5. This passage alludes to an imitation of Horace, quaintly entitled an "Allusion to the Tenth Satire of his First Book" which was the production of Rochester. As however it appeared without a name, it may have been for a time imputed to some of the inferior wits, whom his Lordship patronized. It contains a warm attack on Dryden, part of which has been already quoted. Dryden probably knew the real author of this satire, although he chose to impute it to one of the "Zanies" of the great. At least it seems unlikely that he should take Crown for the author, as has been supposed by Mr Malone; for in the imitation we have these lines: For by that rule I might as well admit Crown's heavy scenes for poetry and wit. Crown could hardly be charged as author of a poem, in which this sarcasm occurred. 6. Alluding probably to the concluding lines of the Satire. I loath the rabble; 'tis enough for me If Sedley, Shadwell, Shepherd, Wycherley, Godolphin, Butler, Buckhurst, Buckingham, And some few more whom I omit to name, Approve my sense; I count their censure fame. 7. Dryden alludes to the censure past on himself, where it is said, Five hundred verses in a morning writ. Prove him no more a poet than a wit. 8. This refers to the characters of Shadwell and Wycherley, which according to Dryden, the satirist seems to have misunderstood. Of all our modern wits, none seems to me Once to have touched upon true comedy, But hasty Shadwell and slow Wycherley; Shadwell's unfinished works do yet impart Great proofs of force of nature, none of art. With just bold strokes he dashes here and there, Shewing great mastery with little care; But Wycherley earns hard whate'er he gains, He wants no judgment, and he spares no pains; He frequently excels, and, at the least, Makes fewer faults than any of the rest. 9. "I have chiefly considered the fable, or plot, which all conclude to be the soul of a tragedy, which, with the ancients, is all ways to be found a reasonable soul, but with us, for the most part, a brutish, and often worse than brutish. "And certainly there is not required much learning, or that a man must be some Aristotle and doctor of subtilties, to form a right judgement in this particular; common sense suffices; and rarely have I known women-judges mistaken in these points, where they have patience to think; and left to their own heads, they decide with their own sense. But if people are prepossessed, if they will judge of Rollo by Othello, and one crooked line by another, we can never have a certainty." The tragedies of the last age considered, in a letter to Fleetwood Shepherd, by Thomas Rymer, Edit. 1678, p. 4. PROLOGUE.