5.Grendel, of the Eoten (giant) race, the death shadow, the mark stalker, the shadow ganger, is also variously called god's foe, fiend of hell, Cain's brood, etc. It need hardly be explained that the latter terms are additions to the original poem, made, probably, by monks who copied the manuscript. A belief in Wyrd, the mighty power controlling the destinies of men, is the chief religious motive of the epic. In line 1056 we find a curious blending of pagan and Christian belief, where Wyrd is withstood by the "wise God."
6.Summary of ll. 710-727. We have not indicated in our translation (or in quotations from Garnett, Morley, Brooke, etc.) where parts of the text are omitted.
7.Grendel's mother belongs also to the Eoten (giant) race. She is calledbrimwylf(sea wolf),merewif(sea woman),grundwyrgen(bottom master), etc.
8.From Garnett'sBeowulf, ll. 1384-1394.
9.From Morley's version, ll. 1357-1376.
10.Beowulf, ll. 2417-2423, a free rendering.
11.Lines 2729-2740, a free rendering.
12.Morley's version, ll. 2799-2816.
13.Lines 3156-3182 (Morley's version).
14.Probably to the fourth century, though some parts of the poem must have been added later. Thus the poet says (II. 88-102) that he visited Eormanric, who diedcir. 375, and Queen Ealhhild whose father, Eadwin, diedcir. 561. The difficulty of fixing a date to the poem is apparent. It contains several references to scenes and characters inBeowulf.
15.Lines 135-143 (Morley's version).
16.A lyric is a short poem reflecting some personal emotion, like love or grief. Two other Anglo-Saxon poems, "The Wife's Complaint" and "The Husband's Message," belong to this class.
17.First strophe of Brooke's version,History of Early English Literature
18.Seafarer, Part I, Iddings' version, inTranslations from Old English Poetry.
19.It is an open question whether this poem celebrates the fight at which Hnæf, the Danish leader, fell, or a later fight led by Hengist, to avenge Hnæf's death.
20.Brooke's translation,History of Early English Literature, For another early battle-song see Tennyson's "Battle of Brunanburh."
21.William Camden (1551-1623), one of England's earliest and greatest antiquarians. His first work,Britannia, a Latin history of England, has been called "the common sun whereat our modern writers have all kindled their little torches."
22.From Iddings' version ofThe Seafarer.
23.FromAndreas, ll. 511 ff., a free translation. The whole poem thrills with the Old Saxon love of the sea and of ships.
24.FromBeowulf, ll. 1063 ff., a free translation.
25.Translated fromThe Husband's Message, written on a piece of bark. With wonderful poetic insight the bark itself is represented as telling its story to the wife, from the time when the birch tree grew beside the sea until the exiled man found it and stripped the bark and carved on its surface a message to the woman he loved. This first of all English love songs deserves to rank with Valentine's description of Silvia:
Why, man, she is mine own,And I as rich in having such a jewelAs twenty seas, if all their sand were pearl,The water nectar and the rocks pure gold.
Why, man, she is mine own,And I as rich in having such a jewelAs twenty seas, if all their sand were pearl,The water nectar and the rocks pure gold.
Two Gentlemen of Verona, II, 4.
26.From theAnglo-Saxon Chronicle, record of the year 457.
27.According to Sweet the original home of the Aryans is placed in central or northern Europe, rather than in Asia, as was once assumed. SeeThe History of Language, p. 103.
28."Cædmon's Hymn," Cook's version, inTranslations from Old English Poetry.
29.Ecclesiastical History, IV, xxiv.
30.Genesis, 112-131 (Morley).
31.Exodus, 155 ff. (Brooke).
32.Runes were primitive letters of the old northern alphabet. In a few passages Cynewulf uses each rune to represent not only a letter but a word beginning with that letter. Thus the rune-equivalent of C stands forcene(keen, courageous), Y foryfel(evil, in the sense of wretched), N fornyd(need), W forivyn(joy), U forur(our), L forlagu(lake), F forfeoh(fee, wealth). Using the runes equivalent to these seven letters, Cynewulf hides and at the same time reveals his name in certain verses ofThe Christ, for instance:
Then theCourage-heartedquakes, when the King (Lord) he hearsSpeak to those who once on earth but obeyed Him weakly,While as yet theirYearning fainand theirNeedmost easily Comfort might discover.... Gone is then theWinsomenessOf the earth's adornments! What toUsas men belongedOf the joys of life was locked, long ago, inLake-flood.All theFeeon earth.
Then theCourage-heartedquakes, when the King (Lord) he hearsSpeak to those who once on earth but obeyed Him weakly,While as yet theirYearning fainand theirNeedmost easily Comfort might discover.... Gone is then theWinsomenessOf the earth's adornments! What toUsas men belongedOf the joys of life was locked, long ago, inLake-flood.All theFeeon earth.
See Brooke'sHistory of Early English Literature, pp. 377-379, orThe Christ of Cynewulf, ed. by Cook, also by Gollancz.
33.
My robe is noiseless while I tread the earth,Or tarry 'neath the banks, or stir the shallows;But when these shining wings, this depth of air,Bear me aloft above the bending shoresWhere men abide, and far the welkin's strengthOver the multitudes conveys me, thenWith rushing whir and clear melodious soundMy raiment sings. And like a wandering spiritI float unweariedly o'er flood and field.
My robe is noiseless while I tread the earth,Or tarry 'neath the banks, or stir the shallows;But when these shining wings, this depth of air,Bear me aloft above the bending shoresWhere men abide, and far the welkin's strengthOver the multitudes conveys me, thenWith rushing whir and clear melodious soundMy raiment sings. And like a wandering spiritI float unweariedly o'er flood and field.
(Brougham's version, inTransl. from Old Eng. Poetry.)
34.The source ofAndreasis an early Greek legend of St. Andrew that found its way to England and was probably known to Cynewulf in some brief Latin form, now lost.
35.Our two chief sources are the famous Exeter Book, in Exeter Cathedral, a collection of Anglo-Saxon poems presented by Bishop Leofric (c. 1050), and the Vercelli Book, discovered in the monastery of Vercelli, Italy, in 1822. The only known manuscript ofBeowulfwas discoveredc. 1600, and is now in the Cotton Library of the British Museum. All these are fragmentary copies, and show the marks of fire and of hard usage. The Exeter Book containsthe Christ, Guthlac, the Phoenix, Juliana, Widsith, The Seafarer, Deor's Lament, The Wife's Complaint, The Lover's Message, ninety-five Riddles, and many short hymns and fragments,--an astonishing variety for a single manuscript.
36.From Alfred'sBoethius.
37.It is not certain that the translation of Bede is the work of Alfred.
38.SeeTranslations from Old English Poetry. Only a brief account of the fight is given in theChronicle. The song known as "The Battle of Maldon," or "Byrhtnoth's Death," is recorded in another manuscript.
39.This is an admirable little book, containing the cream of Anglo-Saxon poetry, in free translations, with notes. Translations fromOld English Proseis a companion volume.
40.For full titles and publishers of general reference books, and for a list of inexpensive texts and helps, see General Bibliography at the end of this book.
41.The chief object of these questions is not to serve as a review, or to prepare for examination, but rather to set the student thinking for himself about what he has read. A few questions of an advanced nature are inserted which call for special study and research in interesting fields.
42.A Romance language is one whose basis is Latin,--not the classic language of literature, but a vulgar or popular Latin spoken in the military camps and provinces. Thus Italian, Spanish, and French were originally different dialects of the vulgar Latin, slightly modified by the mingling of the Roman soldiers with the natives of the conquered provinces.
43.See p. 51.
44.It is interesting to note that all the chroniclers of the period, whether of English or Norman birth, unite in admiration of the great figures of English history, as it was then understood. Brutus, Arthur, Hengist, Horsa, Edward the Confessor, and William of Normandy are all alike set down as English heroes. In a French poem of the thirteenth century, for instance, we read that "there is no land in the world where so many good kings and saints have lived as in the isle of the English ... such as the strong and brave Arthur, Edmund, and Cnut." This national poem, celebrating the English Edward, was written in French by a Norman monk of Westminster Abbey, and its first heroes are a Celt, a Saxon, and a Dane. (See Jusserand,Literary History of the English People, I, 112 ff.)
45.English Literature from the Norman Conquest to Chaucer.
46.Anselm was an Italian by birth, but wrote his famous work while holding the see of Canterbury.
47.During the Roman occupancy of Britain occurred a curious mingling of Celtic and Roman traditions. The Welsh began to associate their national hero Arthur with Roman ancestors; hence the story of Brutus, great-grandson of Aeneas, the first king of Britain, as related by Geoffrey and Layamon.
48.Probably a Latin copy of Bede.
49.Wace's translation of Geoffrey.
50.Only one word in about three hundred and fifty is of French origin. A century later Robert Mannyng uses one French word in eighty, while Chaucer has one in six or seven. This includes repetitions, and is a fair estimate rather than an exact computation.
51.The matter of Britain refers strictly to the Arthurian, i.e. the Welsh romances; and so another division, the matter of England, may be noted. This includes tales of popular English heroes, like Bevis of Hampton, Guy of Warwick, Horn Child, etc.
52.According to mediæval literary custom these songs were rarely signed. Later, when many songs were made over into a long poem, the author signed his name to the entire work, without indicating what he had borrowed
53.An English book in which such romances were written was called a Gest or Jest Book. So also at the beginning ofCursor Mundi(c. 1320) we read:
Men yernen jestis for to hereAnd romaunce rede in diverse manere,
Men yernen jestis for to hereAnd romaunce rede in diverse manere,
and then follows a summary of the great cycles of romance, which we are considering.
54.Tennyson goes farther than Malory in making Gawain false and irreverent. That seems to be a mistake; for in all the earliest romances Gawain is, next to Arthur, the noblest of knights, the most loved and honored of all the heroes of the Round Table.
55.There were various French versions of the story; but it came originally from the Irish, where the hero was called Cuchulinn.
56.It is often alleged that in this romance we have a very poetical foundation for the Order of the Garter, which was instituted by Edward III, in 1349; but the history of the order makes this extremely doubtful. The reader will be chiefly interested in comparing this romance withBeowulf, for instance, to see what new ideals have taken root in England.
57.Originally Cockaygne (variously spelled) was intended to ridicule the mythical country of Avalon, somewhat as Cervantes'Don Quixotelater ridicules the romances of chivalry. In Luxury Land everything was good to eat; houses were built of dainties and shingled with cakes; buttered larks fell instead of rain; the streams ran with good wine; and roast geese passed slowly down the streets, turning themselves as they went.
58.Child'sEnglish and Scottish Popular Balladsis the most scholarly and complete collection in our language. Gummere'sOld English Balladsis a good short work. Professor Kittredge's Introduction to the Cambridge edition of Child'sBalladsis the best summary of a very difficult subject. For an extended discussion of the literary character of the ballad, see Gummere'sThe Popular Ballad.
59.little bird.
60.in her language.
61.I live
62.fairest
63.I am
64.power, bondage.
65.a pleasant fate I have attained.
66.I know
67.gone
68.lit, alighted
69.For titles and publishers of reference books see General Bibliography at the end of this book.
70.The reader may perhaps be more interested in these final letters, which are sometimes sounded and again silent, if he remembers that they represent the decaying inflections of our old Anglo-Saxon speech.
71.House of Fame, II, 652 ff. The passage is more or less autobiographical.
72.Legend of Good Women, Prologue, ll. 29 ff.
73.wealth.
74.the crowd.
75.success.
76.blinds.
77.act.
78.trouble.
79.i.e. the goddess Fortune.
80.kick.
81.awl.
82.judge.
83.For the typography of titles the author has adopted the plan of putting the titles of all books, and of all important works generally regarded as single books, in italics. Individual poems, essays, etc., are in Roman letters with quotation marks. Thus we have the "Knight's Tale," or the story of "Palamon and Arcite," in theCanterbury Tales. This system seems on the whole the best, though it may result in some inconsistencies.
84.Troilus and Criseyde, III.
85.See p. 107.
86.For a summary of Chaucer's work and place in our literature, see the Comparison with Spenser, p. 111.
87.clad.
88.wonder.
89.brook.
90.sounded.
91.theirs
92.rule
93.righteousness
94.called
95.theirs
96.yield
97.say
98.them
99.hate
100.persecute
101.slander
102.rains
103.In its English form the alleged Mandeville describes the lands and customs he has seen, and brings in all the wonders he has heard about. Many things he has seen himself, he tells us, and these are certainly true; but others he has heard in his travels, and of these the reader must judge for himself. Then he incidentally mentions a desert where he saw devils as thick as grasshoppers. As for things that he has been told by devout travelers, here are the dog-faced men, and birds that carry off elephants, and giants twenty-eight feet tall, and dangerous women who have bright jewels in their heads instead of eyes, "and if they behold any man in wrath, they slay him with a look, as doth the basilisk." Here also are the folk of Ethiopia, who have only one leg, but who hop about with extraordinary rapidity. Their one foot is so big that, when they lie in the sun, they raise it to shade their bodies; in rainy weather it is as good as an umbrella. At the close of this interesting book of travel, which is a guide for pilgrims, the author promises to all those who say a prayer for him a share in whatever heavenly grace he may himself obtain for all his holy pilgrimages.
104.For titles and publishers of reference works see General Bibliography at the end of this book.
105.Constitutional History of England.
106.Symonds,Revival of Learning.
107.Sismondi attributes this to two causes: first, the lack of general culture; and second, the absorption of the schools in the new study of antiquity. SeeLiterature of the South of Europe, II, 400 ff.
108.Erasmus, the greatest scholar of the Renaissance, was not an Englishman, but seems to belong to every nation. He was born at Rotterdam (c. 1466), but lived the greater part of his life in France, Switzerland, England, and Italy. HisEncomium Moriaewas sketched on a journey from Italy (1509) and written while he was the guest of Sir Thomas More in London.
109.Unless, perchance, the reader finds some points of resemblance in Plato's "Republic."
110.See Wordsworth's sonnet,On the Sonnet. For a detailed study of this most perfect verse form, see Tomlinson'sThe Sonnet, Its Origin, Structure, and Place in Poetry.
111.William Caxton (c. 1422-1491) was the first English printer. He learned the art abroad, probably at Cologne or Bruges, and about the year 1476 set up the first wooden printing press in England. His influence in fixing a national language to supersede the various dialects, and in preparing the way for the literary renaissance of the Elizabethan age, is beyond calculation.
112.Malory has, in our own day, been identified with an English country gentleman and soldier, who was member of Parliament for Warwickshire in 1445.
113.For titles and publishers of general works see General Bibliography at the end of this book.
114.Eastward Ho!a play given in Blackfriars Theater about 1603. The play was written by Marston and two collaborators.
115.Lie so faint.
116.TheViewwas not published till 1633.
117.clad.
118.handsome.
119.jousts, tournaments.
120.countenance.
121.dreaded.
122.took off.
123.pity.
124.know.
125.In the nineteenth century men learned again to appreciate Chaucer.
126.The most dramatic part of the early ritual centered about Christ's death and resurrection, on Good Fridays and Easter days. An exquisite account of this most impressive service is preserved in St. Ethelwold's Latin manual of church services, written about 965. The Latin and English versions are found in Chambers'sMediaeval Stage, Vol. II. For a brief, interesting description, see Gayley,Plays of Our Forefathers, pp. 14 ff.
127.How much we are indebted to the Norman love of pageantry for the development of the drama in England is an unanswered question. During the Middle Ages it was customary, in welcoming a monarch or in celebrating a royal wedding, to represent allegorical and mythological scenes, like the combat of St. George and the dragon, for instance, on a stage constructed for the purpose. These pageants were popular all over Europe and developed during the Renaissance into the dramatic form known as the Masque. Though the drama was of religious origin, we must not overlook these secular pageants as an important factor in the development of dramatic art.
128.Miracles were acted on the Continent earlier than this. The Normans undoubtedly brought religious plays with them, but it is probable that they began in England before the Conquest (1066). See Manly,Specimens of the Pre-Shaksperean Drama, I, xix.
129.See Jusserand,A Literary History of the English People, I, iii, vi. For our earliest plays and their authors see Gayley,Plays of Our Forefathers.
130.These three periods are not historically accurate. The author uses them to emphasize three different views of our earliest plays rather than to suggest that there was any orderly or chronological development from Miracle to Morality and thence to the Interludes. The latter is a prevalent opinion, but it seems hardly warranted by the facts. Thus, though the Miracles precede the Moralities by two centuries (the first known Morality, "The Play of the Lord's Prayer," mentioned by Wyclif, was given probably about 1375), some of the best known Moralities, like "Pride of Life," precede many of the later York Miracles. And the term Interlude, which is often used as symbolical of the transition from the moral to the artistic period of the drama, was occasionally used in England (fourteenth century) as synonymous with Miracle and again (sixteenth century) as synonymous with Comedy. That the drama had these three stages seems reasonably certain; but it is impossible to fix the limits of any one of them, and all three are sometimes seen together in one of the later Miracles of the Wakefield cycle.
131.In fact, Heywood "cribbed" from Chaucer'sTalesin another Interlude called "The Pardoner and the Frere."
132.Schelling,Elizabethan Drama, I, 86.
133.That these gallants were an unmitigated nuisance, and had frequently to be silenced by the common people who came to enjoy the play, seems certain. Dekker'sGull's Hornbook(1609) has an interesting chapter on "How a Gallant should behave Himself in a Playhouse."
134.The first actors were classed with thieves and vagabonds; but they speedily raised their profession to an art and won a reputation which extended far abroad. Thus a contemporary, Fynes Moryson, writes in hisItinerary:"So I remember that when some of our cast despised stage players came ... into Germany and played at Franckford ... having nether a complete number of actors, nor any good aparell, nor any ornament of the stage, yet the Germans, not understanding a worde they sayde, both men and wemen, flocked wonderfully to see their gesture and action."
135.Schelling,Elizabethan Drama.
136.Baker, in hisDevelopment of Shakespeare as a Dramatist, pp. 57-62, takes a different view, and shows how carefully many of the boy actors were trained. It would require, however, a vigorous use of the imagination to be satisfied with a boy's presentation of Portia, Juliet, Cordelia, Rosalind, or any other of Shakespeare's wonderful women.
137.These choir masters had royal permits to take boys of good voice, wherever found, and train them as singers and actors. The boys were taken from their parents and were often half starved and most brutally treated. The abuse of this unnatural privilege led to the final withdrawal of all such permits.
138.So called from Euphues, the hero of Lyly's two prose works,Euphues, the Anatomy of Wit(1579), andEuphues and his England(1580). The style is affected and over-elegant, abounds in odd conceits, and uses hopelessly involved sentences. It is found in nearly all Elizabethan prose writers, and partially accounts for their general tendency to artificiality. Shakespeare satirizes euphuism in the character of Don Adriano ofLove's Labour's Lost, but is himself tiresomely euphuistic at times, especially in his early or "Lylian" comedies. Lyly, by the way, did not invent the style, but did more than any other to diffuse it.
139.See Schelling, I, 211.
140.See p. 114.
141.In 1587 the first history of Johann Faust, a half-legendary German necromancer, appeared in Frankfort. Where Marlowe found the story is unknown; but he used it, as Goethe did two centuries later, for the basis of his great tragedy.
142.We must remember, however, that our present version ofFaustusis very much mutilated, and does not preserve the play as Marlowe wrote it.
143.The two dramatists may have worked together in such doubtful plays asRichard III, the hero of which is like Timur in an English dress, andTitus Andronicus, with its violence and horror. In many strong scenes in Shakespeare's works Marlowe's influence is manifest.
144.Gammer Gurton's Needleappearedc. 1562;Love's Labour's Lost, c. 1591.
145.King John, IV, 2.
146.Queen Mab, inRomeo and Juliet.
147.By Archdeacon Davies, in the seventeenth century.
148.In 1709, nearly a century after the poet's death.
149.Robert Greene, one of the popular playwrights of the time, who attacked Shakespeare in a pamphlet called "A Groat's Worth of Wit Bought with a Million of Repentance." The pamphlet, aside from its jealousy of Shakespeare, is a sad picture of a man of genius dying of dissipation, and contains a warning to other playwrights of the time, whose lives were apparently almost as bad as that of Greene.
150.Love's Labour's Lost, Comedy of Errors, Two Gentlemen of Verona.
151.Henry VI, Richard III, Richard II, King John. Prior to 1588 only three true Chronicle plays are known to have been acted. The defeat of the Armada in that year led to an outburst of national feeling which found one outlet in the theaters, and in the next ten years over eighty Chronicle plays appeared. Of these Shakespeare furnished nine or ten. It was the great popular success ofHenry VI, a revision of an old play, in 1592 that probably led to Greene's jealous attack.
152.See Lee'sLife of William Shakespeare, pp. 188-196.
153.LikeHenry VIII, and possibly the lostCardenio.
154.A name given to the privilege--claimed by the mediæval Church for its clergy--of being exempt from trial by the regular law courts. After the Reformation the custom survived for a long time, and special privileges were allowed to ministers and their families. Jonson claimed the privilege as a minister's son.
155.A similar story of quackery is found in Chaucer, "The Canon's Yeoman's Tale."
156.In this and inA Fair QuarrelMiddleton collaborated with William Rowley, of whom little is known except that he was an actor fromc. 1607-1627.
157.The reader will find wholesome criticism of these writers, and selections from their works, in Charles Lamb'sSpecimens of English Dramatic Poets, an excellent book, which helps us to a better knowledge and appreciation of the lesser Elizabethan dramatists.
158.The first five books were published 1594-1597, and are as Hooker wrote them. The last three books, published after his death, are of doubtful authorship, but they are thought to have been completed from Hooker's notes.
159.For titles and publishers of reference works see General Bibliography at the end of this book.
160.See, for instance, the "Hymn to St. Theresa" and "The Flaming Heart."
161.So called from Pindar, the greatest lyric poet of Greece.
162.See, for instance, "Childhood," "The Retreat," "Corruption," "The Bird," "The Hidden Flower," for Vaughan's mystic interpretation of childhood and nature.
163.There is some doubt as to whether he was born at the Castle, or at Black Hall. Recent opinion inclines to the latter view.
164."On his being arrived to the Age of Twenty-three."
165."It is remarkable," says Lamartine, "how often in the libraries of Italian princes and in the correspondence of great Italian writers of this period you find mentioned the name and fame of this young Englishman."
166.In Milton's work we see plainly the progressive influence of the Puritan Age. Thus his Horton poems are joyous, almost Elizabethan in character; his prose is stern, militant, unyielding, like the Puritan in his struggle for liberty; his later poetry, following the apparent failure of Puritanism in the Restoration, has a note of sadness, yet proclaims the eternal principles of liberty and justice for which he had lived.
167.Of these sixty were taken from the Bible, thirty-three from English and five from Scotch history.
168.The latter was by Lewis Bayly, bishop of Bangor. It is interesting to note that this book, whose very title is unfamiliar to us, was speedily translated into five different languages. It had an enormous sale, and ran through fifty editions soon after publication.
169.Abridged fromGrace Abounding, Part 3;Works(ed. 1873), p. 71.
170.For titles and publishers of reference works, see General Bibliography at the end of this book.
171.Guizot'sHistory of the Revolution in England.
172.Jeremy Collier (1650-1726), a clergyman and author, noted for his scholarlyEcclesiastical History of Great Britain(1708-1714) and hisShort View of the Immorality and Profaneness of the English Stage(1698). The latter was largely instrumental in correcting the low tendency of the Restoration drama.
173.The Royal Society, for the investigation and discussion of scientific questions, was founded in 1662, and soon included practically all of the literary and scientific men of the age. It encouraged the work of Isaac Newton, who was one of its members; and its influence for truth--at a time when men were still trying to compound the philosopher's stone, calculating men's actions from the stars, and hanging harmless old women for witches--can hardly be overestimated.
174.If the reader would see this in concrete form, let him read a paragraph of Milton's prose, or a stanza of his poetry, and compare its exuberant, melodious diction with Dryden's concise method of writing.
175.Edmund Waller (1606-1687), the most noted poet of the Restoration period until his pupil Dryden appeared. His works are now seldom read.
176.FromDivine Poems, "Old Age and Death."
177.Following the advice of Boileau (1676-1711), a noted French critic, whom Voltaire called "the lawgiver of Parnassus."
178.By a critic we mean simply one who examines the literary works of various ages, separates the good from the bad, and gives the reasons for his classification. It is noticeable that critical writings increase in an age, like that of the Restoration, when great creative works are wanting.
179.Two other principles of this book should be noted: (1) that all power originates in the people; and (2) that the object of all government is the common good. Here evidently is a democratic doctrine, which abolishes the divine right of kings; but Hobbes immediately destroys democracy by another doctrine,--that the power given by the people to the ruler could not be taken away. Hence the Royalists could use the book to justify the despotism of the Stuarts on the ground that the people had chosen them. This part of the book is in direct opposition to Milton'sDefense of the English People.
180.Locke'sTreatises on Governmentshould also be mentioned, for they are of profound interest to American students of history and political science. It was from Locke that the framers of the Declaration of Independence and of the Constitution drew many of their ideas, and even some of their most striking phrases. "All men are endowed with certain inalienable rights"; "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness"; "the origin and basis of government is in the consent of the governed,"--these and many more familiar and striking expressions are from Locke. It is interesting to note that he was appointed to draft a constitution for the new province of Carolina; but his work was rejected,--probably because it was too democratic for the age in which he lived.
181.A few slight changes and omissions from the original text, as given in Wheatley's edition of Pepys (London, 1892, 9 vols.), are not indicated in these brief quotations.
182.The first daily newspaper,The Daily Courant, appeared in London in 1702.
183.See Lecky,England in the Eighteenth Century.
184.Addison's "Campaign" (1704), written to celebrate the battle of Blenheim.
185.Great writers in every age, men like Shakespeare and Milton, make their own style. They are therefore not included in this summary. Among the minor writers also there are exceptions to the rule; and fine feeling is often manifest in the poetry of Donne, Herbert, Vaughan, and Herrick.
186.We have endeavored here simply to show the meaning of terms in general use in our literature; but it must be remembered that it is impossible to classify or to give a descriptive name to the writers of any period or century. While "classic" or "pseudo-classic" may apply to a part of eighteenth-century literature, every age has both its romantic and its classic movements. In this period the revolt against classicism is shown in the revival of romantic poetry under Gray, Collins, Burns, and Thomson, and in the beginning of the English novel under Defoe, Richardson, and Fielding. These poets and novelists, who have little or no connection with classicism, belong chronologically to the period we are studying. They are reserved for special treatment in the sections following.
187.Pope's satires, for instance, are strongly suggested in Boileau; hisRape of the Lockis much like the mock-heroicLe Lutrin;and the "Essay on Criticism," which made him famous, is an English edition and improvement ofL'Art Poétique. The last was, in turn, a combination of theArs Poeticaof Horace and of many well-known rules of the classicists.
188.These are the four kinds of spirits inhabiting the four elements, according to the Rosicrucians,--a fantastic sect of spiritualists of that age. In the dedication of the poem Pope says he took the idea from a French book calledLe Comte de Gabalis.
189.Compare this with Shakespeare's "All the world's a stage," inAs You Like it, II, 7.
190.It is only fair to point out that Swift wrote this and two other pamphlets on religion at a time when he knew that they would damage, if not destroy, his own prospects of political advancement.
191.See Tennyson's "Merlin and the Gleam."
192.Of theTatleressays Addison contributed forty-two; thirty-six others were written in collaboration with Steele; while at least a hundred and eighty are the work of Steele alone.
193.From "The Vanity of Human Wishes"
194.A very lovable side of Johnson's nature is shown by his doing penance in the public market place for his unfilial conduct as a boy. (See, in Hawthorne'sOur Old Home, the article on "Lichfield and Johnson.") His sterling manhood is recalled in his famous letter to Lord Chesterfield, refusing the latter's patronage for theDictionary. The student should read this incident entire, in Boswell'sLife of Johnson.
195.In Johnson'sDictionarywe find this definition: "Grub-street, the name of a street in London much inhabited by writers of small histories,dictionaries, and temporary poems; whence any mean production is called Grub-street."
196.From Macaulay's review of Boswell'sLife of Johnson.
197.Many of the writers show a mingling of the classic and the romantic tendencies. Thus Goldsmith followed Johnson and opposed the romanticists; but hisDeserted Villageis romantic in spirit, though its classic couplets are almost as mechanical as Pope's. So Burke's orations are "elegantly classic" in style, but are illumined by bursts of emotion and romantic feeling.
198.A much more interesting work is Thomas Paine'sRights of Man, which was written in answer to Burke's essay, and which had enormous influence in England and America.
199.In the same year, 1775, in which Burke's magnificent "Conciliation" oration was delivered, Patrick Henry made a remarkable little speech before a gathering of delegates in Virginia. Both men were pleading the same cause of justice, and were actuated by the same high ideals. A very interesting contrast, however, may be drawn between the methods and the effects of Henry's speech and of Burke's more brilliant oration. Burke makes us wonder at his learning, his brilliancy, his eloquence; but he does not move us to action. Patrick Henry calls us, and we spring to follow him. That suggests the essential difference between the two orators.
200.The romantic revival is marked by renewed interest in mediæval ideals and literature; and to this interest is due the success of Walpole's romance,The Castle of Otranto, and of Chatterton's forgeries known as theRowley Papers.
201.FromThe Task, Book II.
202.See, for instance, Phelps,Beginnings of the Romantic Movement, for a list of Spenserian imitators from 1700 to 1775.
203.Such is Goldsmith's version of a somewhat suspicious adventure, whose details are unknown.
204.Goldsmith's idea, which was borrowed from Walpole, reappears in the pseudoLetters from a Chinese Official, which recently attracted considerable attention.
205.Fitz-Greene Halleck's poem "To a Rose from near Alloway Kirk" (1822) is a good appreciation of Burns and his poetry. It might be well to read this poem before the sad story of Burns's life.
206.Introduction,Songs of Innocence.
207.Swinburne'sWilliam Blake.
208.There are several omissions from the text in this fragment fromFingal.
209.Several fragments of Gaelic poetry, attributed to Ossian or Oisin, are now known to have existed at that time in the Highlands. Macpherson used these as a basis for his epic, but most of the details were furnished by his own imagination. The alleged text of "Ossian" was published in 1807, some eleven years after Macpherson's death. It only added another mystery to the forgery; for, while it embodied a few old and probably genuine fragments, the bulk of it seems to be Macpherson's work translated back into Gaelic.
210.For various other collections of songs and ballads, antedating Percy's, see Phelps'sBeginnings of the English Romantic Movement, ch. vii.
211.The first books to which the term "novel," in the modern sense, may be applied, appeared almost simultaneously in England, France, and Germany. The rapid development of the English novel had an immense influence in all European nations.
212.The name "romance" was given at first to any story in one of the Romance languages, like the French metrical romances, which we have considered. Because these stories were brought to England at a time when the childish mind of the Middle Ages delighted in the most impossible stories, the name "romance" was retained to cover any work of the unbridled imagination.
213.This division of works of fiction into romances and novels is a somewhat arbitrary one, but it seems, on the whole, the most natural and the most satisfactory. Many writers use the generic term "novel" to include all prose fiction. They divide novels into two classes, stories and romances; the story being a form of the novel which relates certain incidents of life with as little complexity as possible; and the romance being a form of novel which describes life as led by strong emotions into complex and unusual circumstances. Novels are otherwise divided into novels of personality, likeVicar of WakefieldandSilas Marner; historical novels,Ivanhoe; novels of romance, likeLorna Dooneand novels of purpose, likeOliver TwistandUncle Tom's Cabin. All such classifications are imperfect, and the best of them is open to objections.
214.One of these tales was calledThe Wonderful Things beyond Thule. It is the story of a youth, Dinias, who for love of a girl, Dercyllis, did heroic things and undertook many adventures, including a journey to the frozen north, and another to the moon. A second tale,Ephesiaca, is the story of a man and a maid, each of whom scoffs at love. They meet and fall desperately in love; but the course of true love does not run smooth, and they separate, and suffer, and go through many perils, before they "live happily ever after." This tale is the source of the mediæval story,Apollonius of Tyre, which is used in Gower'sConfessio Amantisand in Shakespeare'sPericles. A third tale is the pastoral love story,Daphnis and Chloe, which reappeared in many forms in subsequent literature.
215.Minto'sLife of Defoe, p. 139.
216.These were not what the booksellers expected. They wanted a "handy letter writer," something like a book of etiquette; and it was published in 1741, a few months afterPamela.
217.See p. 315.
218.For titles and publishers of general reference works, and of inexpensive texts, see General Bibliography at end of this book.
219.Mrs. Radcliffe's best work is theMysteries of Udolpho. This is the story of a tender heroine shut up in a gloomy castle. Over her broods the terrible shadow of an ancestor's crime. There are the usual "goose-flesh" accompaniments of haunted rooms, secret doors, sliding panels, mysterious figures behind old pictures, and a subterranean passage leading to a vault, dark and creepy as a tomb. Here the heroine finds a chest with blood-stained papers. By the light of a flickering candle she reads, with chills and shivering, the record of long-buried crimes. At the psychologic moment the little candle suddenly goes out. Then out of the darkness a cold, clammy hand--ugh! Foolish as such stories seem to us now, they show, first, a wild reaction from the skepticism of the preceding age; and second, a development of the mediæval romance of adventure; only the adventure is here inward rather than outward. It faces a ghost instead of a dragon; and for this work a nun with her beads is better than a knight in armor. So heroines abound, instead of heroes. The age was too educated for medieval monsters and magic, but not educated enough to reject ghosts and other bogeys.
220.TheLyrical Balladswere better appreciated in America than in England. The first edition was printed here in 1802.
221.The Preludewas not published till after Wordsworth's death, nearly half a century later.
222.The Prelude, Book IV.
223.Dowden'sSelections from Wordsworthis the best of many such collections. See Selections for Reading, and Bibliography, at the end of this chapter.
224.See "Christ's Hospital Five and Thirty Years Ago," inEssays of Elia.
225.See Scott's criticism of his own work, in comparison with Jane Austen's, p. 439.
226.Scott's novels were not the first to have an historical basis. For thirty years preceding the appearance ofWaverley, historical romances were popular; but it was due to Scott's genius that the historical novel became a permanent type of literature. See Cross,The Development of the English Novel.