It was not to be expected that, at a time so very critical, a public representation, including such bold allusions, or rather parallels, should pass without critical censure.  “The Duke of Guise” was attacked by Dryden’s old foe Shadwell, in some verses, entitled, “A Lenten Prologue refused by the Players;"[37] and more formally, in “Reflections on the pretended Parallel in the Play called the Duke of Guise.”  In this pamphlet Shadwell seems to have been assisted by a gentleman of the Temple, so zealous for the popular cause, that Dryden says he was detected disguised in a livery-gown, proffering his vote at the Common-hall.  Thomas Hunt, a barrister,[38] likewise stepped forth on this occasion; and in his “Defence of the Charter of London,” then challenged by the famous process of Quo Warranto, he accuses Dryden of having prepared the way for that arbitrary step, by the degrading representation of their magistrates executed in effigy upon the stage.  Dryden thought these pamphlets of consequence enough to deserve an answer, and published, soon after, “The Vindication of the Duke of Guise.”  In perusing the controversy, we may admire two circumstances, eminently characteristical of the candour with which such controversies are usually maintained:  First, the anxiety with which the critics labour to fix upon Dryden a disrespectful parallel between Charles II. and Henry II. [III.] of France, which certainly our author did not propose to carry farther than their common point of situation; and secondly, the labour with which he disavows what he unquestionably did intend,—­a parallel between the rebellious conduct of Monmouth and of Guise.  The Vindication is written in a tone of sovereign contempt for the adversaries, particularly for Shadwell.  Speaking of Thomas Hunt, Dryden says,—­“Even this their celebrated writer knows no more of style and English than the Northern dictator; as if dulness and clumsiness were fatal to the name of Tom.  It is true, he is a fool in three languages more than the poet; for, they say, ’he understands Latin, Greek, and Hebrew,’ from all which, to my certain knowledge, I acquit the other.  Og may write against the king, if he pleases, so long as he drinks for him, and his writings will never do the government so much harm, as his drinking does it good; for true subjects will not be much perverted by his libels; but the wine-duties rise considerably by his claret.  He has often called me an atheist in print; I would believe more charitably of him, and that he only goes the broad way, because the other is too narrow for him.  He may see, by this, I do not delight to meddle with his course of life, and his immoralities, though I have a long bead-roll of them.  I have hitherto contented myself with the ridiculous part of him, which is enough, in all conscience, to employ one man; even without the story of his late fall at the Old Devil, where he broke no ribs, because the hardness of the stairs could reach no bones; and, for my part,