Page:The Lives of the Most Eminent English Poets, Volume 2.djvu/183

Rh Of the images which the two following citations afford, the first is elegant, the second magnificent; whether either be just, let the reader judge:
 * What precious drops are these,

Which silently each other's track pursue, Bright as young diamonds in their infant dew? Resign your castle —Enter, brave Sir; for, when you speak the word, The gates shall open of their own accord; The genius of the place its Lord shall meet, And bow its towery forehead at your feet. These bursts of extravagance Dryden calls the "Dalilahs" of the Theatre; and owns that many noisy lines of Maximin and Almanzor call out for vengeance upon him; "but I knew," says he, "that they were bad enough to please, even when I wrote them." There is surely reason to suspect that he pleased himself as well as the audience; and that these, like the harlots of other men, had his love, though not his approbation.

He had sometimes faults of a less generous and splendid kind. He makes, like Rh