noise for feeling, and those points and turns of wit, which misbecome one actuated by real and deep emotion.  He candidly gives an example of the last error from his own Montezuma who, pursued by his enemies, and excluded from the fort, describes his situation in a long simile, taken besides from the sea, which he had only heard of for the first time in the first act.  As a description of natural passion, the famous procession of King Richard in the train of the fortunate usurper is quoted, in justice to the divine author.  From these just and liberal rules of criticism, it is easy to discover that Dryden had already adopted a better taste, and was disgusted with comedies, where the entertainment arose from bustling incident, and tragedies, where sounding verse was substituted for the delineation of manners and expression of feeling.  These opinions he pointedly expresses in the Prologue to “Troilus and Cressida,” which was spoken by Betterton, representing the ghost of Shakespeare: 

  “See, my loved Britons, see your Shakespeare rise,
  An awful ghost confessed to human eyes! 
  Unnamed, methinks, distinguished I had been,
  From other shades, by this eternal green,
  About whose wreaths the vulgar poets strive,
  And, with a touch, their withered bays revive. 
  Untaught, unpractised, in a barbarous age,
  I found not, but created first the stage. 
  And if I drained no Greek or Latin store,
  ’Twas that my own abundance gave me more. 
  On foreign trade I needed not rely,
  Like fruitful Britain, rich without supply. 
  In this, my rough-drawn play, you shall behold
  Some master-strokes, so manly and so bold,
  That he who meant to alter, found ’em such;
  He shook, and thought it sacrilege to touch. 
  Now, where are the successors to my name? 
  What bring they to fill out a poet’s fame? 
  Weak, short-lived issues of a feeble age;
  Scarce living to be christened on the stage! 
  For humour farce, for love they rhyme dispense,
  That tolls the knell for their departed sense.”

It is impossible to read these lines, remembering Dryden’s earlier opinions, without acknowledging the truth of the ancient proverb, Magna est veritas, et praevalebit.

The “Spanish Friar,” our author’s most successful comedy, succeeded “Troilus and Cressida.”  Without repeating the remarks which are prefixed to the play in the present edition,[34] we may briefly notice, that in the tragic scenes our author has attained that better strain of dramatic poetry which he afterwards evinced in “Sebastian.”  In the comic part, the well-known character of Father Dominic, though the conception only embodies the abstract idea which the ignorant and prejudiced fanatics of the day formed to themselves of a Romish priest, is brought out and illustrated with peculiar spirit.  The gluttony, avarice, debauchery, and meanness of Dominic are qualified with the talent and wit necessary