The Age of Dryden

The preface says the period described extends from 1660 to 1700 and might with equal propriety have been entitled The Age of the Restoration. The preface describes the plan of a general history of English literature in a series of introductory manuals, each dealing with a well-defined period and individually complete. The text says the apology for a conversion was given to the world in Hind and Panther (1687), a poem displaying even augmented power of reasoning in rhyme.

The text describes Religio Laici as a serious argument in verse on the credibility of the Christian religion and the merits of the Anglican form of doctrine and church government. The text cites the opening of a Dialogue on Dramatic Poesy, which begins with a memorable day in the first summer of the late war, when a navy engaged the Dutch. The text says the best passages of one book are those depicting the horror of the London visitor at the steepness of the Derbyshire hills and the narrowness of the Derbyshire bridges.