Page:Annus Mirabilis - Dryden (1688).djvu/11

would hide a fallacy, so those who do it in any Poetical description would vail their Ignorance.

Descriptas servare vices operumque colores,
Cur ego, si nequeo ignoroque, Poeta salutor?

For my own part, if I had little knowledge of the Sea, yet I have thought it no shame to learn: and if I have made some few mistakes, 'tis only, as you can bear me witness, because I have wanted opportunity to correct them; the whole Poem being first written, and now sent you from a place, where I have not so much as the converse of any Sea-man. Yet, though the trouble I had in writing it was great, it was more than recompens'd by the pleasure; I found my self so warm in celebrating the Praises of Military men, two such especially as the Prince and General, that it is no wonder if they inspir'd me with thoughts above my ordinary level. And I am well satisfied, that as they are incomparably the best subject I ever had, excepting only the Royal Family; so also, that this I have written of them is much better than what I have perform'd on any other. I have been forc'd to help out other Arguments, but this has been bountiful to me; they have been low and barren of praise, and I have exalted them, and made them fruitful: But here—Omnia sponte suâ reddit justissima tellus. I have had a large, a fair and a pleasant field, so fertile, that without my cultivating, it has given me two Harvests in a Summer, and in both oppressed the Reaper. All other greatness in Subjects is only counterfeit, it will not endure the test of danger; the greatness of arms is only real: Other greatness burdens a Nation with its weight, this supports it with its

strength