants in hot-beds; from hence it proceeds that our British maids, who
in the time of our Henrys, were not held marriageable till turned
of twenty, are now become falling ripe at twelve, and forced to
prematureness, by the heat of adventitious fire. Nor has luxury only
changed our natures, but transformed our sexes: We have men that are
more soft, more languid, and more passive than women. On the other
side we have women, who, as it were in revenge, are masculine in their
desires, and masculine in their practices.'
In a pretty advanced age Mr. Dennis, who then laboured under severe
necessities, published two volumes of Letters, by subscription, which
are by far the most entertaining part of his writings. They have more
sprightliness and force in them than, from reading his other works,
we would be disposed to imagine. They are addressed to persons
distinguished by their fortune, genius, and exalted station; the
duke of Marlborough, the Lord Lansdowne, earl of Godolphin, earl of
Halifax, Mr. Dryden, Mr. Prior, Mr. Wycherley, Henry Cromwel, Esq;
Walter Moyle, Esq; and Sir Richard Blackmore. He entitles them
Letters, Moral and Critical. The Critical are chiefly imployed upon
Mr. Addison's Cato, which he censures in some places with great
justice, and critical propriety: In other places he only discovers
spleen, and endeavours to burlesque noble passages, merely from
resentment to the author.
There is likewise published amongst these letters, an enquiry into
the genius and writings of Shakespear. He contends for Shakespear's
ignorance of the ancients, and observes, that it would derogate
much from his glory to suppose him to have read, or understood them,
because if he had, his not practicing their art, and not restraining
the luxuriance of his imagination would be a reproach to him. After
bestowing the highest panegyric upon Shakespear, he says, 'That he
seems to have been the very original of our English tragical harmony;
that is the harmony of blank verse, diversified often by dissyllable
and trisyllable terminations. For that diversity distinguishes it from
heroic harmony, and bringing it nearer to common use, makes it more
proper to gain attention, and more fit for action, and dialogue. Such
verses we make when we are writing prose, we make such verse in common
conversation.'
One of the reasons Mr. Dennis assigns for Shakespear's want of
learning, is, that Julius Cæsar, in the play which goes by his name,
makes but a third rate figure, and had he (says the author) consulted
the Latin writers, he could not have been guilty of such an error; but
this is far from being conclusive, which might us well be owing to
his having a contempt for Cæsar's character, and an enthusiastic
admiration for those of Brutus and Cassius.
Another prose Essay of Mr. Dennis's, which does him very great honour,
is his Grounds of Criticism in Poetry. Amongst many masterly things,
which he there advances, is the following. 'The antient poets (says
he) derived that advantage which they have over the moderns, to the
constituting their subjects after a religious manner; and from the
precepts of Longinus, it appears that the greatest sublimity is to be
derived from religious ideas.'
Mr. Dennis then observes, that one of the principal reasons, that has
made the modern poetry so contemptible, is that by divesting itself of
religion, it is fallen from its dignity, and its original nature and
excellence; and from the greatest production in the mind of man, it is
dwindled to an extravagant, and vain amusement. When subjects are in
themselves great, the ideas of the writer must likewise be great; and
nothing is in its nature so dignified as religion. This he illustrates
by many examples from Milton, who when he raises his voice to heaven,
and speaks the language of the divinity, then does he reach the true
sublime; but when he descends to the more trifling consideration of
human things, his wing is necessarily depressed, and his strains are
less transporting. We shall now take a view of Mr. Dennis, in that
part of his life and writings, in which he makes a less considerable
figure, by exposing himself to the resentment of one so much his
superior; and who, after a long provocation, at last, let loose his
rage against him, in a manner that no time can obliterate. Mr. Dennis
we have already observed, waged a perpetual war with successful
writers, except those few who were his friends; but never engaged with
so much fury, and less justice, against the writings of any poet, as
those of Mr. Pope.
Some time after the death of Dryden, when Pope's reputation began to
grow, his friends who were sanguine in his interest, were imprudent
enough to make comparisons, and really assert, that Pope was the
greatest poet of the two: Dennis, who had made court to Dryden, and
was respected by him, heard this with indignation, and immediately
exerted all the criticism and force of which he was master, to reduce
the character of Pope. In this attempt he neither has succeeded, nor
did he pursue it like a gentleman.
In his reflexions on Pope's Essay on Criticism, he uses the following
unmannerly epithets. 'A young squab, short gentleman, whose outward
form tho' it should be that of a downright monkey, would not differ
so much from human shape, as his unthinking, immaterial part does
from human understanding.--He is as stupid and as venomous as an
hunch-backed toad.--A book through which folly and ignorance, those
brethren so lame, and impotent, do ridiculously look very big, and
very dull, and strut, and hobble cheek by jowl, with their arms on
kimbo, being led, and supported, and bully-backed, by that blind
Hector impudence.' The reasons which our critic gives for this
extraordinary fury are equally ridiculous. 'I regard him (says he) as
an enemy, not so much to me, as to my king, to my country, and to my
religion. The epidemic madness of the times has given him reputation,
and reputation is power; and that has made him dangerous. Therefore
I look on it as my duty to king George, and to the liberties of my
country, more dear than life to me, of which I have now been 40
years a constant assertor, &c. I look upon it as my duty I say to
do,--Reader observe what,--To pull the lion's skin from this little
ass, which popular error has thrown round him, and shew that this
little author, who has been lately so much in vogue, has neither sense
in his thoughts, nor English in his expressions. See his Remarks on
Homer, Pref. p. 2. and p. 91.
Speaking of Mr. Pope's Windsor-Forrest, he says, 'It is a wretched
rhapsody, impudently writ in emulation of Cooper's-Hill. The author
of it is obscure, is ambiguous, is affected, is temerarious, is
barbarous.'
After these provocations, it is no wonder that Pope should take an
opportunity of recording him in his Dunciad; and yet he had some
esteem for our author's learning and genius. Mr. Dennis put his name
to every thing he wrote against him, which Mr. Pope considered as
a circumstance of candour. He pitied him as a man subject to the
dominion of invidious passions, than which no severer sensations can
tear the heart of man.
In the first Book of his Dunciad. line 103, he represents Dullness
taking a view of her sons; and thus mentions Dennis,
She saw slow Philips creep like Tate's poor page,
And all the mighty mad in Dennis rage.
He mentions him again slightly in his second Book, line 230, and in
his third Book, line 165, taking notice of a quarrel between him and
Mr. Gildon, he says,
Ah Dennis! Gildon ah! what ill-starr'd rage
Divides a friendship long confirm'd by age?
Blockheads, with reason, wicked wits abhor,
But fool with fool, is barbr'ous civil war,
Embrace, embrace, my sons! be foes no more!
Nor glad vile poets, with true critic's gore.
Our author gained little by his opposition to Pope, in which he must
either have violated his judgment, or been under the influence of the
strongest prejudice that ever blinded the eyes of any man; for not to
admire the writings of this excellent poet, is an argument of a total
deprivation of taste, which in other respects does not appear to be
the case of Mr. Dennis.
We shall now take a view of our author in the light of a dramatist.
In the year 1697 a comedy of his was acted at the Theatre-Royal
in Drury-Lane, called A Plot and No Plot, dedicated to the Earl of
Sunderland. The scope of this piece is to ridicule the credulity and
principles of the Jacobites, the moral of which is this, 'That there
are in all parties, persons who find it their interest to deceive
the rest, and that one half of every faction makes a property in
fee-simple of the other, therefore we ought never to believe any thing
will, or will not be, because it is agreeable, or contrary to our
humours, but because it is in itself likely, or improbable. Credulity
in men, engaged in a party, proceeds oftner from pride than weakness,
and it is the hardest thing in the world to impose upon a humble man.'
In 1699 a tragedy called Rinaldo and Armida was acted at the Theatre
in Lincoln's-Inn-Fields, dedicated to the Duke of Ormond. Scene the
top of a mountain in the Canaries. The hint of the chief characters
is owing to Tasso's Gierusalemme, but the manners of them being by our
author thought unequal in that great Italian, he has taken the liberty
to change them, and form his characters more agreeable to the subject.
The reasons for doing it are expressed in the preface and prologue to
the play.
Our author's next tragedy was upon the subject of Iphigenia, daughter
to Agamemnon King of Argos, acted at the Theatre in Lincoln's-Inn
1704. Iphigenia was to have been sacrificed by her father, who was
deluded by the fraud of Calchas, who proclaimed throughout the Grecian
fleet, that the offended gods demanded of Agamemnon the sacrifice of
his daughter to Lucina, and till, that oblation was offered, the fleet
would remain wind-bound. Accordingly, under pretence of marrying
her to Achilles, she was betrayed from Argos, but her mother,
Clytemnestra, discovering the cheat, by a stratagem prevented its
execution, and effected her rescue without the knowledge of any one
but her husband Agamemnon. A Grecian virgin being sacrificed in her
place, Iphigenia is afterwards wrecked on the Coast of Scythia, and
made the Priestess of Diana. In five years time her brother Orestes,
and his friend Pylades, are wrecked on the same shore, but saved from
slaughter by the Queen of Scythia, because she loved Orestes. Orestes,
on the other hand, falls in love with the Priestess of Diana; they
attempt an escape, and to carry off the image of the Goddess, but are
prevented. The Queen then dooms Orestes to the altar, but Pylades,
from his great friendship, personates Orestes, and disconcerts the
design. The story and incidents of this play are interesting and
moving, but Mr. Dennis has not wrought the scenes much in the spirit
of a tragedian: This was a subject admirably suited for the talents
of Otway. The discovery of Orestes's being the brother of Iphigenia
is both surprizing and natural, and though the subject is not well
executed, yet is this by far the most affecting tragedy of our author;
it is almost impossible to read it without tears, though it abounds
with bombast.
The fourth play introduced upon the stage by Mr. Dennis, 1704, was, a
tragedy called Liberty Asserted, dedicated to Anthony Henley, esq;
to whom he says he was indebted for the happy hint upon which it was
formed. Soon after this he wrote another tragedy upon the story of
Appius and Virginia, which Mr. Maynwaring, in a letter to Mr. Dennis,
calls one of our best modern tragedies; it is dedicated to Sidney Earl
of Godolphin.
He altered Shakespear's Merry Wives of Windsor, and brought it on the
stage under the title of The Comical Gallant. Prefixed to this, is
a large account of Taste in Poetry, and the Causes of its Degeneracy
addressed to the Hon. George Granville, Esq; afterwards Lord
Lansdowne.
Our author's next dramatic production was Coriolanus, the Invader
of his Country, or the Fatal Resentment, a Tragedy; altered from
Shakespear, and acted at the Theatre-Royal in Drury-Lane. This piece
met with some opposition the first night; and on the fourth another
play was given out. The second night's audience was very small, though
the play was exceedingly well acted. The third night had not the
charges in money; the fourth was still worse, and then another play
was given out, not one place being taken in the boxes for any ensuing
night. The managers were therefore obliged to discontinue it.
This usage Mr. Dennis highly resented; and in his dedication to the
duke of Newcastle, then lord chamberlain, he makes a formal complaint
against the managers. To this play Mr. Colley Cibber took the pains to
write an epilogue, which Mrs. Oldfield spoke with universal applause,
and for which poor peevish, jealous Dennis, abused them both.
Mr. Dennis happened once to go to the play, when a tragedy was acted,
in which the machinery of thunder was introduced, a new artificial
method of producing which he had formerly communicated to the
managers. Incensed by this circumstance, he cried out in a transport
of resentment, 'That is my thunder by G--d; the villains will play my
thunder, but not my plays.' This gave an alarm to the pit, which
he soon explained. He was much subject to these kind of whimsical
transports, and suffered the fervor of his imagination often to subdue
the power of his reason; an instance of which we shall now relate.
After he was worn out with age and poverty, he resided within the
verge of the court, to prevent danger from his creditors. One Saturday
night he happened to saunter to a public house, which he discovered in
a short time was out of the verge. He was sitting in an open drinking
room, and a man of a suspicious appearance happened to come in. There
was something about the man which denoted to Mr. Dennis that he was a
Bailiff: this struck him with a panic; he was afraid his liberty was
now at an end; he sat in the utmost solicitude, but durst not offer to
stir, lest he should be seized upon. After an hour or two had passed
in this painful anxiety, at last the clock struck twelve, when Mr.
Dennis, in an extasy, cried out, addressing himself to the suspected
person, 'Now sir, Bailiff, or no Bailiff, I don't care a farthing for
you, you have no power now.' The man was astonished at this behaviour,
and when it was explained to him, he was so much affronted with the
suspicion, that had not Mr. Dennis found his protection in age, he
would have smarted for his mistaken opinion of him.
In the year 1705 a comedy of Mr. Dennis's called Gibraltar, or The
Spanish Adventure, was acted unsuccessfully at Drury-Lane Theatre. He
was also author of a masque called Orpheus and Euridice.
Mr. Dennis, considered as a dramatic writer, makes not so good a
figure as in his critical works; he understood the rules of writing,
but it is not in the power of every one to carry their own theory into
execution. There is one error which he endeavoured to reform, very
material for the interest of dramatic poetry. He saw, with concern,
that love had got the entire possession of the tragic stage, contrary
to the authority of the ancients, and the example of Shakespear. He
resolved therefore to deviate a little from the reigning practice, and
not to make his heroes such whining slaves in their amours, which
not only debases the majesty of tragedy, but confounds most of the
principal characters, by making that passion the predominant quality
in all. But he did not think it safe at once to shew his principal
characters wholly exempt from it, lest so great and sudden a
transition should prove disagreeable. He rather chose to steer a
middle course, and make love appear violent, but yet to be subdued
by reason, and give way to the influence of some other more noble
passion; as in Rinaldo, to Glory; in Iphigenia, to Friendship; and
in Liberty Asserted, to the Public Good. He thought by these means an
audience might be entertained, and prepared for greater alterations,
whereby the dignity of tragedy might be supported, and its principal
characters justly distinguished.
Besides the works which we have already mentioned, Mr. Dennis is
author of the following pieces, mostly in the Pindaric way.
Upon our Victory at Sea, and burning the French Fleet at La Hogne in
1692.
Part of the Te Deum Paraphrased, in Pindaric Verse.
To Mr. Dryden, upon his Translation of the Third Book of Virgil's
Georgics. Pindaric Ode.
A Pindaric Ode on the King, written in the beginning of August 1691;
occasioned by the Victory at Aghrim.
To a Painter drawing a Lady's Picture, an Epigram.
Prayer for the King's Safety in the Summer's Expedition in 1692, an
Epigram.
The Court of Death, a Pindaric Poem; dedicated to the Memory of her
Most Sacred Majesty Queen Mary.
The Passion of Byblis, made English from the Ninth Book of Ovid's
Metamorphosis.
The Monument, a Poem; sacred to the Memory of the best, and greatest
of Kings, William III.
Britannia Triumphans, or A Poem on the Battle of Blenheim; dedicated
to Queen Anne.
On the Accession of King George to the Imperial Crown of Great
Britain.
The following specimen, which is part of a Paraphrase on the Te Deum,
serves to shew, that Mr. Dennis wrote with more elegance in Pindaric
odes, than in blank verse.
Now let us sing a loftier strain,
Now let us earth and earthly things disdain,
Now let our souls to Heaven repair,
Direct their most aspiring flight,
To fields of uncreated light,
And dare to draw empyreal air.
'Tis done, O place divinely bright!
O Sons of God divinely fair!
O sight! unutterable sight!
O unconceivable delight!
O joy which only Gods can bear!
Heark how their blissful notes they raise,
And sing the Great Creator's praise!
How in extatic song they cry,
Lo we the glorious sons of light,
So great, so beautiful, so bright,
Lo we the brightest of created things,
Who are all flame, all force, all spirit, and all eye,
Are yet but vile, and nothing in thy sight!
Before thy feet O mighty King of kings,
O Maker of this bounteous all!
Thus lowly reverent we fall.
After a life exposed to vicissitudes, habituated to many
disappointments, and embroiled in unsuccessful quarrels, Mr. Dennis
died on the 6th of January 1733, in the 77th year of his age. We have
observed that he outlived the reversion of his place, after which
he fell into great distress, and as he had all his life been making
enemies, by the ungovernable fury of his temper, he found few persons
disposed to relieve him. When he was near the close of his days, a
play was acted for his benefit. This favour was procured him by the
joint interest of Mr. Thomson, Mr. Martin, Mr. Mallet, and Mr. Pope.
The play was given by the company then acting at the little Theatre in
the Hay-market, under the direction of Mr. Mills sen. and Mr. Cibber
jun. the latter of whom spoke a prologue on the occasion, written by
Mr. Pope.
Mr. Dennis was less happy in his temper, than his genius; he possessed
no inconsiderable erudition, which was joined to such natural parts,
as if accompanied with prudence, or politeness, might have raised him,
not only above want, but even to eminence. He was happy too in having
very powerful patrons, but what could be done for a man, who declared
war against all the world? Dennis has given evidence against himself
in the article of politeness; for in one of his letters he says, he
would not retire to a certain place in the country, lest he should be
disturbed in his studies by the ladies in the house: for, says he,
I am not over-fond of the conversation of women. But with all his
foibles, we cannot but consider him as a good critic, and a man of
genius.
His perpetual misfortune was, that he aimed at the empire of wit, for
which nature had not sufficiently endowed him; and as his ambition
prompted him to obtain the crown by a furious opposition to all other
competitors, so, like Cæsar of old, his ambition overwhelmed him.
[Footnote A: Jacob's Lives of the Poets.]
[Footnote B: Which friendship he ill repaid. Sir Richard once became
bail for Dennis, who hearing that Sir Richard was arrested on his
account, cried out; "'Sdeath! Why did not he keep out of the way, as I
did?"]
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