the determination to understand and the wish to bring all things under
rule--should make themselves felt so strongly and, on the whole, so
harmoniously in his Essays. No man could have felt more keenly the
shortcomings of the Elizabethan writers. No man could have set greater
store by that "art of writing easily" which was the chief pride of the
Restoration poets. Yet no man has ever felt a juster admiration for
the great writers of the opposite school; and no man has expressed his
reverence for them in more glowing words. The highest eulogy that has
yet been passed on Milton, the most discriminating but at the same
time the most generous tribute that has ever been offered to
Shakespeare--both these are to be found in Dryden. And they are to be
found in company with a perception, at once reasoned and instinctive,
of what criticism means, that was altogether new to English literature.

The finest and most characteristic of Dryden's critical writings--but
it is unfortunately also the longest--is without doubt the _Essay of
Dramatic Poesy_. The subject was one peculiarly well suited to Dryden's
genius. It touched a burning question of the day, and it opened the
door for a discussion of the deeper principles of the drama. The _Essay_
itself forms part of a long controversy between Dryden and his
brother-in-law, Sir Robert Howard. The dispute was opened by Dryden's
preface to his tragi-comedy, _The Rival Ladies_, published probably,
as it was certainly first acted, in 1664; and in the beginning Dryden,
then first rising [Footnote: "To a play at the King's house, _The Rival
Ladies_, a very innocent and most pretty witty play"--is Pepys' entry
for August 4, 1664: _Diary_, ii. 155. Contrast his contemptuous
description of Dryden's first comedy, _The Wild Gallant_, in the
preceding year (Feb. 23)--"So poor a thing as I never saw in my life
almost".--_Ib_., i. 390.] into fame as a dramatist, confines himself
to pleading the cause of rhyme against blank verse in dramatic writing.