once abundance and variety of whatever could gratify the most eccentric appetite.-Sir W. Scott. His "Journal" contains the most unquestionable evidences of veracity; and as the writer made no scruple of committing his most secret thoughts to paper, encouraged no doubt by the confidence which he derived from the use of shorthand, perhaps there never was a publication more implicitly to be relied upon for the authenticity of its statements and the exactness with which every fact is detailed.—Lord Braybrooke. It may be affirmed of this gentleman that he was, without exception, the greatest and most useful minister that ever filled the same situations in England: the Acts and Registers of the Admiralty proving this fact beyond contradiction. The principal rules and establishments in present use in those offices are well known to have been of his introducing, and most of the officers serving therein, since the Restoration, of his bringing up. He was a most studious promoter and strenuous assertor of order and discipline through all their dependencies. . . . He was a person of universal worth, and in great estimation among the literati, for his unbounded reading, his sound judgment, his great elocution, his mastery in method, his singular curiosity, and his uncommon munificence towards the advancement of learning, arts and industry in all degrees to which were subjoined the severest morality of a philosopher, and all the polite accomplishments of a gentleman, particularly those of music, languages, conversation, and address.-Collier's Dictionary. He seems to have been possessed of the most extraordinary activity, and the most indiscriminating, insatiable, and miscellaneous curiosity that ever prompted the researches or supplied the pen of a daily chronicler. Although excessively busy and diligent in his attendance at his office he finds time to go to every play, to every execution, to every procession, fire, concert, riot, trial, review, city feast, public dissection, or picture gallery, that he can hear of. Nay, there seems scarcely to have been a school-examination, a wedding, a christening, charity-sermon, bull-baiting, philosophical meeting, or private merry-making in his neighbourhood at which he was not sure to make his appearance and mindful to record all the particulars. He is the first to hear all the court scandal and all the public news-to observe the changes of fashion and the downfall of parties-to pick up family gossip and to retail 102 Samuel Pepys-Earl of Roscommon. philosophical intelligence-to criticise every new house or carriage that is built-every new book or beauty that appears— every measure the king adopts, and every mistress he discards. -Edinburgh Review, 1825. The avid vanity of Mr. Pepys would be gratified if made aware of the success of his "Diary;" but curiously to inquire into the reason of that success, why his " Diary" has been found so amusing, would not conduce to his comfort-A. Smith. Earl of Roscommon. 1633-1684. Roscommon was more learned than Buckingham. He had laid a design of forming a society for the refining and fixing the standard of our language; in which project his intimate friend Dryden was a principal assistant. It may be remarked, to the praise of Roscommon, that he was the first critic who had taste and spirit enough publicly to praise the "Paradise Lost."Warton. His imagination might have probably been more fruitful and sprightly if his judgment had been less severe; but that severity, delivered in a masculine, clear, succinct style, con. tributed to make him so eminent in the didactical manner, that no man can with justice affirm he was ever equalled by any of our own nation, without confessing at the same time that he is inferior to none.-Fenton. In all Charles's days Roscommon only boasts unspotted lays.-Pope. He is the only correct writer in verse before Addison.Fohnson. It was my Lord Roscommon's "Essay on Translated Verse" which made me uneasy till I tried whether or no I was capable of following his rules, and of reducing the speculation into practice.-Dryden. Sir Charles Sedley. 1639-1701. One of the most brilliant and profligate wits of the Restoration. The licentiousness of his writings is not redeemed by Sir Charles Sedley-Thomas Shadwell. 103 much grace or vivacity; but the charms of his conversation were acknowledged even by sober men who had no esteem for his character. To sit near him at the theatre, and to hear his criticisms on a new play, was regarded as a privilege. Dryden had done him the honour to make him a principal interlocutor in the dialogue on dramatic poetry.-Macaulay. Pierce do tell me among other news the late frolick and debauchery of Sir Charles Sedley' and Buckhurst running up and down all the night, almost naked through the streets; and at last fighting and being beat by the watch and clapped up all night, and how the king takes their part; and my Lord Chief Justice Keeling hath laid the constable by the heels to answer it next session, which is a horrid shame.-Pepys. Thomas Shadwell. 1640-1692. I do not pretend to determine how great a poet Shadwell may be, but I am sure he is an honest man.-Earl of Dorset. If Shadwell had burnt all he wrote, and printed all he spoke, he would have had more wit and humour than any other poet.-Earl of Rochester. Now stop your noses, readers, all and some, 1 Of Farquhar, another dramatist of the Restoration, Horace Walpole says: "Farquhar's plays talk the language of a marching regiment in country quarters." Johnson: "I think Farquhar a man whose writings have considerable merit." Pope: "What pert low dialogue has Farquhar writ!" James Prior: "His genius for comedy was not excelled by either Congreve or Sheridan." And Lord Lytton: "Farquhar is the Fielding of the drama." 104 Thomas Shadwell-William Wycherley. And if man could have reason, none has more To what would he on quail and pheasant swell, But though heaven made him poor, with rev'rence speaking, The midwife laid her hand on his thick skull, With this prophetic blessing-Be thou dull !-Dryden.' He was an accomplished observer of human nature, had a ready power of seizing the ridiculous in the manners of the times, was a man of sense and information, and displayed in his writings a very considerable fund of humour.-Sir Egerton Brydges," Retrospective Review." William Wycherley. 1640-1715. No Translated into real life the characters of . . . . Wycherley's dramas are profligates and strumpets-the business of their brief existence the undivided pursuit of lawless gallantry. No other spring of action, or possible motive of conduct, is recognised; principles which, universally acted upon, must reduce this frame of things to a chaos. But we do them wrong in so translating them. No such effects are produced in their world. When we are among them, we are amongst a chaotic people. We are not to judge them by our usages. reverend institutions are insulted by their proceedings, for they have none among them. No peace of families is violated, for no family ties exist among them. No purity of the marriage bed is stained, for none is supposed to have a being. No deep affections are disquieted. -no holy wedlock-bands are snapped asunder; for affection's depth and wedded faith are not of the growth of that soil. There is neither right nor wrong gratitude or its opposite-claim or duty-paternity or son-ship. Of what consequence is it to virtue, or how is she at all concerned about it, whether Sir Simeon or Dapperwit 1 Shadwell is also the hero of "Macflecnoe."-ED. William Wycherley. 105 steal away Miss Martha; or who is the father of Lord Froth's or Sir Paul Pliant's children ?-Lamb. Wycherley's indecency is protected against the critics as a skunk is protected against the hunters. It is safe, because it is too filthy to handle, and too noisome even to approach.— Macaulay. Thou, whom the Nine with Plautus' wit inspire, The art of Terence, and Menander's fire; Whose sense instructs us, and whose humour charms, Of all our modern wits, none seem to me But hasty Shadwell and slow Wycherley.-Rochester. Wycherley earns hard whate'er he gains.—Ibid. The satire, wit and strength of manly Wycherley.-Dryden. The very rinsings of Wycherley's plays have a raciness in them that is indestructible.-T. Moore. In Mr. Wycherley everything is masculine: his muse is not led forth as to a review, but as to a battle; not adorned for parade, but for execution; he would be tried by the sharpness of his blade and not by the finery; like your hero of antiquity, he charges his iron and seems to despise all ornament but intrinsic merit; and like those heroes, has therefore added another name to his own, and by the unanimous consent of his contemporaries is distinguished by the just appellation of Manly Wycherley.-Lord Lansdowne. 1 At this time began his acquaintance with Wycherley, a man who seems to have had among his contemporaries his full share of reputation, to have been esteemed without virtue, and caressed without good nature. Pope was proud of his notice. Wycherley wrote verses in his praise, which he was charged by Dennis with writing to himself, and they agreed for awhile to flatter one another. It is pleasant to remark how soon Pope learnt the cant of an author, and began to treat critics with contempt, though he had yet suffered nothing from them. But the fondness of Wycherley was too violent to last. His esteem of Pope was such that he submitted some poems to his revision; and when Pope, perhaps proud of such confidence, was sufficiently bold in his criticisms and liberal in his alterations, the old scribbler was angry to see his pages defaced, and felt more pain from the detection than content from the amendment of his faults. They parted; but Pope always considered him with kindness; and visited him a little before he died.-Johnson's "Life of Pope." |