University Studies 



Vol. VII JANUARY 1907 No. 1 



I. — Drydcn and the Critical Canons of the EigJiteenth Century 



BY PROSSER HALL FRYE 



I 



Dryden's spirit, like that of the whole age which he deter- 

 mined, was largely, as we look at these matters nowadays, a prose 

 spirit. That is, it was marked by common sense or intelligence 

 more strongly than by fancy or imagination. In general terms 

 he may be defined as a man of parts who applied himself to the 

 business of letters. His lack of creative power is very conspicu- 

 ous. He never in all his plays made a character. His dramas 

 have no illusion. Even their mechanical construction is rather 

 rickety. His themes are usually suggested, and his materials 

 are frequently furnished in part, either by some other writer, as 

 in Amphitryon^ which is a clever compilation of Aloliere and 

 Plautus and in some respects better than either, or else by some 

 current truism or commonplace of the day. For this reason he 

 is at his best poetically in translation or in satire. For even in 

 poetry his chief merit is to say things in a downright manner, to 

 hit the nail on the head and hit it hard. This is no despicable 

 quality, to be sure, but it is on the whole a quality more proper 

 to prose than to poetry. 



Indeed, in Dryden's conception and practice poetry is very 

 nearly identical with propriety of thought and expression ; that 



University Studies, Vol VII, No. 1, January 1907. 



I 



