"
[43] [This list requires a certain amount of correction and completion.
In the Appendix to the present edition (vol. xviii.) a separate article
will be given to it.--ED.]
SECTION VII.
_State of Dryden's Connections in Society after the Revolution--Juvenal
and Persius--Smaller Pieces--Eleonora--Third Miscellany--Virgil--Ode to
St. Cecilia--Dispute with Milbourne--With Blackmore--Fables--The
Author's Death and Funeral--His private Character--Notices of his
Family._
The evil consequences of the Revolution upon Dryden's character and
fortunes began to abate sensibly within a year or two after that event.
It is well known, that King William's popularity was as short-lived as
it had been universal. All parties gradually drew off from the king,
under their ancient standards. The clergy returned to their maxims of
hereditary right, the Tories to their attachment to the house of Stuart,
the Whigs to their jealousy of the royal authority. Dryden, we have
already observed, so lately left in a small and detested party, was now
among multitudes who, from whatever contradictory motives, were joined
in opposition to the government and some of his kinsmen; particularly
with John Driden of Chesterton, his first cousin; with whom, till his
death, he lived upon terms of uninterrupted friendship. The influence of
Clarendon and Rochester, the Queen's uncles, were, we have seen, often
exerted in the poet's favour; and through them, he became connected with
the powerful families with which they were allied.
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