perhaps the only judge now living. As for the opera itself,
it was all composed, and was just ready to have been performed, when
he, in honour of whom it was principally made, was taken from us.

He had been pleased twice or thrice to command, that it should be
practised before him, especially the first and third acts of it; and
publicly declared more than once, that the composition and choruses
were more just, and more beautiful, than any he had heard in England.
How nice an ear he had in music, is sufficiently known; his praise
therefore has established the reputation of it above censure, and made
it in a manner sacred. It is therefore humbly and religiously
dedicated to his memory.

It might reasonably have been expected that his death must have
changed the whole fabric of the opera, or at least a great part of it.
But the design of it originally was so happy, that it needed no
alteration, properly so called; for the addition of twenty or thirty
lines in the apotheosis of Albion, has made it entirely of a piece,
This was the only way which could have been invented, to save it from
botched ending; and it fell luckily into my imagination; as if there
were a kind of fatality even in the most trivial things concerning the
succession: a change was made, and not for the worse, without the
least confusion or disturbance; and those very causes, which seemed to
threaten us with troubles, conspired to produce our lasting happiness.

Footnotes:
1. This definition occurs in the preface to the "State of Innocence;"
but although given by Dryden, and sanctioned by Pope, it has a very
limited resemblance to that which is defined. Mr Addison has,
however, mistaken Dryden, in supposing that he applied this
definition exclusively to what we now properly call _wit_. From the
context it is plain, that he meant to include all poetical
composition.--_Spectator_, No. 62. The word once comprehended human
knowledge in general. We still talk of the wit of man, to signify
all that man can devise.

2. The first Italian opera is said to have been that of "Dafne,"
performed at Florence in 1597.--_See_ BURNEY'S _History of Music_,
Vol. iv. p. 17.

3. This passage gave great offence, being supposed to contain an
oblique reflection on Purcell and the other English composers.

4. Alluding to the disputes betwixt the King and Parliament, on the
important point of the command of the militia.]