nonsense.* With the same ignorance, or malice, they would accuse me for using-empty arms, when I writ of a ghost or shadow, which has only the appearance of a body or limbs, and is empty or void of flesh and blood; and vacuis amplectitur ulnis, was an expression of Ovid's on the same subject. Some fool before them had charged me in THE INDIAN EMPEROR with nonsense, in these words:

"And follow Fate, which does too fast pursue;" which was borrowed from Virgil in the eleventh of his Encids:

Eludit gyro interior, sequiturque sequentem.

I quote not these to prove that I never writ nonsense, but only to shew that they are so unfortunate as not to have found it.

VALE.

* Our author alludes to the following spirited lines of the Prologue to TYRANNICK LOVE:

"Poets, like lovers, should be bold and dare;
"They spoil their business with an over-care;
"And he who servilely creeps after sense,
"Is safe, but ne'er will reach to excellence.
"Hence 'tis, our poet in his conjuring
"Allow'd his fancy the full force and swing;
"But when a tyrant for his theme he had,
"He loos'd the reins, and bid his muse run mad:
"And though he stumbles in a full career,

"Yet rashness is a better fault than fear.

"He saw his way; but, in so swift a pace, "To choose the ground might be to lose the race, "They then, who of each trip the advantage take, "Find but those faults, which they want wit to make,"

In the fifth line the author alludes to his alteration of THE TEMPEST, which being placed before THE Mock ASTROLOGER, in his own list of his plays arranged in the order in which they were written, was probably first represented, as I have already suggested, in the winter of 1668, or early in 1669. From a passage in the Preface, appears not to have been produced till after the death of D'Avenant. He died April 7, 1668.

it

HEROICK Poesy has always been sacred to

Princes and to Heroes. Thus Virgil inscribed his Eneids to Augustus Cæsar; and of latter ages, Tasso and Ariosto dedicated their poems to the house of Este. It is indeed but justice, that the most excellent and most profitable kind of writing, should be addressed by pocts to such persons whose characters have, for the most part, been the guides and patterns of their imitation; and poets, while they imitate, instruct. The feigned hero inflames the true; and the dead virtue animates the living. Since, therefore, the world is governed by precept and example, and both these can only

7 James, Duke of York, afterwards King James II. This Dedication was addressed to the Duke in 1672, when THE CONQUEST OF GRANADA was first published.

have influence from those persons who are above us, that kind of poesy which excites to virtue the greatest men, is of greatest use to human kind.

It is from this consideration that I have presumed to dedicate to your Royal Highness these faint representations of your own worth and valour in heroick poetry; or to speak more properly, not to dedicate, but to restore to you those ideas which, in the more perfect part of my characters, I have taken from you. Heroes may lawfully be delighted with their own praises, both as they are farther incitements to their virtue, and as they are the highest returns which mankind can make them for it.

And certainly, if ever nation were obliged either by the conduct, the personal valour, or the good fortune of a leader, the English are acknowledging, in all of them, to your Royal Highness. Your whole life has been a continued series of heroick actions, which you began so early, that you were no sooner named in the world, but it was with praise and admiration. Even the first blossoms of your youth paid us all that could be expected from a ripening manhood. While you practised but the rudiments of war, you outwent all other captains; and have since found none to surpass but yourself alone. The opening of your glory was like that of light; you shone to us from afar, and disclosed your first beams on distant nations; yet so, that the lustre of them was spread abroad, and reflected brightly on your

native country. You were then an honour to it, when it was a reproach to itself; and when the fortunate Usurper sent his arms to Flanders,' many of the adverse party were vanquished by your fame, ere they tried your valour. The report of it drew over to your ensigns whole troops and companies of converted rebels; and made them forsake successful wickedness, to follow an oppressed and exiled virtue. Your reputation waged war with the enemies of your royal family, even within their trenches; and the more obstinate or more guilty of them were forced to be spies over those whom they commanded, lest the name of YORK should disband that army in whose fate it was to defeat the Spaniards, and force Dunkirk to surrender. Yet those victorious forces of the rebels were not able to sustain your arms; where you charged in person you were a conqueror. It is true, they afterwards recovered courage, and wrested that victory from others which they had lost to you; and it was a greater action for them to rally than it was to overcome. Thus, by the presence of your Royal Highness, the English on both sides remained victorious; and that army which was broken by your valour, became a terrour to those for whom they conquered. Then it was, that at the cost of other nations you informed and cultivated that valour which was to defend

" In 1657.
• June 17, 1658.