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The Personal Drama of Dryden's The Hind and the Panther
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 December 2020
Abstract
Dryden's poem, though praised for its style, remains generally unappreciated because it is regarded as public and theological in its theme and argumentative in method. What is overlooked is the vivid personal confession of faith, the poem's most vital and appealing element. The neoclassical strategy of providing a literary treatment through the beast fable has obscured the personal drama. Both the Panther and the Hind are at times personae for Dryden: they dramatize the poet's struggle to achieve faith and charity. Their debate over church authority recapitulates in the present moment the doctrinal doubts of Dryden before his conversion. The more spiritual struggle, between charity and humility (represented by the Hind) and pride and revenge (represented by the Panther), is also crucial in the poem since pride is innate in the poet and prompts him still to revenge against enemies like Stillingfleet and Burnet. The poem not only provides a vivid, dramatic testimony to the poet's unending struggle to achieve practical piety, but as a neoclassical work, it transforms the personal drama into the pattern of the universal Christian drama to achieve faith and charity.
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- Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1972
References
1 “Dryden's Conversion: The Struggle for Faith,” TLS, 17 April 1937, p. 281.
2 Dennis Davison, Dryden (London: Evans Bros., 1968), p. 141. For stress on the ideas in the poem, see Victor M. Hamm, “Dryden's The Hind and the Panther and Roman Catholic Apologetics,” PMLA, 83 (May 1968), 400–15.
3 “The original impropriety and the subsequent unpopularity of the subject, added to the ridiculousness of its first elements, has sunk it into neglect; but it may be usefully studied as an example of poetical ratiocination, in which the argument suffers little from the metre”—Samuel Johnson, “Dryden,” in Lives of the English Poets, ed. George Birkbeck Hill (Oxford: Clarendon, 1905), i, 446. See Mark Van Doren's remark that “Dryden's ratio-cinative talent” is demonstrated in the poem— John Dryden, A Study of His Poetry (Bloomington: Indiana Univ. Press, 1960), p. 172.
4 F. T. Prince, “Dryden Redivivus,” REL, 1 (1960), 71–79. The interest in style is paramount in Clarence H. Miller, “The Styles of The Hind and the Panther,” JEGP, 61 (1962), 511–27.
5 An idiosyncratic, though not implausible, suggestion is that “the poem is first and foremost about politics” and “its method is satirical”—William Myers, “Politics in The Hind and the Panther,” Essays in Criticism, 19 (Jan. 1969), 29, 31.
6 Earl Miner, Dryden's Poetry (Bloomington: Indiana Univ. Press, 1967), p. 204. Hereafter cited within text as Poetry.
7 Philip Harth, Contexts of Dryden's Thought (Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press, 1968), Chs. vii, viii.
8 James Sutherland, English Literature of the Late Seventeenth Century (New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 1969), p. 191.
9 For the study of Dryden's mind, see Louis I. Bredvold, The Intellectual Milieu of John Dryden (Ann Arbor: Univ. of Michigan Press, 1934).
10 Cf. Sutherland, p. 191: “In this strange medley of religious confession, theological argument, and personal satire, of allegory and the actual, of the heroic, the plain, and the familiar styles, he is at his furthest point from the canons of neo-classicism.”
11 This literary strategy is exemplified also in Dryden's “Eleanora” (1692). In the dedication of that poem, Dryden says he followed the example of John Donne's treatment of Mrs. Elizabeth Drury in the Anniversaries: “I once intended to have call'd this Poem, the Pattern: And though on a second consideration, I chang'd the Title into the Name of that Illustrious Person, yet the Design continues, and Eleanora is still the Pattern of Charity, Devotion, and Humility; of the best Wife, the best Mother, and the best of Friends.” From The Works of John Dryden, Vol. Ill: Poems 1685–1692, ed. Earl Miner (Berkeley: Univ. of California Press, 1969), p. 233. Charity and humility appear as traits of the Hind (Dryden) in The Hind and the Panther.
12 The beast fable is extremely complex, and it obviously accommodates more than the personal confession. See Miner, Works of Dryden, iii, 345: “… the fable is an integral and complex part of the poem, providing it with numerous thematic possibilities, rapid shifts of tone, and a unity admitting a diversity of poetic materials.”
13 Miner, Dryden's Poetry, p. 146. Miner characterizes the personal passages as “the most interesting unifying device” in the poem, in Works of Dryden, iii, 346.
14 Miner, Works of Dryden, iiI, 119. All quotations from the poem and its preface are from this text, hereafter referred to as Works.
15 Sir Walter Scott, The Life of John Dryden, ed. Bernard Kreissman (Lincoln: Univ. of Nebraska Press, 1963), p. 262.
16 Harth, p. 52. In fairness to Harth, one should note his qualification: “To point out the rhetorical effectiveness in the poem of such reminders is not to question the sincerity of Dryden's declaration or the genuineness of his feelings. It is simply to recognize that these passages serve a deliberate rhetorical function as a mode of persuasion carefully subordinated to Dryden's general purpose in the poem and to his awareness of his audience” (p. 54).
17 See letter to Mrs. Steward, 7 Nov. 1699: “May God be pleasd to open your Eyes, as he has opend mine”— The Letters of John Dryden, ed. Charles E. Ward (Durham, N. C: Duke Univ. Press, 1942), p. 124.
18 This idea has been suggested by Earl Miner, in “The Significance of Plot in The Hind and the Panther,” BNYPL, 69 (1965), 454: “One possibility is . . . that the debate between the Hind and the Panther mirrors a debate in Dryden's own mind from about that date” (July 1685, possibly the date of his conversion).
19 Though the discovery of precise allegories can become a pedantic exercise, one might note that the Panther's lechery (1.351–75), fashionable quality (1.572), and witty raillery (n.60–69) echo qualities we associate with Dryden when he was an Anglican: his licentious comedies, which he regretted in his Catholic period, and his pride in his success as a wit at Court in the early 1670's.
20 James Kinsley, “Dryden's Bestiary,” RES, NS 4 (1953), 332; also Miner, Poetry, Ch. v.
21 The Panther and the Hind are distinguished by “two essentially different moral natures”—George Wasserman, “Note on Dryden's Panther,” N&Q, 13 (Oct. 1966), 382.
22 The Poems of John Dryden, ed. James Kinsley (Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 1958), n, 646. See “To my Ingenious Friend, Mr. Henry Higden, Esq. On his Translation of the Tenth Satyr of Juvenal” (1687):
Oh! were your Author's Principle receiv'd, Half of the lab'ring World wou'd be reliev'd; For not to Wish, is to be Deceiv'd! Revenge wou'd into Charity be chang'd, Because it costs too Dear to be Reveng'd:
It costs our Quiet and Content of Mind:
And when 'tis compass'd, leaves a Sting behind. (11. 22–28)
Miner, Works, m, 116.
23 Charles E. Ward ascribes all three parts of the defense to Dryden, in The Life of John Dryden (Chapel Hill: Univ. of North Carolina Press, 1961), p. 219; p. 359, n. 13. Earl Miner supports, on factual and stylistic grounds, the generally accepted view that Dryden wrote only the third part; see “Dryden as Prose Controversialist: His Role in a Defence of the Royal Papers” PQ, 63 (1964), 412–19. One might note also that, unlike Dryden, the author of the defense of the second part shows firmer grounding in Catholic doctrine in his orthodox disparagement of private judgment: “Every ingenuous Man, who reads these Papers, will tell him [Stillingfleet], that to build upon ones own Judgment, is the same with following ones own Fancy, being ones own Judge, and . . . Judging unreasonably”—A Defence of the Papers Written by the Late King of Blessed Memory, and Duchess of York, Against the Answer Made to Them (London, 1686), p. 71. Cf. Dryden's statement justifying the Duchess' use of her own judgment: “But is not every Man to be satisfied pro modulo suol according to the measure of his own Understanding … As for her comparing the Doctrines of both Churches, no question but she did it to the best of her Ability … the upshot of all is that every Man is to Interpret for himself”— A Defence, pp. 94–99. For Stillingfleet's sarcastic comment on this, see his Vindication, p. 102.
24 Gilbert Burnet, History of His Own Time (Oxford: Clarendon, 1823), in, 99. For a list of controversial papers, see William Clagett, The Present State of the Controversie Between the Church of England and the Church of Rome (London, 1687). For other lists, see Miner, Works, iii, 329, n. 6.
25 “The tone of his arguments is harsh, contemptuous, and insulting”—Scott, p. 277.
26 A Defence of the Papers, pp. 85–86. This accusation is not really fair to Stillingfleet, despite the mild sarcasm of the latter's Answer. Dryden's historical arguments against Stillingfleet on the Reformation are superior to his theological arguments.
27 For a more temperate refutation of Stillingfleet, see A Reply to the Answer Made Upon the Three Royal Papers (London, 1686).
28 Edward Stillingfleet, A Vindication of the Answer to Some Late Papers Concerning the Unity and Authority of the Catholick Church, and the Reformation of the Church of England (London, 1687), p. 54.
29 Cf. Miner, Works, iii, 411, nn. to 11. 165–66: “… much in Part in and also in Parts I and ii of the poem is cut to the cloth of controversy, making the Hind something other than an exact voice for Dryden.” The note of asperity is, however, Dryden's according to my interpretation.
30 See the Hind's charge earlier against the Panther :
Thus fear and int'rest will prevail with some, For all have not the gift of martyrdome. (ii.58–59)
31 From 1685 to 1688, Dryden's annual income was only slightly above the average §380 he had between 1677 and 1685—Charles E. Ward, “A Biographical Note on John Dryden,” MLR, 27 (1932), 209.
32 This statement is supported in a letter from Dryden to Sir George Etherege (16 Feb. 1686/7), in which the poet says: “I have made my Court to the King once in seaven moneths, have seen my Lord Chamberlain [Mulgrave] full as often”— Letters, p. 26.
33 Shimei cursed David and cast stones at him (ii Samuel xvi.5–14); later he was slain by command of Solomon (II Kings ii.36–46).
314 See iiI, 343–52, where Dryden justifies revenge:
For laws of arms permit each injur'd man, To make himself a saver where he can. (11. 343–44)
But Christianity requires forgiveness instead:
Yet Christian laws allow not such redress; (1. 351)
35 Earl Miner points out rightly that in his public character the Buzzard represents William of Orange— Works, iii, 449, nn. to 11. 1120–94.
36 Perhaps Burnet's publication of “Reasons against the Repealing of the Acts of Parliament concerning the Test” may have angered Dryden—Miner, Works, iii, 449, nn. to II. 1120–94.
37 “I have been informed from England, that a Gentleman, who is known for Poetry and several other things, had spent three moneths in translating Mr. Varillas's History, but that as soon as my Reflections appeared, he discontinued his Labour, finding the credit of his Author was gone”—Gilbert Burnet, A Defence of the Reflections on the Ninth Book of the First Volume of Mr. Varillas's History of Heresies (Amsterdam, 1687), p. 138. Burnet published his Reflections on Mr. Varillas's History toward the end of 1686. A translation by Dryden of Varillas' History was entered in the Stationers' Register on 29 April 1686, but for some reason this work by Dryden was never published. Ward (Life of Dryden, p. 223) and Scott (p. 288) question the importance of the Varillas episode.
38 “Dryden's opposition to the ascendant radical Catholic opinion in the Privy Council [Petres and Sunderland] is therefore the chief point conveyed by the fable”—Miner, Works, in, 421. The Hind resents the Panther's attack as an expression of hate—
But most in Martyn's character and fate, She saw her slander'd sons, the Panther's hate, The people's rage, the persecuting state: (iii.644–46)
But as Miner points out: “Significantly, Dryden does not dispute the Panther's characterization of the rash Catholics, especially the priests, who advised James”—Miner, Works, iii, 431 ; see 11. 654–56 in Part iii. R. A. Anselment suggests that the Martin is identified with Martin Marprelate; through the Panther's tale, Dryden expressed his abhor rence of religious extremists like Father Petres and other immoderates—“Martin Marprelate: A New Source for Dryden's Fable of the Martin and the Swallows,” RES, NS 17 (Aug. 1966), 266. Francis Manley notes that the ambivalence of Dryden toward James and his policies is expressed in the fable of the swallows—“Ambivalent Allusions in Dryden's Fable of the Swallows,” MLN, 71 (Nov. 1956), 485–87.
39 F. A. J. Mazure, Histoire de la révolution de 1688, en Angleterre (Paris, 1825), ii, 58, 72. For background on Petres, see Bredvold, pp. 174–82.
40 Letter to Barillon, March 1685; in Mazure, I, 404.
41 Memoirs of Thomas, Earl of Ailesbury (London: Nichols and Sons, 1890), I, 126, 152.
42 Letters, p. 27. See the Hind's criticism of James's policy of replacing Anglican officers with Catholics—Miner, Works, iii, 409–10, nn. to 11. 90–99.
43 See the Hind's caustic remark :
Not onely Jesuits can equivocate; (ii.45)
44 Dryden's pension was paid with some regularity because of the kindness of Rochester, who was Lord Treasurer from 1679 to 1687—Louis I. Bredvold, “Notes on John Dryden's Pension,” MP, 30 (1933), 271.
45 The Autobiography of Sir John Bramston, Camden Society, No. 32 (London, 1845), pp. 253–54, 264.
46 See the description of Petres by an English Catholic as avaricious and “filled with vanity and great passions, and, as to state affairs a perfect novice,” in Ailesbury, I, 128.
47 Miner, Works, iii, 427, nn. to 11. 547–52. See the lines :
False Friends, (his deadliest foes,) could find no way But shows of honest bluntness to betray; (iii.926–27)
“The Hind agrees with the Panther in condemning James's rash Catholic advisers: they betray him, as the Buzzard will betray the Pigeons”—Miner, Works, iiI, 442, nn. to 11. 926–27.
48 “… he expressed that aspect of religious experience to which we may surmise that, given the temper of his mind and of contemporary religion, he had devoted most attention after his conversion, daily personal piety”—Ruth Wallerstein, Studies in Seventeenth-Century Poetic (Madison: Univ. of Wisconsin Press, 1961), p. 142. The stress on charitable and moral conduct and on practical piety was in accord with the trend of religion in the late seventeenth century, which tended to identify religion with morality—G. R. Cragg, From Puritanism to the Age of Reason (Cambridge, Eng.: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1950), pp. 47, 78, 129.
49 For a list of works attacking Dryden, see Hugh Mac-donald, John Dryden: A Bibliography of Early Editions and of Drydeniana (Oxford: Clarendon, 1939), pp. 254–58.
50 [Robert Gould], The Lauréat (London, 1687), p. 1. 51 Ward, p. 233.
52 Dominique Bouhours, The Life of St. Francis Xavier of the Society of Jesus, trans. John Dryden (London, 1688), sig. A4.