Mac Flecknoe

I think people have underestimated the scatological aspect of Dryden's Mac Flecknoe; or, A satyr upon the True-Blew-Protestant Poet, T.S. (1682) and its attack upon Thomas Shadwell. In part this pivots upon very simple thing: the habit in modern editions of replacing Dryden's original 'Sh----' with Shadwell's full name. To read:

Some beams of wit on other souls may fall,
Strike through and make a lucid interval;
But Shadwell's genuine night admits no ray,
His rising fogs prevail upon the day:

--is to read a witty jibe at the expense of a person. To read:

Some beams of wit on other souls may fall,
Strike through and make a lucid interval;
But Sh-----'s genuine night admits no ray,
His rising fogs prevail upon the day:

--is to remind the reader that letters in a word are as often omitted for reason of propriety as anonymity. This latter, in other words, encourages us to read the poem as being about 'Shitter' (conceivably: as about 'Shatwell'; but perhaps that would be a touch too refined), or in places simply as about 'Shit'. So 'Shitter's 'rising fogs' become noisome faecal gases, whilst

Here Flecknoe, as a place to fame well known,
Ambitiously design'd his Shitter's throne.

--invokes the toilet, still called 'the throne' in some parts of England. Or:

Much Heywood, Shirley, Ogleby there lay,
But loads of Shadwell almost chok'd the way.

--which suggests publishers' remainders, as opposed to

Much Heywood, Shirley, Ogleby there lay,
But loads of Shitte almost chok'd the way.

--which makes more pertinent reference to ordure.