John Dennis 1657-1734 Son of a London saddler, after education at Harrow and at Caius College, Cambridge, travelled in France and Italy, and began his career as a writer in the reign of William III., with "The Passion of Byblis" in 1692, and in the same year "The Impartial Critic; or, some Observations on Mr. Rymer's late Book, entitled a Short View of Tragedy." In 1693 Dennis published "Miscellanies in Verse and Prose." In 1695 he published a poem, "The Court of Death," on the death of Queen Mary; and in 1696, "Letters on Milton and Congreve," and "Letters upon Several Occasions, Written by and between Mr. Wycherley, Mr. Dryden, Mr. Moyle, Mr. Congreve, and Mr. Dennis;" also adverse "Remarks" on Blackmore's "Prince Arthur. In 1697 he published "Miscellaneous Poems;" in 1698 "The Usefulness of the Stage to the Happiness of Mankind, to Government, and to Religion, occasioned by a late Book written by Jeremy Collier, M. A. ;" in 1701 a little treatise on the "Advancement and Reformation of Modern Poetry;" and in 1702 an "Essay on the Navy," a tract against Sacheverell's party, "Priestcraft dangerous to Religion and Government," a volume of collected "Works," and, on the death of William III., a poem sacred to his memory, "The Monument." He produced plays also, poor ones: "A Plot and No Plot," in 1697; "Rinaldo and Armida," in 1699; in 1702, "Iphigenia," and "The Comical Gallant; or, the Amours of Sir John Falstaff, with an Essay on Taste in Poetry." In 1711 he attacked Pope in "Reflections Critical and Satirical upon a late Rhapsody called An Essay on Criticism:" and in 1713, on the production of Addison's Cato, Dennis appeared as a hostile critic, with "Remarks upon Cato, a Tragedy." In 1718 Dennis's "Letters" were published in two volumes; and in the same year his "Select Works," consisting of plays, poems, etc., likewise in two volumes. -MORLEY, HENRY, 1879, A Manual of English Literature, ed. Tyler, pp. 511, 512. Like some fierce tyrant in old tapestry. I observed his room was hung with old tapestry, which had several holes in it, caused, as the old woman informed me, by his having cut out of it the heads of divers tyrants, the fierceness of whose visages had much provoked him. On all sides of his room were pinned a great many sheets of a tragedy called Cato, with notes on the margin with his own hand. The words absurd, monstrous, execrable, were everywhere written in such large characters, that I could read them without my spectacles. By the fireside lay three farthings worth of small coal in a Spectator, and behind the door huge heaps of papers of the same title, which his nurse informed me she had conveyed thither out of his sight, believing they were books of the black art; for her master never read in them, but he was either quite moped, or in raving fits. There was nothing neat in the whole room, except some books on his shelves, very well bound and gilded, whose names I had never before heard of, nor I believe were anywhere else to be found; such as "Gibraltar, a Comedy;" "Remarks on Prince. Arthur;" "The Grounds of Criticism in Poetry;" "An Essay on Public Spirit." The only one I had any knowledge of was a "Paradise Lost," interleaved. The whole floor was covered with manuscripts, as thick as a pastry-cook's shop on a Christmas eve. On his table were some ends of verse and of candles; a gallipot of ink with a yellow pen in it, and a pot of half dead ale covered with a Longinus. -POPE, ALEXANDER? 1713, The Narrative of Dr. Robert Norris; Works, ed. Elwin and Courthope, vol. x, p. 453. His motion is quick and sudden, turning on all sides, with a suspicion of every object, as if he had done or feared some extraordinary mischief. extraordinary mischief. You see wickedness in his meaning, but folly of countenance, that betrays him to be unfit for the execution of it. He starts, stares, and looks round him. This constant shuffle of haste without speed, makes the man thought a little touched; but the vacant look of his two eyes gives you to understand that he could never run out of his wits, which seemed not so much to be lost, as to want employment; they are not so much astray, as they are a wool-gathering. He has the face and surliness of a mastiff, which has often saved him from being treated like a cur, till some more sagacious than ordinary found his nature, and used him accordingly. Unhappy being! terrible without, fearful within! Not a wolf in sheep's clothing, but a sheep in a wolf's.-STEELE, RICHARD, 1720, The Theatre; Disraeli, Calamities of Authors. Say what revenge on Dennis can be had, Too dull for laughter, for reply too mad. On one so poor you cannot take the law, On one so old your sword you scorn to draw. Uncaged then, let the harmless monster rage, Secure in dullness, madness, want, and age! sit at a table or enter a coffee-house without exerting the despotism of a literary dictator. How could the mind that had devoted itself to the contemplation of masterpieces, only to reward its industry by detailing to the public their human frailties, experience one hour of amenity, one idea of grace, one generous impulse of sensibility? But the poor critic himself at length fell, really more the victim of his criticism than the genius he had insulted. Having incurred the public neglect, the blind and helpless Cacus in his den sunk fast into contempt, dragged on a life of misery, and in his last days, scarcely vomiting his fire and smoke, became the most pitiable creature, receiving the alms he craved from triumphant genius.DISRAELI, ISAAC, 1812-13, Influence of a Bad Temper in Criticism, Calamities of Authors. The great opportunities for success and self-praise offered by the stage, it is to be -SAVAGE, RICHARD, ? 1731, Grub Street feared, engender more of malice, hatred, Adieu! unsocial excellence! at last Thy foes are vanquish'd, and thy fears are pass'd: Want, the grim recompense of truth like thine, Shall now no longer dim thy destined shine. His reason dies not--and has friends to find! Though here, revenge and pride withheld his praise, No wrongs shall reach him through his future days: and ill-will than is found in other professions. There is an episode, in which Pope figured, which gathers these vices into a small compass in an incredible way. Dennis, the savage critic, grown old and reduced to poverty, was to have a benefit, and bethought him that if he could get his old enemy's (Pope's) patronage for the performance, it would bring money and company. What follows Voltaire might have described. The old critic declared that he knew how to get him to consent. He knew pretty well the vanity of the little gentleman, and would, therefore, solicit him to write a prologue, and that he was sure, notwithstanding their mutual enmity, the reputation of appearing charitable would readily induce him to undertake it. He was not deceived. Pope consented, and the play, thus The rising ages shall redeem his name; It was not literature, then, that made the mind coarse, brutalising the habits and inflaming the style of Dennis. He had thrown himself among the walks of genius, and aspired to fix himself on a throne to which Nature had refused him a legitimate claim. What a lasting source of vexation and rage, even for a longlived patriarch of criticism! Accustomed to suspend the scourge over the heads of the first authors of the age, he could not while the virtue of forgiveness of enemies was loudly chanted to Pope's honour. Both the world, however, and Dennis were deceived, for the prologue was couched in such terms that every line contained some fine ironical stroke of satire against the poor devil he professed to serve.FITZGERALD, PERCY, 1882, A New History of the English Stage, vol. 1, p. 323. The careers of Rymer and Dennis are amongst the saddest and most deplorable stories to be found in the annals of English literature. If industry-ever deserved an acknowledgement, these two men deserved it. If they were not exactly buried in paupers' graves, they at all events spent their last days in great misery and misery in the earliest part of the last century is not conceivable to the "general reader" of to-day.-ROBERTS, WILLIAM, 1889, Two Eighteenth Century Critics, The Bookworm, vol. 2, p. 150. GENERAL How chang'd from him who made the boxes groan, And shook the Stage with Thunders all his own! Stood up to dash each vain PRETENDER'S Maul the French Tyrant, or pull down the If there's a Briton then, true bred and born, scorn: If there's a Critic of distinguished rage;" -POPE, ALEXANDER, 1733, A Prologue Mr. Dennis, considered as a dramatic writer, makes not so good a figure as in his critical works; he understood the rules of writing, but it is not in the power of every one to carry their own theory into execution. There is one error which he endeavoured to reform, very material for the interest of dramatic poetry. He saw, with concern, that love had got the entire possession of the tragic stage, contrary to the authority of the ancients, and the example of Shakespear. He resolved. therefore to deviate a little from the reigning practice, and not to make his heroes such whining slaves in their amours, which not only debases the majesty of tragedy, but confounds most of the principal characters, by making that passion the predominant quality in all. But he did not think it safe at once to shew his principal characters wholly exempt from it, lest so great and sudden a transition should prove disagreeable. He rather chose to steer a middle course, and make love appear violent, but yet to be subdued by reason, and give way to the influence of some other more noble passion; as in Rinaldo, to Glory; in Iphigenia, to Friendship; and in Liberty Asserted, to the Public Good.-CIBBER, THEOPHILUS, 1753, Lives of the Poets, vol. IV, p. 235. The universality of applause, however it might quell the censure of common mortals, had no other effect than to harden Dennis in fixed dislike; but his dislike was not merely capricious. He found and shewed many faults; he shewed them indeed with anger, but he found them indeed with acuteness, such as ought to rescue his criticism from oblivion; though, at last, it will have no other life than it derives from the work which it endeavours to oppress.- JOHNSON, SAMUEL, 1779-81, Addison, Lives of the Poets. Pope and Addison had a Dennis; and Dennis, if I mistake not, held up as he had been to scorn and detestation, was a sensible fellow, and passed some censures upon both those writers that, had they been less just, would have hurt them less. -COWPER, WILLIAM, 1786, Letter to Rev. Walter Bagot, July 4. His poetry and politics are now but little regarded; yet, from Dr. Johnson's frequent and long extracts from his critical pieces, it may be fairly presumed, that he did not think meanly of them; and such readers as will not suffer their judgment to be run away with by a regard for names, will think, that even "Cato" itself, was indebted to the enthusiasm of party at the time, for getting rid so easily of Dennis's strictures. He is, perhaps, one of those authors who have not had justice done to them. Dennis was overwhelmed in his own time, and has never been able to recover himself since.NOBLE, MARK, 1806, A Biographical History of England, vol. II, p. 257. Dennis could not be carried beyond the cold line of a precedent, and before he ventured to be pleased, he was compelled to look into Aristotle. His learning was the bigotry of literature. It was ever Aristotle explained by Dennis. But in the explanation of the obscure text of his master, he was led into such frivolous distinctions, and tasteless propositions, that his works deserve inspection, as examples of the manner of a true mechanical critic.-DISRAELI, ISAAC, 1812-13, Influence of a Bad Temper in Criticism, Calamities of Authors. His credit with the public in his day was at least as great as that of Rymer, the formidable champion who had threatened destruction to the "Paradise Lost" in 1677.-GODWIN, WILLIAM, 1815, Lives of Edward and John Philips, ch. xi. We must not forget, that Mr. Dennis laid claims to public esteem, not only as a critic, but as a wit, a politician, and a poet. In the first and the last of these characters, he can receive but little praise, His attempts at gaiety and humour are weighty and awkward, almost without example. His poetry can only be described by negatives; it is not inharmonious, nor irregular, nor often turgid-for the author, too nice to sink into the mean, and too timid to rise into the bombastic, dwells in elaborate "decencies for ever.' He was a true-hearted Englishman with the legitimate prejudices of his country, warmly attached to the principles of the Revolution, detesting the French, abominating the Italian opera, and deprecating as heartily the triumph of the Pretender, as the success of a rival's tragedy. His political treatises, though not very elegantly finished, are made of sturdy and lasting materials. He appears, from some passages in his letters, to have cherished a genuine love of nature, and to have turned, with eager delight, to her deep and quiet solitudes, for refreshment from the feverish excitements, the vexatious defeats, and the barren triumphs, of his critical career.-TALFOURD, THOMAS, NOON, 1820, John Dennis's Works, Retrospective Review, vol. 1, p. 306. The fiercest oppugner of puns in ancient or modern times.--LAMB, CHARLES, 1826, Popular Fallacies. He carried heavier metal than Gildon; but he nevertheless belonged to the cuckoo school of "rules of art.”—KNIGHT, CHARLES, 1849, Studies of Shakspere. Steele one time gave the title of hangman of the gospel to a furious preacher. He might have called John Dennis the hangman of literature. Indeed he was worse than the hangman, who merely executes a painful but necessary duty. Dennis, on the contrary, indulged in wanton cruelty, and if he had been the functionary referred to, would have treated his victim to a preliminary rehearsal of his office before executing it. ---MONTGOMERY, HENRY R., 1862, Memoirs of the Life and Writings of Sir Richard Steele, vol. II, p. 47. One of Pope's typical dunces, a dull man outside of his own sphere, as men are apt to be, but who had some sound notions as a critic, and thus became the object of Pope's fear and therefore of his resentment.-LOWELL, JAMES RUSSELL, 1868-90, Dryden, Prose Works, Riverside ed., vol. III, p. 190. John Dennis was one of those old campaigners who can boast more scars than laurels; but with whom a long experience in the wars goes to supply the want of regular training or native capacity. As an original author, he occupied a place among the rank and file of his contemporaries. He wrote or altered nine dramatic pieces, among which two comedies are said by an indefatigable and conscientious searcher of such wares to display considerable merit. As a critic, he undoubtedly possessed certain characteristics which would have ensured him the prominence he coveted even in our own times. He was free from that sentiment which with the generality of critics so fatally interferes with a due exercise of the judicial faculty-a respect for success. Indeed he avowed it as his guiding principle in the choice of his victims, to select leading instances of unmerited popularity. -WARD, ADOLPHUS WILLIAM, 1869, ed. Poetical Works of Alexander Pope, Introductory Memoir, p. xxiv. A writer of turgid plays, and of ferocious but not always wholly unjust eritiques. WILLIAMS, HOWARD, 1886, English Letters and Letter-Writers of the Eighteenth Century, p. 282. In the literary matters he was a born dissenter. He belonged by nature to the opposition, and the cardinal principle upon which he acted was to find fault with any view that had met with general approval. He could not fail to be at times right.-LOUNSBURY, THOMAS R., 1891, Studies in Chaucer, vol. III, p. 141. Dennis has been resolutely misjudged, in consequence of his foolish attitude towards his younger contemporaries in old age, but in his prime he was a writer of excellent judgment. He was the first English critic to do unstinted justice to Milton and to Molière, and he was a powerful factor in preparing public opinion for the literary verdicts of Addison. GOSSE, EDMUND, 1897, Short History of Modern English Literature p. 200. Roger North 1653-1734 Born 1653: died 1734. An English historian, sixth son of Dudley North, fourth Baron North. He was attorney-general to the queen (Mary of Modena). He wrote the abusive "Examen" of White Kennett's "History of England" (1740), the "Lives" of his brothers, "A Discourse on the Study of the Laws" (first printed in 1824), "Memoirs of Music" (first printed in 1846), etc. He is one of the chief authorities on the history of the reigns of Charles II. and James II., and is remembered for his partizanship toward his brothers.-SMITH, BENJAMIN E., ed., 1894-97, The Century Cyclopaedia of Names, p. 743. PERSONAL Roger North was in no respect a famous man. His estimate of himself, that he was "a plant of a slow growth, and when mature but slight wood and of a flashy growth," is perhaps over-modest, and yet it is evidently not far from the mark. During his early manhood he was, so to speak, in tutelage to his brothers: to John, the future master of Trinity, while at Cambridge; to Francis, the lord chief justice and lord keeper, while at the bar. He never occupied any prominent position, and his fairly successful professional career was the result not so much of his own merit as of his position as "favourite" to the great and successful lawyer, the "bond of the faggot." His mind, though active and from boyhood ingenious, was not very powerful; and though his senses were unsealed and his judgment clear, and though he participated fully in the general zeal for culture which marked the period, his professional duties left him little time to become more than an interested and interesting student of music, mathematics, morals, politics, and a score of other subjects.-AIRY, OSMUND, 1888, The English Historical Review, vol. 3, p. 174. Roger North was held in great and increasing respect by his neighbours as an authority on questions of law, and was frequently consulted by the magnates of the county, and sometimes chosen to arbitrate when disputes arose. On one occasion he was called in to settle some difference between Sir Robert Walpole and his mother. The country people called him "Solomon," as in his early days the pamphleteers had styled him "Roger the Fiddler." He retained his vigour and brightness of intellect to the last, and one of his latest letters was written when he was nearly eighty years old, in answer to some one who had applied to him for advice as to Francis, Lord Keeper Guilford, was younger son of the lord North before mentioned. Burnet and Kennet have given no very favourable character of the keeper: his relation, Roger North, has defended him in a very bulky work; which, however, does not contribute much to raise our ideas either of the writer or his subject. If that performance and its companion, the Examen, had nothing else ridiculous in them, it would be sufficient to blast their reputation, that they aim at decrying that excellent magistrate, the lord chief justice Hale; and that Charles the second, and that wretch the duke of Lauderdale, the king's taking money from France, and the seizure of the charter of London, are some of the men, and some of the measures, the author defends! It is very remarkable that two peers of this race have suffered by apologies written for them by two of their own relations; but with this difference naturally attending the performances of a sensible man and a weak one: Dudley, lord North, has shown himself an artful and elegant historian; Roger North, a miserable biographer.-WALPOLE, HORACE, 1758-1806, A Catalogue of the Royal and Noble Authors of England, Scotland and Ireland, ed. Parke, vol. III, p. 295, and note. Roger North's life of his brother, the lord Keeper, is the most valuable specimen of this class of our literature; it is delightful, and much beyond any other of |