him as an Indian Prince, and not expect any other eloquence from his
simplicity, than what his griefs have furnished him withal. His story
is, perhaps, the greatest which was ever represented in a poem of this
nature; the action of it including the discovery and conquest of a new
world. In it I have neither wholly followed the truth of the history,
nor altogether left it; but have taken all the liberty of a poet,
to add, alter, or diminish, as I thought might best conduce to
the beautifying of my work: it being not the business of a poet to
represent historical truth, but probability. But I am not to make
the justification of this poem, which I wholly leave to your grace's
mercy. It is an irregular piece, if compared with many of Corneille's,
and, if I may make a judgment of it, written with more flame than art;
in which it represents the mind and intentions of the author, who is
with much more zeal and integrity, than design and artifice,

MADAM,
Your Grace's most obedient,
And most obliged servant,
JOHN DRYDEN,
_October_ 12. 1667.

Betwixt 1664, when our author assisted Sir Robert Howard in composing
the preceding play, and the printing of the Indian Emperor in 1668,
some disagreement had arisen betwixt them. Sir Robert appears to have
given the first provocation, by prefixing to his tragedy of the Duke
of Lerma, or Great Favourite, in 1668, some remarks, which drew down
the following severe retort. It is therefore necessary to mention the
contents of the offensive preface.

Sir Robert Howard begins, as one taking leave of the drama and
dramatic authors, "his too long acquaintances;" and unwilling again to
venture "into the civil wars of Censure,

_Ubi--Nullos habitura triumphos_."

He states his unwilling interference to be owing to the "unnecessary
understanding" of some, who endeavoured to apply as strict rules to
poetry as mathematics, which rendered it incumbent on him to justify
his having written some scenes of his tragedy in blank verse. In the
next paragraph, Dryden is expressly pointed out as the author of the
Essay on Dramatic Poetry; and is ridiculed for attempting to prove,
not that rhyme is more natural in a dialogue on the stage supposed to
be spoken _extempore_, but grander and more expressive. In like
manner, Sir Robert unfortunately banters our author for drawing from
Seneca an instance of a lofty mode of expressing so ordinary a thing
as _shutting a door_[A], instead of giving an examp