ncy, in Blank Verse; may want it as well, in Rhyme: and he
who has it, will avoid errors in both kinds [pp. 498, 571], Latin Verse
was as great a confinement to the imagination of those poets, as Rhyme to
ours: and yet, you find OVID saying too much on every subject.

"_Nescivit_, says SENECA, _quod bene cessit relinquere_: of which he
[OVID] gives you one famous instance in his description of the Deluge.

"_Omnia pontus erat, deerant quoque litora ponto._
Now all was sea; nor had that sea a shore.

"Thus OVID's Fancy was not limited by Verse; and VIRGIL needed not Verse
to have bounded his.

"In our own language, we see BEN. JOHNSON confining himself to what ought
to be said, even in the liberty of Blank Verse; and yet CORNEILLE, the
most judicious of the French poets, is still varying the same Sense a
hundred ways, and dwelling eternally upon the same subject, though
confined by Rhyme.

"Some other exceptions, I have to Verse; but these I have named, being,
for the most part, already public: I conceive it reasonable they should,
first, be answered."

"It concerns me less than any," said NEANDER, seeing he had ended, "to
reply to this discourse, because when I should have proved that Verse may
be _natural_ in Plays; yet I should always be ready to confess that those
which I [_i.e., DRYDEN, see_ pp. 503, 566] have written in this kind,
come short of that perfection which is required. Yet since you are
pleased I should undertake this province, I will do it: though, with all
imaginable respect and deference both to that Person [_i.e., SIR ROBERT
HOWARD, see_ p. 494] from whom you have borrowed your strongest
arguments; and to whose judgement, when I have said all, I finally submit.

"But before I proceed to answer your objections; I must first remember
you, that I exclude all Comedy from my defence; and next, that I deny not
but Blank Verse may be also used: and content myself only to assert that
_in serious Plays_, where the Subject and Characters are great, and the
Plot unmixed with mirth (which might allay or divert these concernments
which are produced), _Rhyme is there, as natural, and more effectual than
Blank Verse_.

"And now having laid down this as a foundation: to begin with CRITES, I
must crave leave to tell him, that some of his arguments against Rhyme,
reach no farther that from _the faults or defects of ill Rhyme_ to
conclude against _the use of it in general_ [p. 598]. May not I conclude
a