Various references indicate that Scott was acquainted in at least a general way with English writers throughout the whole of Dryden’s century.  He speaks of the poems of Phineas Fletcher as containing “many passages fully equal to Spenser"[178]; he says that Cowley “is now ... undeservedly forgotten"[179]; he calls Hudibras “the most witty poem that ever was written,"[180] but says, “the perpetual scintillation of Butler’s wit is too dazzling to be delightful"[181]; he talks of Waller and quotes from him[182]; he refers to the charming quality of Isaac Walton’s work;[183] and he adopts Samuel Pepys as a familiar acquaintance.[184] These references occur mostly in the Dryden or in the novels, and we may conclude that the work for the Dryden gathered up and strengthened all Scott’s acquaintance with the literature of the seventeenth century, from Shakspere and Milton down to writers of altogether minor importance; and gave him material for many of the allusions that appear in his later work.  It is probably true that there are more quotations from Dryden in Scott’s books than from any other one author,[185] though lines from Shakspere occurred more often in his conversation and familiar letters.

THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY

Swift

The preparation of Swift’s Complete Works—­Comparison of the Dryden and the Swift—­The bibliographical problem presented by Swift’s works—­Inaccuracies in the biography—­Scott’s success in portraying a perplexing temperament—­Judicious quality of his literary criticism.

As soon as the Dryden was completed Scott was offered twice as much money as he had received for that work, for a similar edition of Swift.[186] He readily undertook the task, and in the midst of many other editorial engagements set to work upon it.  The preparation of the book extended over the six years during which Scott ran the greater part of his poetical career.  On its appearance one of his friends expressed the feeling which every student of Scott must have had in regard to the large editorial labors that he undertook, in saying, “I am delighted and surprised; for how a person of your turn could wade through, and so accurately analyze what you have done (namely, all the dull things calculated to illustrate your author), seems almost impossible, and a prodigy in the history of the human mind."[187] The work was first published in 1814.  Ten years later it was revised and reissued; and Scott’s Swift has, like his Dryden, been the standard edition of that author ever since.

In each case Scott had to deal with an important and varied body of literature in the two fields of poetry and prose, though the proportions were different; and in each case he had occasion for illustrative historical annotations of the kind that he wrote with unrivalled facility.  He was master of the political intrigues of Queen Anne’s reign no less completely than of the circumstances which gave rise to Absalom and Achitophel, and the fact that his notes are less voluminous in the Swift is probably to be accounted for by the comparative absence of quaintness in the literary and social fashions of the eighteenth century.