1. ENGLISH LITERATURE AND ITS DIVISIONS.--The original inhabitants of
England, belonging to the great race of Celts, were not the true founders
of the English nation; and their language, which is still spoken unchanged
in various parts of the kingdom, has exerted but an incredibly small
influence on the English tongue. During the period of the Roman domination
(55 B.C.-447 A.D.), the relations between the conquerors and the natives
did not materially alter the nationality of the people, nor did the Latin
language permanently displace or modify the native tongue.
The great event of the Dark Ages which succeeded the fall of the Roman
empire was the vast series of emigrations which planted tribes of Gothic
blood over large tracts of Europe, and which was followed by the formation
of all the modern European languages, and by the general profession of
Christianity. The Anglo-Saxon invaders of England continued to emigrate
from the Continent for more than a hundred years, and before many
generations had passed away, their language, customs, and character
prevailed throughout the provinces they had seized. During the six hundred
years of their independence (448-1066), the nation made wonderful progress
in the arts of life and thought. The Pagans accepted the Christian faith;
the piratical sea-kings applied themselves to the tillage of the soil and
the practice of some of the ruder manufactures; the fierce soldiers
constructed, out of the materials of legislation common to the whole
Teutonic race, a manly political constitution.
The few extant literary monuments of the Anglo-Saxons possess a singular
value as illustrations of the character of the people, and have the
additional attraction of being written in what was really our mother
tongue.
In the Middle Ages (from the eleventh to the sixteenth centuries), the
painful convulsions of infant society gave way to the growing vigor of
healthy though undisciplined youth. All the relations of life were
modified, more or less, by the two influences predominant in the early
part of the period, but decaying in the latter,--Feudalism and the Church
of Rome,--and by the consolidation of the new languages, which were
successively developed in all European countries, and were soon qualified
as instruments for communicating the results of intellectual activity. The
Middle Ages closed by two events occurring nearly at the same time: the
erection of the great monarchies on the ruins of feudalism, and the
shattering of the sovereignty of the Romish Church by the Reformation. At
the same period, the invention of printing, the most important event in
the annals of literature, became available as a means of enlightenment.
The Norman conquest of England (1066) subjected the nation at once to both
of the ruling mediaeval impulses: feudalism, which metamorphosed the
relative positions of the people and the nobles, and the recognition of
papal supremacy, which altered not less thoroughly the standing of the
church. While these changes were not unproductive of good at that time,
they were distasteful to the nation, and soon became injurious, both to
freedom and knowledge, until at length, under the dynasty of the Tudors,
the ecclesiastical shackles were cast off, and the feudal bonds began
gradually to be loosened.
The Norman invaders of England took possession of the country as military
masters. They suppressed the native polity by overwhelming force, made
Norman-French the fashionable speech of the court and the aristocracy, and
imposed it on the tribunals. Their romantic literature soon weaned the
hearts of educated men from the ancient rudeness of taste, but the mass of
the English people clung so obstinately to their ancestral tongue, that
the Anglo-Saxon language kept its hold in substance until it was evolved
into modern English; and the Norman nobles were at length forced to learn
the dialect which had been preserved among their despised English vassals.
Emerging from the Middle Ages into the illuminated vista of modern
history, we find the world of action much more powerfully influenced by
the world of letters than ever before. Among the causes which produced
this change are the invention of printing, the use of a cultivated living
language, and in England the vindication of freedom of thought and
constitutional liberty.
The period from the accession of Elizabeth to the Restoration (1558-1660)
is the most brilliant in the literary history of England. The literature
assumes its most varied forms, expatiates over the most distant regions of
speculation and investigation; and its intellectual chiefs, while they
breathe the spirit of modern knowledge and freedom, speak to us in tones
which borrow an irregular stateliness from the chivalrous past. But this
magnificent panorama does not meet the eye at once; the unveiling of its
features is as gradual as the passing away of the mists that shroud the
landscape before the morning sun.
The first quarter of the century was unproductive in all departments of
literature. Of the great writers who have immortalized the name of
Elizabeth, scarcely one was born five years before she ascended the
throne, and the immense and invaluable series of literary works which
embellished the period in question may be regarded as beginning only with
the earliest poem of Spenser, 1579.
"There never was anywhere," says Lord Jeffrey, "anything like the sixty or
seventy years that elapsed from the middle of the reign of Elizabeth to
the Restoration. In point of real force and originality of genius, neither
the age of Pericles nor the age of Augustus, nor the times of Leo X., or
of Louis XIV., can come at all into comparison. In that short period we
shall find the names of almost all the very great men that this nation has
ever produced."
Among the influences which made the last generation of the sixteenth
century so strong in itself, and capable of bequeathing so much strength
to those who took up its inheritance, was the expanding elasticity, the
growing freedom of thought and action. The chivalry of the Middle Ages
began to seek more useful fields of adventure in search of new worlds, and
fame, and gold. There was an increasing national prosperity, and a
corresponding advance of comfort and refinement, and mightier than all
these forces was the silent working of the Reformation on the hearts of
the people.
The minor writers of this age deserve great honor, and may almost be
considered the builders of the structure of English literature, whose
intellectual chiefs were Spenser, Shakspeare, and Hooker.
Spenser and Shakspeare were both possessed of thoughts, feelings, and
images, which they could not have had if they had lived a century later,
or much earlier; and, although their views were very dissimilar, they both
bear the characteristic features of the age in which they lived. Spenser
dwelt with animation on the gorgeous scenery which covered the elfin land
of knighthood and romance, and present realities were lost in his dream of
antique grandeur and ideal loveliness. He was the modern poet of the
remote past; the last minstrel of chivalry, though incomparably greater
than his forerunners.
Shakspeare was the poet of the present and the future, and of universal
humanity. He saw in the past the fallen fragments on which men were to
build anew--august scenes of desolation, whose ruin taught men to work
more wisely. He painted them as the accessory features and distant
landscape of colossal pictures, in whose foreground stood figures soaring
beyond the limits of their place, instinct with the spirit of the time in
which the poet lived, yet lifted out of it and above it by the impulse of
potent genius prescient of momentous truths that lay slumbering in the
bosom of futurity.
By the side of poetry contemporary prose shows poorly, with one great
exception. In respect to style, Hooker stands almost alone in his time,
and may be considered the first of the illustrious train of great prose
writers. His "Ecclesiastical Polity" appeared in 1594. Sir Philip Sidney's
"Arcadia" had been written before 1587. Bacon's Essays appeared in 1596,
and also Spenser's "View of Ireland," But none of these are comparable in
point of style to Hooker.
The reign of Elizabeth gave the key-note to the literature of the two
succeeding reigns, that of James I. (1603-1625), and Charles (1625-1649),
and the literary works of this period were not only more numerous, but
stand higher in the mass than those which closed the sixteenth century.
But Spenser remained un-imitated and Shakspeare was inimitable; the drama,
however, which in this as in the last generation monopolized the best
minds, received new developments, poetry was enriched beyond precedent,
and prose writing blossomed into a harvest of unexampled eloquence. But
although, under the rule of James, learning did good service in theology
and the classics, English writing began to be infected with pedantic
affectations. The chivalrous temper of the preceding age was on the wane,
coarseness began to pass into licentiousness, and moral degeneracy began
to diffuse its poison widely over the lighter kinds of literature. Bacon,
the great pilot of modern science, gave to the world the rudiments of his
philosophy. Bishop Hall exemplified not only the eloquence and talent of
the clergy, but the beginning of that resistance to the tendencies by
which the church was to be soon overthrown. The drama was headed by Ben
Jonson, honorably severe in morals, and by Beaumont and Fletcher, who
heralded the licentiousness which soon corrupted the art generally, while
the poet Donne introduced fantastic eccentricities into poetical
composition.
Some of the most eloquent prose writings of the English language had their
birth amidst the convulsions of the Civil War, or in the strangely
perplexed age of the Commonwealth and protectorate (1649-1660), that stern
era which moulded the mind of one poet gifted with extraordinary genius.
Although Milton would not, in all likelihood, have conceived the "Paradise
Lost" had he not felt and acted with the Puritans, yet it would have been
less the consummate work of art which it is, had he not fed his fancy with
the courtly pomp of the last days of the monarchy.
The prose writers of this time are represented by Bishop Hall and Jeremy
Taylor, among the clergy, and Selden and Camden among the laymen. The
roughness of speech and manners of Elizabeth's time, followed, in the next
reign, by a real coarseness and lowness of sentiment, grew rapidly worse
under Charles, whose reign was especially prolific in poetry, the tone of
which varied from grave to gay, from devotion to licentiousness, from
severe solemnity to indecent levity; but no great poet appeared in the
crowd. The drama was still rich in genius, its most distinguished names
being those of Ford, Massinger, and Shirley; but here depravity had taken
a deeper root than elsewhere, and it was a blessing that, soon after the
breaking out of the war, the theatres were closed, and the poets left to
idleness or repentance.
The Commonwealth and Protectorate, extending over eleven years (1649-
1660), made an epoch in literature, as well as in the state and church.
The old English drama was extinct, and poetry had few votaries. Cowley now
closed with great brilliancy the eccentric and artificial school of which
Donne had been the founder, and Milton was undergoing the last steps of
that mental discipline that was to qualify him for standing forth the last
and all but the greatest of the poetical ancients. At the same time, the
approach of a modern era was indicated by the frivolity of sentiment and
ease of versification which prevailed in the poems of Waller.
In philosophy, Hobbes now uttered his defiance to constitutional freedom
and ecclesiastical independence; Henry More expounded his platonic dreams
in the cloisters of Cambridge; and Cudworth vindicated the belief in the
being of the Almighty and in the foundations of moral distinctions. The
Puritans, the ruling power in the state, became also a power in
literature, nobly represented by Richard Baxter. Milton, like many of his
remarkable contemporaries, lived into the succeeding generation, and he
may be accepted as the last representative of the eloquence of English
prose in that brilliant stage of its history which terminated about the
date of the Restoration.
The aspect of the last forty years of the seventeenth century--the age of
the Restoration and the Revolution--is far from being encouraging, and
some features marking many of their literary works are positively
revolting. Of the social evils of the time, none infected literature so
deeply as the depravation of morals, into which the court and aristocracy
plunged, and many of the people followed. The drama sunk to a frightful
grossness, and the tone of all other poetry was lowered. The reinstated
courtiers imported a mania for foreign models, especially French, literary
works were anxiously moulded on the tastes of Paris, and this prevalence
of exotic predilections lasted for more than a century. But amidst these
and other weaknesses and blots there was not wanting either strength or
brightness.
The literary career of Dryden covers the whole of this period and marks a
change which contained many improvements. Locke was the leader of
philosophical speculation; and mathematical and physical science had its
distinguished votaries, headed by Sir Isaac Newton, whose illustrious name
alone would have made the age immortal.
The Nonconformists, forbidden to speak, wrote and printed. A younger
generation was growing up among them, and some of the elder race still
survived, such as Baxter, Owen, and Calamy. But greatest of all, and only
now reaching the climax of his strength, was Milton, in his neglected old
age consoling himself for the disappointments which had darkened a weary
life, by consecrating its waning years, with redoubled ardor of devotion,
to religion, to truth, and to the service of a remote posterity.
In England, as elsewhere in Europe, the temper of the eighteenth century
was cold, dissatisfied, and hypercritical. Old principles were called in
question, and the literary man, the statesman, the philosopher, and the
theologian found their tasks to be mainly those of attack or defence. The
opinions of the nation and the sentiments which they prompted were neither
speculative nor heroic, and they received adequate literary expression in
a philosophy which acknowledged no higher motive than utility,--in a kind
of poetry which found its field in didactic discussion, and sunk in
narrative into the coarse and domestic. In all departments of literature,
the form had come to be more regarded than the matter; and melody of
rhythm, elegance of phrase, and symmetry of parts were held to be higher
excellences than rich fancy or fervid emotion. Such an age could not give
birth to a literature possessing the loftiest and most striking qualities
of poetry or of eloquence; but it increased the knowledge previously
possessed by mankind, swept away many wrong opinions, produced many
literary works, excellent in thought and expression, and exercised on the
English language an influence partly for good and partly for evil, which
is shown in every sentence which we now speak or write.
The First Generation is named from Queen Anne (1702-1714), but it includes
also the reign of her successor. Our notion of its literary character is
derived from the poetry of Pope and the prose of Addison and his friends.
In its own region, which, though not low, is yet far from the highest, the
lighter and more popular literature of Queen Anne's time is valuable; its
lessons were full of good sense and correct taste, and as literary
artists, the writers of this age attained an excellence as eminent as can
be attained by art not inspired by the enthusiasm of genius nor employed
on majestic themes. In its moral tone, the early part of the eighteenth
century was much better than that of the age before it.
The Second Generation of the century may be reckoned as contained in the
reign of George II. (1727-1760). It was more remarkable than the preceding
for vigor of thinking and often for genuine poetic fancy and
susceptibility, though inferior in the skill and details of literary
composition. Samuel Johnson produced his principal works before the close
of this period. Among the novelists, Richardson alone had anything in
common with him. Fielding, Smollett, and Sterne are equally distant from
the dignified pomp of his manner and the ascetic elevation of his
morality. In contrast to the looseness of the novels and the skepticism of
Hume, the reasoning of Butler was employed in defense of sacred truth, and
the stern dissent of Whitefield and Wesley was entered against religious
deadness. Poetry began to stir with new life; a noble ambition animated
Young and Akenside, and in Thomson, Gray, and Collins a finer poetic sense
was perceptible.
The Third Generation of the eighteenth century, beginning with the
accession of George III. (1760), was by no means so fertile in literary
genius as either of the other two. But the earliest of its remarkable
writers, Hume, Robertson, and Gibbon, produced works which have rarely
been exceeded as literary compositions of their class. In ethics, there
were Paley and Adam Smith; in psychology and metaphysics, Reid and the
founders of the Scottish school; and in the list of poets who adorned
these forty years were Goldsmith, Cowper, and Burns.
The nineteenth century, for us naturally more interesting than any other
period of English literature, is, in its intellectual character,
peculiarly difficult of analysis, from its variety and novelty. For the
reason that we have been moulded on its lessons, we are not favorably
placed for comprehending it profoundly, or for impartially estimating the
value of the monuments it has produced.
It has been a time of extraordinary mental activity more widely diffused
than ever before throughout the nation at large. While books have been
multiplied beyond precedent, readers have increased in a yet greater
proportion, and the diffusion of enlightenment has been aimed at as
zealously as the discovery of new truths. While no other time has
exhibited so surprising a variety in the kinds of literature, none has
been so distinguished for the prevalence of enlightened and philanthropic
sentiment.
In point of literary merit, the half century presents two successive and
dissimilar stages, of which the first or opening epoch of the century,
embraced in its first thirty years, was by far the most brilliant. The
animation and energy which characterized it arose from the universal
excitation of feeling and the mighty collision of opinions which broke out
over all Europe with the first French Revolution, and the fierce struggle
so long maintained almost single-handed by England against Napoleon I. The
strength of that age was greatest in poetry, but it gave birth to much
valuable speculation and eloquent writing. The poetical literature of that
time has no parallel in English literature, unless in the age of
Shakspeare.
A marked feature in the English poetry of the nineteenth century is the
want of skill in execution. Most of the poets not only neglect polishing
in diction but also in symmetry of plan, and this fault is common to the
most reflective as well as the most passionate of them. Byron, in his
tales and sketches, is not more deficient in skill as an artist than
Wordsworth in his "Excursion," the huge fragment of an unfathomable
design, cherished throughout a long and thoughtful lifetime.
Another feature is this, that the poems which made the strongest
impression were of the narrative kind. That and the drama may be said to
be the only forms of representation adequate to embody the spirit or to
interest the sympathies of an age and nation immersed in the turmoil of
energetic action.
Among the prose writings of this period, two kinds of composition employed
a larger fund of literary genius than any other, and exercised a wider
influence; these were the novels and romances, and the reviews and other
periodicals. Novel-writing acquired an unusually high rank in the world of
letters, through its greatest master, and was remarkable for the high
character imprinted on it. By Scott and two or three precursors and some
not unworthy successors, the novel was made for us nearly all that the
drama in its palmy days had been for our fore-fathers, imbibing as much of
its poetic spirit as its form and purpose allowed, thoughtful in its views
of life, and presenting pictures faithful to nature.
In the beginning of the present century was founded the dynasty of the
reviews, which now began to be chosen as the vehicles of the best prose
writing and the most energetic thinking that the nation could command.
Masses of valuable knowledge have been laid up, and streams of eloquence
have been poured out in the periodicals of our century by authors who have
often left their names to be guessed at. But the best writers have not
always escaped the dangers of this form of writing, which is unfavorable
to completeness and depth of knowledge, and strongly tempting to
exaggeration of style and sentiment. This evil has worked on the ranks of
inferior contributors with a force which has seriously injured the purity
of the public taste. The strong points of periodical writers are their
criticism of literary works and their speculation in social and political
philosophy, which have nowhere been handled so skillfully as in the
Reviews. After poetry, they are the most valuable departments in the
literature of the first age.
Since the Anglo-Saxon period, English literature has derived much of its
materials and inspiration from the teaching of other countries. In the
Middle Ages, France furnished the models of chivalrous poetry and much of
the social system; the Augustan age of French letters, the reign of Louis
XIV., ruled the literary taste of England from the Restoration to the
middle of the eighteenth century; and from Germany, more than from any
other foreign nation, have come the influences by which the intellect of
Great Britain has been affected, especially during the last thirty years.
Within this time, the study and translation of German literature have
become fashionable pursuits, and on the whole, highly beneficial. The
philology of Germany and its profound poetical criticism have taught much:
the philosophical tendency of German theology has engaged the attention of
teachers of religion, and had its effect both for good and evil, and the
accurate study of the highest branches of German philosophy has tended
decidedly to elevate the standard of abstract speculation.
The most hopeful symptom of English literature in the last thirty years is
to be found in the zeal and success with which its teachings have been
extended beyond the accustomed limits. Knowledge has been diffused with a
zeal and rapidity never before dreamed of, and the spirit which prompted
it has been worthily embodied in the enlarged and enlightened temper with
which it has been communicated. In the midst of much error, there are many
features prominent which presage the birth of a love of mankind more
expansive and generous than any that has ever yet pervaded society.
The present age possesses no poetry comparable to that of the preceding,
and few men who unite remarkable eloquence with power of thought. Among
the thinkers, there is greater activity of speculation in regard to
questions affecting the nature and destiny of man; and problems have been
boldly propounded, but the solutions have not been found, and amidst much
doubt and dimness, the present generation seems to be struggling toward a
new organization of social and intellectual life.
The literature of England may be divided into three periods: the first,
extending from the departure of the Romans to the Norman Conquest (448-
1066), comprises the literature in the Celtic, Latin, and Anglo-Saxon
tongues.
The second period, extending from the Norman Conquest to the accession of
Henry VIII. (1066-1509), contains the literature of the Norman period from
1066 to 1307, in the Latin, Norman-French, and Anglo-Saxon tongues, the
transition of the Anglo-Saxon into English, and the literature of the
fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.
The third period, extending from 1509 to 1884, includes the literature of
the age of the Reformation, that of the age of Spenser, Shakspeare, Bacon,
and Milton, of the Restoration and Revolution, and of the eighteenth and
nineteenth centuries.
2. THE LANGUAGE.--The English language is directly descended from the
Anglo-Saxon, but derives much from the Norman-French, and from the Latin.
Although the Celtic in its branches of Cymric and Gaelic still continues
to be the speech of a portion of the inhabitants of Great Britain, it has
never exercised any influence on the language of the nation.
The origin of the Anglo-Saxon tongue is involved in obscurity. It most
nearly resembles the Frisic, a Low German dialect once spoken between the
Rhine and the Elbe, and which is the parent of modern Dutch.
Before the battle of Hastings, the Anglo-Saxon tongue had been spoken in
England for at least six hundred years, during which time it must have
undergone many changes and dialectic variations. On the subjugation of the
conflicting states by the kings of Wessex, the language of the West Saxons
came to be the ruling one, and its use was extended and confirmed by the
example of Alfred, himself a native of Berks. But it does not necessarily
follow that this dialect is the parent of the English language. We must
look for the probable ground-work of this in the gradual coalescence of
the leading dialects.
The changes by which the Anglo-Saxon passed into the modern English
assumed in succession two distinct types, marking two eras quite
dissimilar. First came the Semi-Saxon, or transition period, throughout
which the old language was suffering disorganization and decay, a period
of confusion, perplexing alike to those who then used the tongue, and to
those who now endeavor to trace its vicissitudes. This chaotic state came
to an end about the middle of the thirteenth century, after a duration of
nearly two hundred years. The second era, or period of reconstruction,
follows, during which the language may be described as English.
A late critic divides the Old English Period, extending from 1250 to 1500,
into the Early English (1250-1330) and the Middle English (1330-1500). The
latter was used by Chaucer and Wickliffe, and is in all essentials so like
the modern tongue, except in the spelling, that a tolerable English
scholar may easily understand it. A great change was effected in the
vocabulary by the introduction and naturalization of words from the
French. The poems of Chaucer and Gower are studded with them, and the
style of these favorite writers exercised a commanding influence ever
after.
The grammar of the English language, in all points of importance, is a
simplification of the grammar of the Anglo-Saxon. In considering the
sources of the English vocabulary, we find that from the Anglo-Saxon are
derived first, almost all those words which import relations; secondly,
not only all the adjectives, but all the other words, nouns, and verbs
which grammarians call irregular; thirdly, the Saxon gives us in most
instances our only names, and in all instances those which suggest
themselves most readily for the objects perceived through the senses;
fourthly, all words, with a few exceptions, whose signification is
specific, are Anglo-Saxon. For instance, we use a foreign, naturalized
term when we speak of color, or motion, in general, but the Saxon in
speaking of the particular color or motion, and the style of a writer
becomes animated and suggestive in proportion to the frequency with which
he uses these specific terms; fifthly, it furnishes a rich fund of
expressions for the feelings and affections, for the persons who are the
earliest and most natural objects of our attachment, and for those
inanimate things whose names are figuratively significant of domestic
union; sixthly, the Anglo-Saxon is, for the most part, the language of
business; of the counting-house, the shop, the street, the market, the
farm. Among an eminently practical people it is eminently the organ of
practical action, and it retains this prerogative in defiance alike of the
necessary innovations caused by scientific discovery and of the
corruptions of ignorance and affectation. Seventhly, a very large
proportion of the language of invective, humor, satire, and colloquial
pleasantry is Anglo-Saxon. In short, the Teutonic elements of our
vocabulary are equally valuable in enabling us to speak and write
perspicuously and with animation; and besides dictating the laws which
connect our words, and furnishing the cement which binds them together,
they yield all our aptest means of describing imagination, feeling, and
the every-day facts of life.
From the Latin the English has borrowed more or less for two thousand
years, and freely for more than six centuries; but from the time of the
Conquest it is difficult to distinguish words of Latin origin from those
of French. The Latinisms of the language have arisen chiefly in three
epochs. The first was the thirteenth century, which followed an age
devoted to classical studies, and its theological writers and poets coined
freely in the Roman mint. The second was the Elizabethan age, when, in the
enthusiasm of a new revival of admiration for antiquity, the privilege of
naturalization was used to an extent which threatened serious danger to
the purity and ease of speech. In the third epoch, the latter part of the
eighteenth century, Johnson was the dictator of form and style, and the
pompous rotundity that then prevailed has been permanently injurious,
although our Latin words, on the whole, have done much more good than
harm.
The introduction of French words began with the Conquest, when the
political condition of the country made it imperative that many words
should be understood. The second stage began about a century later, when
the few native Englishmen who loved letters entered on the study of French
poetry. The third era of English Gallicisms opened in the fourteenth
century, when the French tastes of the nobles, and the zeal with which
Chaucer and other men of letters studied the poetry of France, greatly
contributed to introduce that tide of French diction which flowed on to
the close of the Middle Ages. By that time the new words were so numerous
and so strongly ingrafted on the native stock that all subsequent
additions are unimportant. The dictionaries of modern English are said to
contain about 38,000 words, of which about 23,000 or five eighths of the
whole number, come from the Anglo-Saxon.
The English language, by its remarkable combination of strength,
precision, and copiousness, is worthy of being, as it already is, spoken
by many millions, and these the part of the human race that appear likely
to control, more than any others, the future destinies of the world.