To all and singular in this full meeting, Ladies and gallants, Phoebus sends ye greeting. To all his sons, by whate'er title known, Whether of court, or coffee-house, or town; From his most mighty sons, whose confidence Is placed in lofty sound, and humble sense, Even to his little infants of the time, Who write new songs, and trust in tune and rhyme: Be't known, that Phoebus (being daily grieved To see good plays condemned, and bad received) Ordains, your judgment upon every cause, Henceforth, be limited by wholesome laws. He first thinks fit no sonnetteer advance His censure, farther than the song or dance. Your wit burlesque may one step higher climb, And in his sphere may judge all doggrel rhyme: All proves, and moves, and loves, and honours too; All that appears high sense, and scarce is low. As for the coffee-wits, he says not much; Their proper business is to damn the Dutch: For the great dons of wit-- Phoebus gives them full privilege alone, To damn all others, and cry up their own. Last, for the ladies, 'tis Apollo's will, They should have power to save, but not to kill: For love and he long since have thought it fit, Wit live by beauty, beauty reign by wit. SECRET LOVE; OR, THE MAIDEN QUEEN. _Vitiis nemo sine nascitur; optimus ille Qui minimis urgetur_. HORAT. THE MAIDEN QUEEN The Maiden Queen is said, by Langbaine, to be founded upon certain passages in "The Grand Cyrus," and in "Ibrahim, the illustrious Bassa." Few readers will probably take the trouble of consulting these huge volumes, for the purpose of ascertaining the truth of this charge. Even our duty, as editors, cannot impel us to the task; satisfied, as we are, that, since these ponderous folios at that time loaded every toilette, Dryden can hardly have taken more from such well-known sources, than the mere outline of the story. Indeed, to a certain degree, the foundation of the plot, upon a story in the "Cyrus," is admitted by the author. The character of the queen is admirably drawn, and the catastrophe is brought very artfully forward; the uncertainty, as to her final decision, continuing till the last moment. In this, as in all our author's plays, some passages of beautiful poetry occur in the dialogue; as, for example, the scene in act 3d betwixt Philocles and Candiope. The characters, excepting that of the Maiden Queen herself, are lame and uninteresting. Philocles, in particular, has neither enough of love to make him despise ambition, nor enough of ambition to make him break the fetters of love. We might have admired him, had he been constant; or sympathised with him, had he sinned against his affections, and repented; but there is nothing interesting in the vacillations of his indecision. The comic part of the play contains much of what was thought wit in the reign of Charles II.; for marriage is railed against, and a male and female rake join in extolling the pleasures of a single life, even while the usage of