Editor's preface. Life of Samuel Johnson. Abraham Cowley. Sir John Denham. John Milton. Samuel Butler. Earl of Rochester. Earl of Roscommon. Thomas Otway. Edmund Waller. John Dryden. John Pomfret. Earl of Dorset. George Stepney. John Philips. William Walsh. Edmund Smith. Richard Duke. William King. Thomas Sprat. Earl of Halifax. Thomas Parnell. Samuel Garth. Nicholas Rowe, Joseph Addison. John Hughes. John Sheffield, duke of Buckinghamshire. Matthew Prior