"
And in the Preface to the same play he tells us: "I have not everywhere
observed the equality of numbers in my verse, partly by reason of my
haste, but more especially because I _would not have my sense a slave to
syllables_." Dryden, when he had not a bad case to argue, would have had
small respect for the wit whose skill lay in the making of faults, and
has himself, where his self-love was not engaged, admirably defined the
boundary which divides boldness from rashness. What Quintilian says of
Seneca applies very aptly to Dryden: "Velles eum suo ingenio dixisse,
alieno judicio."[62] He was thinking of himself, I fancy, when he makes
Ventidius say of Antony,--
"He starts out wide
And bounds into a vice that bears him far
From his first course, and plunges him in ills;
But, when his danger makes him find his fault,
Quick to observe, and full of sharp remorse,
He censures eagerly his own misdeeds,
Judging himself with malice to himself,
And not forgiving what as man he did
Because his other parts are more than man."
But bad though they nearly all are as wholes, his plays contain passages
which only the great masters have surpassed, and to the level of which no
subsequent writer for the stage has ever risen.
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