The solemn inauguration of Shadwell as his successor in this drowsy kingdom, forms the plan of the poem; being the same which Pope afterwards adopted on a broader canvas for his "Dunciad." The vices and follies of Shadwell are not concealed, while the awkwardness of his pretensions to poetical fame are held up to the keenest ridicule. In an evil hour, leaving the composition of low comedy, in which he held an honourable station, he adventured upon the composition of operas and pastorals. On these the satirist falls without mercy; and ridicules, at the same time, his pretensions to copy Ben Jonson: "Nor let false friends seduce thy mind to fame, By arrogating Jonson's hostile name; Let father Flecknoe fire thy mind with praise, And uncle Ogleby thy envy raise. Thou art my blood, where Jonson has no part: What share have we in nature or in art? Where did his wit on learning fix a brand, And rail at arts he did not understand? Where made he love in Prince Nicander's vein, Or swept the dust in Psyche's humble strain?" This unmerciful satire was sold off in a very short time; and it seems uncertain whether it was again published until 1084, when it appeared with the author's name in Tonson's first Miscellany. It would seem that Dryden did not at first avow it, though, as the title-page assigned it to the author of "Absalom and Achitophel," we cannot believe Shadwell's assertion, that he had denied it with oaths and imprecations. Dryden, however, omits this satire in the [first [23]] printed list of his plays and poems, along with the Eulogy on Cromwell. But he was so far from disowning it, that, in his "Essay on Satire," he quotes "Mac-Flecknoe" as an instance given by himself of the Varronian satire. Poor Shadwell was extremely disturbed by this attack upon him; the more so, as he seems hardly to have understood its tendency. He seriously complains, that he is represented by Dryden as an Irishman, "when he knows that I never saw Ireland till I was three-and-twenty years old, and was there but for four months." He had understood Dryden's parable literally; so true it is, that a knavish speech sleeps in a foolish ear.