His translations appear too much the offspring of haste and hunger: even his fables are ill-chosen tales, conveyed in an incorrect, though spirited versification.

Yet amidst this great number of loose productions, the refuse of our language, there are found some small pieces, his Ode to St.Cecilia, the greater part of Absalom and Achitophel, and a few more, which discover so great genius, such richness of expression, such pomp and variety of numbers, that they leave us equally full of regret and indignation, on account of the inferiority or rather great absurdity of his other writings.

He died in 1701, aged sixty-nine.
The very name of Rochester is offensive to modest ears, yet does his poetry discover such energy of style and such poignancy of satire, as give ground to imagine what so fine a genius, had he fallen in a more happy age, and had followed better models, was capable of producing.

The ancient satirists often used great liberties in their expressions; but their free-* *dom no more resembles the licentiousness of Rochester, than the nakedness of an Indian does that of a common prostitute.
Wycherley was ambitious of the reputation of wit and libertinism, and he attained it: he was probably capable of reaching the fame of true comedy and instructive ridicule.

Otway had a genius finely turned to the pathetic; but he neither observed strictly the rules of the drama, nor the rules, still more essential, of propriety and decorum.