credit than by the place they there occupy. The second subscribers were
two hundred and fifty in number, at two guineas each. But from these
sums was to be deducted the expense of the engravings, though these were
only the plates used for Ogilby's Virgil, a little retouched. Besides
the subscriptions, it would seem, that Dryden received from Tonson fifty
pounds for each Book of the "Georgics" and "AEneid," and probably the
same for the Pastorals collectively.[11] On the other hand, it is
probable that Jacob charged a price for the copies delivered to the
subscribers, which, with the expense of the plates, reduced Dryden's
profit to about twelve or thirteen hundred pounds;--a trifling sum when
compared to what Pope received for the "Iliad," which was certainly
between L5,000 and L6,000; yet great in proportion to what the age of
Dryden had ever afforded, as an encouragement to literature. It must
indeed be confessed, that the Revolution had given a new impulse and
superior importance to literary pursuits. The semi-barbarous age, which
succeeded the great civil war, had been civilised by slow degrees. It is
true, the king and courtiers, among their disorderly and dissolute
pleasures, enumerated songs and plays, and, in the course of their
political intrigues, held satires in request; but they had neither money
nor time to spare for the encouragement or study of any of the higher
and more elaborate departments of poetry. Meanwhile, the bulk of the
nation neglected verse, as what they could not understand, or, with
puritanical bigotry, detested as sinful the use, as well as the abuse,
of poetical talent. But the lapse of thirty years made a material change
in the manners of the English people. Instances began to occur of
individuals, who, rising at first into notice for their proficience in
the fine arts, were finally promoted for the active and penetrating
talents, which necessarily accompany a turn towards them. An outward
reformation of manners, at least the general abjuration of grosser
profligacy, was also favourable to poetry,--

Still first to fly where
sensual joys invade.

This was wrought, partly by the religious manners of Mary; partly by
the cold and unsocial temper of William, who shunned excess, not
perhaps because it was criminal, but because it was derogatory; partly
by the political fashion of the day, which was to disown the profligacy
that marked the partisans of the Stuarts; but, most of all, by th