Of this, his larger poems are full of proof.

But there is another verse, of irregular rhythm, in which he was even more successful,--lyric poetry as found in the irregular ode, varying from the short line to the "Alexandrine dragging its slow length along;" the staccato of a harp ending in a lengthened flow of melody.
Thus long ago, Ere heaving billows learned to blow, While organs yet were mute; Timotheus to his breathing flute And sounding lyre Could swell the soul to rage, or kindle soft desire.
When he became a Roman Catholic, St.Cecilia, "inventress of the vocal frame," became his chief devotion; and the _Song on St.Cecilia's Day_ and _An Ode to St.Cecilia_, are the principal illustrations of this new power.
Gray, who was remarkable for his own lyric power, told Dr.Beattie that if there were any excellence in his own numbers, he had learned it wholly from Dryden.
The _Ode on St.Cecilia's Day_, also entitled "_Alexander's Feast_," in which he portrays the power of music in inspiring that famous monarch to love, pity, and war, has to the scholar the perfect excellence of the best Greek lyric.

It ends with a tribute to St.Cecilia.
At last divine Cecilia came, Inventress of the vocal frame: Now let Timotheus yield the prize, Or both divide the crown.
He raised a mortal to the skies; She drew an angel down, Dryden's prose, principally in the form of prefaces and dedications, has been admired by all critics; and one of the greatest has said, that if he had turned his attention entirely in that direction, he would have been _facile princeps_ among the prose writers of his day.

He has, in general terms, the merit of being the greatest refiner of the English language, and of having given system and strength to English poetry above any writer up to his day; but more than all, his works are a transcript of English history--political, religious, and social--as valuable as those of any professed historian.

Dryden married Lady Elizabeth Howard, the daughter of an earl, who, it is said, was not a congenial companion, and who afterwards became insane.