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Updated: June 12, 2025
Dryden, that love makes a man a rhimster, if not a poet. His dramatic works are, Aglaura, presented at a private House in Black Fryars. Langbaine says, 'that it was much prized in his Time; and that the last Act is so altered, that it is at the pleasure of the Actors to make it a Tragedy, or Tragi-Comedy.
Lived in the reign of Queen Elizabeth and King James I. He was an actor, as appears from the evidence of Mr. Kirkman, and likewise from a piece written by him called, The Actor's Vindication. Langbaine calls his plays second rate performances, but the wits of his time would not permit them to rank so high.
Langbaine has given a place to the earl of Stirling, a man of much inferior note; and that our author, though a Scotchman, wrote extremely pure and elegant English, and his life, that is fruitful of a great many incidents, without further apology, it is here presented to the reader.
I have not been able to ascertain the year in which this author died; but imagine from circumstances, that it must have been some time before the Restoration, and before the Year 1657, for the Sun's Darling, written between him and Decker was published in 1657, which Mr. Langbaine says, was after their Decease.
This play, though it bears the name of Alphonsus, was writ, as Langbaine supposes, in honour of the English nation, in the person of Richard, Earl of Cornwal, son to King John, and brother to Henry III. He was chosen King of the Romans in 1527. About this time Alphonsus, the French King was chosen by other electors.
Were a foreigner to form a notion of the merit of the English poets from reading Langbaine, they would be in raptures with Randolph and Durfey, and others of their class, while Dryden, and the first-rate wits, would be quite neglected; Langbaine is so far generous, that he does all he can to draw obscure men into light, but then he cannot be acquitted of envy, for endeavouring to shade the lustre of those whose genius has broke through obscurity without his means, and he does no service to his country while he confines his panegyric to mean versifiers, whom no body can read without a certain degree of contempt.
Langbaine cannot determine; for, says he, the imperfection of my copy hinders my information; for the foundation, it is built on history: See Josephus. Mr.
Langbaine and Aubrey both make the mistake of ascribing the third figure to Teague in "The Committee;" and in spite of Evelyn's clear statement, his editor in a note follows them in their blunder. done by Lacy, hath not half its life, by reason of the words, I suppose, not being understood, at least by me.
Langbaine has injuriously treated Mr. Dryden, on account of his dramatic performances, and charges him as a licentious plagiary. The truth is, our author as a dramatist is less eminent than in any other sphere of poetry; but, with all his faults, he is even in that respect the most eminent of his time.
The younger, a lawyer of Lincoln's Inn, published in 1615 "Satyrical Essayes, Characters, and others, or accurate and quick Descriptions fitted to the life of their Subjects." He had published two years before a play called "Cinthia's Revenge, or Maenander's Extasie," which Langbaine described as one of the longest he had ever read, and the most tedious.
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