Page:Virgil's Pastorals, Georgics and Aeneis - Dryden (1709) - volume 2.djvu/20

 rather out of decency than Affection; and was Ambitious, as some yet can witness, to be acquainted with a Man, with whom I had the honour to converse, and that almost daily, for so many Years together. Heaven knows, if I have heartily forgiven you this deceit. You extorted a Praise which I shou'd willingly have given, had I known you. Nothing had been more easy, than to commend a Patron of a long standing. The World wou'd join with me, if the Encomiums were just; and if unjust, wou'd excuse a grateful Flatterer. But to come Anonymous upon me, and force me to commend you against my Interest, was not altogether so fair, give me leave to say, as it was Politick. For by concealing your Quality, you might clearly understand how your Work succeeded; and that the general Approbation was given to your Merit, not your Titles. Thus like Apelles you stood unseen behind your own Venus, and receiv'd the Praises of the passing Multitude: the Work was commended, not the Author: And I doubt not this was one of the most pleasing Adventures of your Life.

I have detain'd your Lordship longer than I intended in this Dispute of preference betwixt the Epick Poem, and the Drama: and yet have not formally answer'd any of the Arguments which are brought by Aristotle on the other side, and set in the fairest light by Dacier. But I suppose, without looking on the Book, I may have touch'd on some of the Objections. For in this Address to your Lordship, I design not a Treatise of Heroick Poetry, but write in a loose Epistolary way, somewhat tending to that Subject, after the Example of Horace, in his First Epistle of the Second Book to Augustus Cæsar, and of that to the Piso's, which we call his Art of Poetry. In both of which he observes no Method that I can trace, whatever Scaliger the Father, or Heinsius may have seen, or rather think they had