panies.

Dryden was now to do a new homage to Shakespeare, by refitting for the
stage the play of "Troilus and Cressida," which the author left in a
state of strange imperfection, resembling more a chronicle, or legend,
than a dramatic piece. Yet it may be disputed whether Dryden has greatly
improved it even in the particulars which he censures in his original.
His plot, though more artificial, is at the same time more trite than
that of Shakespeare. The device by which Troilus is led to doubt the
constancy of Cressida is much less natural than that she should have
been actually inconstant; her vindication by suicide is a clumsy, as
well as a hackneyed expedient; and there is too much drum and trumpet in
the grand _finale_, where "Troilus and Diomede fight, and both parties
engage at the same time. The Trojans make the Greeks retire, and Troilus
makes Diomede give ground, and hurts him. Trumpets sound. Achilles
enters with his Myrmidons, on the backs of the Trojans, who fight in a
ring, encompassed round. Troilus, singling Diomede, gets him down, and
kills him; and Achilles kills Troilus upon him. All the Trojans die upon
the place, Troilus last." Such a _bellum internecinum_ can never be
waged to advantage upon the stage. One extravagant passage in this play
serves strongly to evince Dryden's rooted dislike to the clergy. Troilus
exclaims,--

"That I should trust the daughter of a priest!
Priesthood, that makes a merchandise of heaven!
Priesthood, that sells even to their prayers and blessings,
And forces us to pay for our own cozenage!

_Thersites_. Nay, cheats heaven too with entrails and with offals;
Gives it the garbage of a sacrifice,
And keeps the best for private luxury.

Troilus_. Thou hast deserved thy life for cursing priests.
Let me embrace thee; thou art beautiful:
That back, that nose, those eyes are beautiful:
Live; thou art honest, for thou hat'st a priest."

Dryden prefixed to "Troilus and Cressida" his excellent remarks on the
Grounds of Criticism in Tragedy, giving up, with dignified indifference
the faults even of his own pieces, when they contradict the rules his
later judgment had adopted. How much his taste had altered since his
"Essay of Dramatic Poesy," or at least since his "Remarks on Heroic
Plays," will appear from the following abridgment of his new maxims. The
plot, according to these remarks, ought to be simply and naturally
detailed from its commencement to it