Dryden regards as not seriously disputable the
opinion "that the sweetness of English verse was never understood or
practised by our fathers."[98] Cowley could see nothing at all in
Chaucer's poetry.[99] Dryden heartily admired it, and, as we have seen,
praised its matter admirably; but of its exquisite manner and movement
all he can find to say is that "there is the rude sweetness of a Scotch
tune in it, which is natural and pleasing, though not perfect."[100]
Addison, wishing to praise Chaucer's numbers, compares them with
Dryden's own. And all through the eighteenth century, and down even into
our own times, the stereotyped phrase of approbation for good verse
found in our early poetry has been, that it even approached the verse of
Dryden, Addison, Pope, and Johnson.
Are Dryden and Pope poetical classics? Is the historic estimate, which
represents them as such, and which has been so long established that it
cannot easily give way, the real estimate? Wordsworth and Coleridge, as
is well known, denied it;[101] but the authority of Wordsworth and
Coleridge does not weigh much with the young generation, and there are
many signs to show that the eighteenth century and its judgments are
coming into favor again.
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