It cannot be supposed that the poet viewed
without anxiety the crisis while yet at a distance; and perhaps his own
tale of the Swallows may have begun to bear, even to the author, the air
of a prophecy. He is said, in an obscure libel, to have been among those
courtiers who encouraged, by frequent visits, the camp on Hounslow
Heath,[28] upon which the king had grounded his hopes of subduing the
contumacy of his subjects, and repelling the invasion of the Prince of
Orange. If so, he must there have learned how unwilling the troops were
to second their monarch in his unpopular and unconstitutional attempts;
and must have sadly anticipated the event of a struggle between a king
and his whole people. When this memorable catastrophe had taken place,
our author found himself at once exposed to all the insult, calumny, and
sarcasm with which a successful party in politics never fail to
overwhelm their discomfited adversaries But, what he must have felt yet
more severely, the unpopularity of his religion and principles rendered
it not merely unsafe, but absolutely impossible, for him to make
retaliation His powers of satire, at this period, were of no more use to
Dryden than a sword to a man who cannot draw it; only serving to render
the pleasure of insulting him more poignant to his enemies, and the
necessity of passive submission more bitter to himself. Of the numerous
satires, libels, songs, parodies, and pasquinades, which solemnised the
downfall of Popery and of James, Dryden had not only some exclusively
dedicated to his case, but engaged a portion, more or less, of almost
every one which appeared.
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