=1. Poetry.= (_a_) _The Lyric._ The form of the lyric shows little change. In bulk it is inconsiderable, for the lyrical spirit is largely in abeyance. Outside Dryden, who is the best example of the lyrical bard, we have the slight work of the courtiers, the =Earl of Dorset (1637–1706)=, the =Earl of Rochester (1647–80)=, and =Sir Charles Sedley (16391701)=. These were fashionable men, taking their poetry with fashionable irresponsibility. Their poems, which nearly all deal with the love-theme in an artificial manner, have a decided charm and skill, being modeled on the Caroline poems that were the mode before the Civil War. Of real originality there is hardly a trace. (_b_) _The Ode._ Once more Dryden towers pre-eminent in this class of poem. His two odes on the anniversary of St. Cecilia’s Day and his other ode on the death of Mrs. Anne Killigrew are among the best of any period. Written in the irregular Pindaric meter, they are full of the high passion that gives the artificial medium some real fire and energy. We give the opening lines of the elegiac poem: Thou youngest Virgin-Daughter of the skies, Made in the last promotion of the blest; Whose palms, new plucked from Paradise, In spreading branches more sublimely rise, Rich with immortal green above the rest: Whether, adopted to some neighbouring star, Thou roll’st above us in thy wandering race, Or in procession fixed and regular Moved with the heaven’s majestic pace, Or called to more superior bliss, Thou tread’st with seraphim the vast abyss. (_c_) _The Satire._ Several circumstances combined to make this age abound in satirical writing. It was a period of bitter political and personal contention, of easy morals and subdued enthusiasms, of sharp wit and acute discrimination. For these reasons satire acquired a new importance and a sharper edge. The older satire, such as is represented in the poems of Donne and of Andrew Marvell (1621–78), was of a more general kind, and seemed to have been written with deliberate clumsiness and obscurity. These habits were repugnant to the ideals of the new age, whose satire is more personal and more vindictive. Its effect is immensely more incisive, and it obtains a new freshness and point by the use of the heroic couplet, in which it is almost wholly written. Dryden’s _Absalom and Achitophel_ is an excellent example of the political satire, while his _MacFlecknoe_ shows the personal type. Literary satire is also well represented in _The Rehearsal_ (1671), which parodied the literary vices of the time, especially those of the heroic play. This work, which was reproduced year after year, with topical hits in every new edition, was the work of several hands, though the Duke of Buckingham receives the chief credit. Butler’s _Hudibras_ is a satire on the Puritans. The miscellaneous satire of John Oldham (1653–83) had much of the earlier clumsiness.