Page:Virgil's Pastorals, Georgics and Aeneis - Dryden (1709) - volume 2.djvu/81

 have discernment enough to prefer Virgil before any other Poet in the Latin Tongue. Such Spirits as he desir'd to please, such wou'd I chuse for my Judges, and wou'd stand or fall by them alone. Segrais has distinguish'd the Readers of Poetry, ac­cording to their capacity of judging, into three Classes: (He might have said the same of Writers too if he had pleas'd.) In the lowest Form he places those whom he calls Les Petits Esprits: such things as are our Upper-Gallery Audience in a Play-House; who like nothing but the Husk and Rhind of Wit; prefer a Quibble, a Conceit, an Epi­gram, before solid Sense, and Elegant Expression: These are Mobb-Readers: If Virgil and Martial stood for Parliament-Men, we know already who wou'd carry it. But though they make the greatest ap­pearance in the Field, and cry the loudest, the best on't is, they are but a sort of French Hugonots, or Dutch Boors, brought over in Herds, but not Naturaliz'd: who have not Land of two Pounds per Annum in Par­nassus, and therefore are not priviledg'd to Poll. Their Authors are of the same level; fit to represent them on a Mountebank's-Stage, or to be Masters of the Ceremonies in a Bear-Garden. Yet these are they who have the most Admirers. But it often happens, to their mortification, that as their Readers improve their Stock of Sense, (as they may by reading better Books, and by Conversation with Men of Judgment,) they soon forsake them: And when the Torrent from the Mountains falls no more, the swelling Writer is reduc'd into his shallow Bed, like the Mançanares at Madrid with scarce water to moisten his own Pebbles. There are a middle sort of Readers (as we hold there is a middle state of Souls) such as have a farther insight than the former; yet have not the capacity of judging right; (for I speak not of those who are brib'd by a Party, and know better if they were not corrupted;) but I mean a