12. JOHN DRYDEN (+1631-1700+), the greatest of our poets in the second rank, was born at Aldwincle, in Northamptonshire, in the year 1631. He was descended from Puritan ancestors on both sides of his house. He was educated at Westminster School, and at Trinity College, Cambridge. London became his settled abode in the year 1657. At the Restoration, in 1660, he became an ardent Royalist; and, in the year 1663, he married the daughter of a Royalist nobleman, the Earl of Berkshire. It was not a happy marriage; the lady, on the one hand, had a violent temper, and, on the other, did not care a straw for the literary pursuits of her husband. In 1666 he wrote his first long poem, the +Annus Mirabilis+ (“The Wonderful Year”), in which he paints the war with Holland, and the Fire of London; and from this date his life is “one long literary labour.” In 1670, he received the double appointment of Historiographer-Royal and Poet-Laureate. Up to the year 1681, his work lay chiefly in writing plays for the theatre; and these plays were written in rhymed verse, in imitation of the French plays; for, from the date of the Restoration, French influence was paramount both in literature and in fashion. But in this year he published the first part of +Absalom and Achitophel+-- one of the most powerful satires in the language. In the year 1683 he was appointed Collector of Customs in the port of London-- a post which Chaucer had held before him. (It is worthy of note that Dryden “translated” the Tales of Chaucer into modern English.) At the accession of James II., in 1685, Dryden became a Roman Catholic; most certainly neither for gain nor out of gratitude, but from conviction. In 1687, appeared his poem of +The Hind and the Panther+, in which he defends his new creed. He had, a few years before, brought out another poem called +Religio Laici+ (“A Layman’s Faith”), which was a defence of the Church of England and of her position in religion. In +The Hind and the Panther+, the Hind represents the Roman Catholic Church, “a milk-white hind, unspotted and unchanged,” the Panther the Church of England; and the two beasts reply to each other in all the arguments used by controversialists on these two sides. When the Revolution of 1688 took place, and James II. had to flee the kingdom, Dryden lost both his offices and the pension he had from the Crown. Nothing daunted, he set to work once more. Again he wrote for the stage; but the last years of his life were spent chiefly in translation. He translated passages from Homer, Ovid, and from some Italian writers; but his most important work was the translation of the whole of Virgil’s +Æneid+. To the last he retained his fire and vigour, action and rush of verse; and some of his greatest lyric poems belong to his later years. His ode called +Alexander’s Feast+ was written at the age of sixty-six; and it was written at one sitting. At the age of sixty-nine he was