Whoever, indeed, compares these notes with the _Essay on the Georgics_, and with the opinions expressed in the _Account of the English Poets_, will be convinced that the foundations of his critical method were laid at this period (1697). In the _Essay on the Georgics_ he seems to be timid in the presence of Virgil's superiority; his _Account of the English Poets_, besides being impregnated with the principles of taste prevalent after the Restoration, shows deficient powers of perception and appreciation. The name of Shakespeare is not mentioned in it, Dryden and Congreve alone being selected to represent the drama. Chaucer is described as "a merry bard," whose humour has become obsolete through time and change; while the rich pictorial fancy of the _Faery Queen_ is thus described: "Old Spenser next, warmed with poetic rage, In ancient tales amused a barbarous age-- An age that yet uncultivate and rude, Where'er the poet's fancy led pursued, Through pathless fields and unfrequented floods, To dens of dragons and enchanted woods. But now the mystic tale, that pleased of yore, Can charm an understanding age no more; The long-spun allegories fulsome grow, While the dull moral lies too plain below." According to Pope--always a suspicious witness where Addison is concerned--he had not read Spenser when he wrote this criticism on him.[7] Milton, as a legitimate successor of the classics, is of course appreciated, but not at all after the elaborate fashion of the _Spectator_; to Dryden, the most distinguished poet of the day, deserved compliments are paid, but their value is lessened by the exaggerated opinion which the writer entertains of Cowley, who is described as a "mighty genius," and is praised for the inexhaustible riches of his imagination. Throughout the poem, in fact, we observe a remarkable confusion of various veins of thought; an unjust depreciation of the Gothic grandeur of the older English poets; a just admiration for the Greek and Roman authors; a sense of the necessity of good sense and regularity in writings composed for an "understanding age;" and at the same time a lingering taste for the forced invention and far-fetched conceits that mark the decay of the spirit of mediæval chivalry. With the judgments expressed in this performance it is instructive to compare such criticisms on Shakespeare as we find in No. 42 of the _Spectator_, the papers on "Chevy Chase" (73, 74), and particularly the following passage: