Dryden's Relation to Germany 29 



Flogel and Blankenburg both include The Medal in their dis- 

 cussion of Dryden's satires. The former translates in part the 

 prefaced epistle to the Whigs, where Dryden tells them : " Rail at 

 me abundantly, and not to break a custom, do it without wit."^^ 



Schmid regards The Hind and the Panther a personal satire,'^® 

 directed against the Whigs ; and Flogel analyzes and discusses 

 it. Bouterwek ranks it above Religio Laid poetically, but thinks 

 it is so long that it becomes monotonous and is overburdened with 

 unpoetic historical references to the church and the politics of 

 England. ^° 



3. " Essay on the Origin and Progress of the Satire " 



The criticism of Germany was not only influenced by the satires 

 of Dryden, but also by the history and theory of the satire which 

 he presented in his treatise On the Origin and Progress of the 

 Satire (1693). This discourse contained a history of the satire 

 from the beginning; an exhaustive comparison of the satirists 

 Horace, Juvenal, and Persius, and his own theory as to the man- 

 ner of writing a satire. 



Dryden's treatise on the satire found its way into Germany 

 shortly after Lessing's publication of his translation of Dryden's 

 Essay on Dramatic Poesie. In 1762 it was translated and pub- 

 lished by Nicolai, Lessing's co-worker, in his Vermischten 

 Schriften which, as we shall see later, also contained Warton's 

 Essay on the Writings and Genius of Pope, and the translations 

 of some of the best English and French critical works. .The trans- 

 lation was most probably undertaken at Lessing's suggestion, as 

 Nicolai cooperated with him. It does not include the general and 

 personal matter in the beginning, and wisely omits the unessential 

 parenthetical phrases thrown in for illustration, as for instance, 

 " like my friend, ' The Plain Dealer.' " Nicolai's translation does 

 not lack in clearness for the German reader, but his style lacks the 



7'' Friedrich Bouterwek, Geschichte der Kiinste und Wisscnschaften, 

 Vol VIII, p. 48 ff. Gottingen, 1810. 



78 Loco Citato, II, p. 364. 



79 Ibid., p. 365. 



80 Loco citato, VIII, p. 49. 



