1740
History of the Period.--This chapter opens with the Restoration of
Charles II. (1660-1685) in 1660 and ends before the appearance, in
1740, of a new literary creation, Richardson's _Pamela_, the novel of
domestic life and character. This period is often called the age of
Dryden and Pope, the two chief poets of the time. When Oliver Cromwell
died, the restoration of the monarchy was inevitable. The protest
against the Puritanic view of life had become strong. Reaction always
results when excessive restraint in any direction is removed.
During his exile, Charles had lived much in France and had become
accustomed to the dissolute habits of the French court. The court of
Charles II. was the most corrupt ever known in England. The Puritan
virtues were laughed to scorn by the ribald courtiers who attended
Charles II. John Evelyn (1620-1706) and Samuel Pepys (1633-1703)
left diaries, which give interesting pictures of the times. The one by
Pepys is especially vivid.
In 1663 Samuel Butler (1612-1680) published a famous satire,
entitled _Hudibras_. Its object was to ridicule everything that
savored of Puritanism. This satire became extremely popular in court
circles, and was the favorite reading of the king.
[Illustration: SAMUEL BUTLER.]
Charles II. excluded all but Episcopalians from holding office, either
in towns or in Parliament. Only those who sanctioned the Episcopal
prayer book were allowed to preach. In order to keep England's
friendship and to be able to look to her for assistance in time of
war, Louis XIV. of France paid Charles II. £100,000 a year to act as a
French agent. In this capacity, Charles II. began against Holland.
From a position of commanding importance under Cromwell, England had
become a third-rate power, a tail to a French kite.
James II. (1685-1688), who succeeded his brother, Charles II.,
undertook to suspend laws and to govern like a despot. He was driven
out in the bloodless revolution of 1688 by his son-in-law, William
(1689-1702), and his daughter Mary. William of Orange, who thus became
king of England, was a prince of Holland. This revolution led to the
_Bill of Rights_ (1689), the "third pillar of the British
Constitution," the two previous being _Magna Charta_ and the _Petition
of Right_. The foundations were now firmly laid for a strictly
constitutional monarchy in England. From this time the king has been
less important, sometimes only a mere figure-head.
This revolution, coupled with the increasing rivalry of France in
trade and colonial expansion, altered the foreign policy of England.
Holland was the head of the European coalition against France; and
William III. was influential in having England join it. For the larger
part of the eighteenth century there was intermittent war with France.
Under Anne (1702-1714) the Duke of Marlborough won many remarkable
victories against France. The most worthy goal of French antagonism,
expansion of trade, and displacement of the French in America and
India, was not at this time clearly apparent.
Anne's successor was the Hanoverian Elector, George I. (1714-1727), a
descendant of the daughter of James I., who had married a German
prince. At the time of his accession, George I. was fifty-four years
old and could speak no English. He seldom attended the meetings of his
cabinet, since he could not understand the deliberations. This
circumstance led to further decline of royal power, so that his
successor, George II. (1727-1760), said: "Ministers are the king in
this country."
The history of the rest of this period centers around the great prime
minister, Robert Walpole, whose ministry lasted from 1715-1717 and
from 1721-1742. His motto was, "Let sleeping dogs lie"; and he took
good care to offend no one by proposing any reforms, either political
or religious. "Every man has his price" was the succinct statement of
his political philosophy; and he did not hesitate to secure by bribery
the adoption of his measures in Parliament. He succeeded in three
aims: (1) in making the house of Hanover so secure on the throne that
it has not since been displaced, (2) in giving fresh impetus to trade
and industry at home by reducing taxation, and (3) in strengthening
the navy and encouraging colonial commerce.
Change in Foreign Influence.--Of all foreign influences from the
beginning of the Renaissance to the Restoration, the literature of
Italy had been the most important. French influence now gained the
ascendancy.
There were several reasons for this change. (1) France under the great
Louis XIV. was increasing her political importance. (2) She now had
among her writers men who were by force of genius fitted to exert wide
influence. Among such, we may instance Molière (1622-1673), who stands
next to Shakespeare in dramatic power. (3) Charles II. and many
Cavaliers had passed the time of their exile in France. They became
familiar with French literature, and when they returned to England in
1660, their taste had already been influenced by French models.
Change in the Subject Matter of Literature.--The Elizabethan age
impartially held the mirror up to every type of human emotion. The
writers of the Restoration and of the first half of the eighteenth
century, as a class, avoided any subject that demanded a portrayal of
deep and noble feeling. In this age, we catch no glimpse of a Lady
Macbeth in the grasp of remorse or of a Lear bending over a dead
Cordelia.
The popular subjects were those which appealed to cold intellect; and
these were, for the most part, satirical, didactic, and argumentative.
The two greatest poets of the period, John Dryden and his successor,
Alexander Pope, usually chose such subjects. John Locke (1632-1704), a
great prose writer of this age, shows in the very title of his most
famous work, _Of the Conduct of the Understanding_, what he preferred
to discuss. That book opens with the statement, "The last resort a man
has recourse to in the conduct of himself is his understanding." This
declaration, which is not strictly true, embodies a pronounced
tendency of the age, which could not understand that the world of
feeling is no less real than that of the understanding.
One good result of the ascendancy of the intellect was seen in
scientific investigation. The Royal Society was founded in 1662 to
study natural phenomena and to penetrate into the hidden mysteries of
philosophy and life.
The Advance of Prose.--In each preceding age, the masterpieces were
poetry; but before the middle of the eighteenth century we find the
prose far surpassing the poetry. Dryden, almost immediately after the
Restoration, shows noteworthy advance in modern prose style. He avoids
a Latinized inversion, such as the following, with which Milton begins
the second sentence of his _Areopagitica_ (1644):--
"And me perhaps each of these dispositions, as the subject was
whereon I entered, may have at other times variously affected ..."
Here, the object "me" is eighteen words in advance of its predicate.
The sentence might well have ended with the natural pause at
"affected," but Milton adds fifty-one more words. We may easily
understand by comparison why the term "modern" is applied to the prose
of Dryden and of his successors Addison and Steele. To emphasize the
precedence of these writers in the development of modern prose is no
disparagement to Bunyan's style, which is almost as quaint and as
excellent as that of the 1611 version of the _Bible_.
French influence was cumulative in changing the cumbersome style of
Milton's prose to the polished, neatly-turned sentences of Addison.
Matthew Arnold says: "The glory of English literature is in poetry,
and in poetry the strength of the eighteenth century does not lie.
Nevertheless the eighteenth century accomplished for us an immense
literary progress, and its very shortcomings in poetry were an
instrument to that progress, and served it. The example of Germany may
show us what a nation loses from having no prose style... French prose
is marked in the highest degree by the qualities of regularity,
uniformity, precision, balance... The French made their poetry also
conform to the law which was molding their prose... This may have been
bad for French poetry, but it was good for French prose."
The same influence which gave vigor, point, and definiteness to the
prose, necessary for the business of the world, helped to dwarf the
poetry. If both could not have advanced together, we may be thankful
that the first part of the eighteenth century produced a varied prose
of such high excellence.
The Classic School.--The literary lawgivers of this age held that a
rigid adherence to certain narrow rules was the prime condition of
producing a masterpiece. Indeed, the belief was common that a
knowledge of rules was more important than genius.
The men of this school are called _classicists_ because they held that
a study of the best works of the ancients would disclose the necessary
guiding rules. No style that did not closely follow these rules was
considered good. Horace, seen through French spectacles, was the
classical author most copied by this school. His _Epistles_ and
_Satires_ were considered models.
The motto of the classicists was polished regularity. Pope struck the
keynote of the age when he said:--
"True wit is nature to advantage dress'd,
What oft was thought, but ne'er so well express'd."[1]
These two lines show the form of the "riming couplet," which the
classical poets adopted. There is generally a pause at the end of each
line; and each couplet, when detached from the context, will usually
make complete sense.
Edmund Waller (1606-1687), remembered today for his single
couplet:--
"The soul's dark cottage, battered and decayed,
Lets in new light through chinks that time has made,"
had used this form of verse before 1630; but it was reserved for
Dryden, and especially for Pope, to bring the couplet to a high degree
of perfection. A French critic advised poets to compose the second
line of the couplet first. No better rule could have been devised for
dwarfing poetic power and for making poetry artificial.
Voltaire, a French classicist, said, "I do not like the monstrous
irregularities of Shakespeare." An eighteenth-century classicist
actually endeavored to improve Hamlet's soliloquy by putting it in
riming couplets. These lines from _Macbeth_ show that Shakespeare will
not tolerate such leading strings nor allow the ending of the lines to
interfere with his sense:--
"...Besides, this Duncan
Hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been
So clear in his great office, that his virtues
Will plead like angels, trumpet-tongued against
The deep damnation of his taking-off."
A later romantic poet called the riming couplet "rocking-horse meter";
and said that the reading of many couplets reminded him of round trips
on a rocking-horse.
Advances are usually made by overstressing some one point. The
classicists taught the saving grace of style, the need of restraint,
balance, clearness, common sense. We should therefore not despise the
necessary lesson which English literature learned from such
teaching,--a lesson which has never been forgotten.
The Drama.--The theaters were reopened at the time of the
Restoration. It is interesting to read in the vivacious _Diary_ of
Samuel Pepys how he went in 1661 to see Shakespeare's _Romeo and
Juliet_, "a play of itself the worst that I ever heard." The next year
he characterizes _A Midsummer Night's Dream_ as "the most ridiculous
play that I ever saw." He liked the variety in _Macbeth_, and calls
_The Tempest_ "the most innocent play that I ever saw."
The Restoration dramatists, who were dominated by French influence, so
often sneered at morality and the virtues of the home, that they have
paid the penalty of being little read in after times. The theater has
not yet entirely recovered from the deep-seated prejudice which was so
intensified by the coarse plays which flourished for fifty years after
the Restoration.
Although John Dryden is best known among a large number of Restoration
dramatists,[2] he did better work in another field. William Congreve
(1670-1729) made the mast distinctive contribution to the new comedy
of manners. Descended from an old landowning family in Staffordshire,
he was for a while a mate of Jonathan Swift at Trinity College,
Dublin. In 1691 Congreve was entered in the Middle Temple, London, to
begin the study of law, but he soon turned playwright. His four
comedies,--_The Old Bachelor, The Double Dealer, Love for Love, The
Way of the World_,--and one tragedy, _The Mourning Bride_, were all
written in the last decade of the seventeenth century. After 1700 he
wrote no more plays, although he lived nearly thirty years longer. On
his death, in 1729, he was buried in Westminster Abbey.
Congreve attempts to picture the manners of contemporary society, and
he does not penetrate far below the surface of life. He is not read
for the depth of his thought, but for his humor and for the clear,
pointed style of his prose comedies. George Meredith says:--
"Where Congreve excels all his English rivals is in his literary
force, and a succinctness of style peculiar to him... He is at once
precise and voluble. If you have ever thought upon style, you will
acknowledge it to be a signal accomplishment. In this he is a
classic, and he is worthy of treading a measure with Molière."
Congreve's best comedies are _Love for Love_ and _The Way of the
World_. The majority of critics agree with Meredith in calling Miss
Millimant, who is the heroine of the latter play, "an admirable,
almost a lovable heroine." Meredith illustrates one phase of his own
idea of the comic spirit, by the language which Miss Millimant uses in
accepting her lover: "If I continue to endure you a little longer, I
may by degrees dwindle into a wife." Congreve's peculiar genius is
well shown in his ability to make her manner of speech reveal her
characteristics. His plays are unfortunately disfigured with the
coarseness of the age.
The blemishes in the drama did not exist, however, without an emphatic
contemporary protest. Jeremy Collier (1650-1729), a non-conforming
bishop, in his _Short View of the Immorality of the Stage_ (1698),
complains that the unworthy hero of one of Congreve's plays "is
crowned for the man of merit, has his wishes thrown into his lap, and
makes the happy exit."
Such attacks had their weight and prepared the way far the more moral
sentimental comedies of Richard Steele and succeeding playwrights. The
sacrifice of plot to moral purpose and the deliberate introduction of
scenes designed to force an appeal to sentiment caused the later drama
to deteriorate in a different way. We shall see that the natural
hearty humor of Goldsmith's comedy, _She Stoops to Conquer_(1773),
afforded a welcome relief from such plays.
JOHN DRYDEN, 1631-1700
[Illustration: JOHN DRYDEN. _From the painting by Sir Godfrey
Knellwe, National Portrait Gallery_.]
[Illustration: BIRTHPLACE OF DRYDEN. _From a print._]
Life.--John Dryden was born in 1631 in the small village of
Aldwinkle, in the northern part of Northamptonshire. Few interesting
facts concerning his life have come down to us. His father was a
baronet; his mother, the daughter of a rector. Young Dryden graduated
from Cambridge in 1654.
During his entire life, Dryden was a professional literary man; and
with his pen he made the principal part of his living. This necessity
often forced him against his own better judgment to cater to the
perverted taste of the Restoration. When he found that plays had more
market value than any other kind of literature, he agreed to furnish
three plays a year for the king's actors, but was unable to produce
that number. For fifteen years in the prime of his life, Dryden did
little but write plays, the majority of which are seldom read to-day.
His only important poem during his dramatic period was _Annus
Mirabilis_ (_The Wonderful Year_, 1666), memorable for the great
London fire and for naval victories over the Dutch.
By writing the greatest political satire in the language at the age of
fifty, he showed the world where his genius lay. During the last
twenty years of his life, he produced but few plays. His greatest
satires, didactic poems, and lyrics belong to this period. In his last
years he wrote a spirited translation of Vergil, and retold in his own
inimitable way various stories from Chaucer and Boccaccio and _Ovid_.
These stories were published in a volume entitled _Fables, Ancient and
Modern_. Dryden died in 1700 and was buried in Westminster Abbey
beside Chaucer.
It is difficult to speak positively of Dryden's character. He wrote a
poem in honor of the memory of Cromwell, and a little later another
poem, _Astraea Redux_, welcoming Charles II. He argued in stirring
verse in favor of the Episcopal religion when that was the faith of
the court; but after the accession of James II., who was a Catholic,
Dryden wrote another poem to prove the Catholic Church the only true
one. He had been appointed poet laureate in 1670, but the Revolution
of 1688, which drove James from the throne, caused Dryden to lose the
laureateship. He would neither take the oath of fealty to the new
government nor change his religion. In spite of adversity and the loss
of an income almost sufficient to support him, he remained a Catholic
for the rest of his life and reared his sons in that faith.
He seems to have been of a forgiving disposition and ready to
acknowledge his own faults. He admitted that his plays were disfigured
with coarseness. He was very kind to young writers and willing to help
them with their work. In his chair at Will's Coffee House, discoursing
to the wits of the Restoration about matters of literary art, he was
one of the most prominent figures of the age.
His Prose.--Although to the majority of people Dryden is known only
as a poet, his influence on prose has been so far-reaching as to
entitle him to be called one of the founders of modern prose style.
The shortening of sentences has been a striking feature in the
development of modern English prose. Edmund Spenser averages about
fifty words to each of his prose sentences; Richard Hooker, about
forty-one. One of the most striking sentences in Milton's
_Areopagitica_ contains ninety-five words, although he crowds over
three hundred words into some of his long sentences. The sentences in
some of Dryden's pages average only twenty-five words in length.
Turning to Macaulay, one of the most finished masters of modern prose,
we find that his sentences average twenty-two words. Dryden helped
also to free English prose from the inversions, involutions, and
parenthetical intricacies of earlier times. His influence on both
prose and poetry were much the same. In verse he adopted the short,
easily understood unit of the classical couplet; and in prose, the
short, direct sentence.
Dryden's prose deals chiefly with literary criticism. Most of his
prose is to be found in the prefaces to his plays and poems. His most
important separate prose composition is his _Essay of Dramatic Poesy_,
a work which should be read by all who wish to know some of the
foundation principles of criticism.
Satiric Poetry.--No English writer has surpassed Dryden in satiric
verse. His greatest satire is _Absalom and Achitophel_, in which,
under the guise of Old Testament characters, he satirizes the leading
spirits of the Protestant opposition to the succession of James, the
brother of Charles II., to the English throne. Dryden thus satirizes
Achitophel, the Earl of Shaftesbury:--
"Great wits are sure to madness near allied,
And thin partitions do their bounds divide;
Else, why should he, with wealth and honor blest,
Refuse his age the needful hours of rest?
Punish a body which he could not please,
Bankrupt of life, yet prodigal of ease?
And all to leave what with his toil he won
To that unfeathered two-legged thing, a son.
* * * * *
In friendship false, implacable in hate,
Resolved to ruin or to rule the state."
Zimri, the Duke of Buckingham, is immortalized thus:--
"Stiff in opinions, always in the wrong,
Was everything by starts, and nothing long."
_Mac Flecknoe_ is another satire of almost as great merit, directed
against a certain Whig poet by the name of Shadwell. He would have
been seldom mentioned in later times, had it not been for two of
Dryden's lines:--
"The rest to some faint meaning make pretence,
But Shadwell never deviates into sense."
_All for Love_, one of Dryden's greatest plays, shows the delicate
keenness of his satire in characterizing the cold-blooded Augustus
Caesar, or Octavius, as he is there called. Antony has sent a
challenge to Octavius, who replies that he has more ways than one to
die. Antony rejoins:--
"He has more ways than one;
But he would choose them all before that one.
_Ventidius._ He first would choose an ague or a fever.
_Antony._ No; it must be an ague, not a fever;
He has not warmth enough to die by that."
Dryden could make his satire as direct and blasting as a thunderbolt.
He thus describes his publisher:--
"With leering looks, bull-faced, and freckled fair,
With two left legs, and Judas-colored hair,
And frowsy pores that taint the ambient air."
Argumentative or Didactic Verse.--Dryden is a master in arguing in
poetry. He was not a whit hampered by the restrictions of verse. They
were rather an advantage to him, for in poetry he could make more
telling arguments in briefer compass than in prose. The best two
examples of his power of arguing in verse are _Religio Laici_, written
in 1682, to uphold the Episcopal religion, and _The Hind and the
Panther_, composed in 1687, to vindicate the Catholic church. Verse of
this order is called didactic, because it endeavors to teach or to
explain something. The age of the Restoration delighted in such
exercises of the intellect vastly more than in flights of fancy or
imagination.
Lyrical Verse.--While most of Dryden's best poetry is either satiric
or didactic, he wrote three fine lyrical poems: _Alexander's Feast, A
Song for St. Cecilia's Day_, and _An Ode to Mrs. Anne Killigrew_. All
are distinguished by remarkable beauty and energy of expression.
_Alexander's Feast_ is the most widely read of Dryden's poems. The
opening lines of the Ode to Mrs. Anne Killigrew seem almost Miltonic
in their conception, and they show great power in the field of lyrical
poetry. Mistress Killigrew was a young lady of rare accomplishments in
both poetry and painting, who died at the age of twenty-five. Dryden
thus begins her memorial ode:--
"Thou youngest virgin daughter of the skies,
Made in the last promotion of the blest;
Whose palms, new plucked from Paradise,
In spreading branches more sublimely rise,
Rich with immortal green above the rest:
* * * * *
Thou wilt have time enough for hymns divine,
Since Heaven's eternal year is thine."
Some of his plays have songs and speeches instinct with lyrical force.
The following famous lines on the worth of existence are taken from
his tragedy of _Aurengzebe:_--
"When I consider'd life, 'tis all a cheat,
Yet, fool'd with hope, men favor the deceit,
Trust on, and think to-morrow will repay:
To-morrow's falser than the former day,
Lies worse; and while it says, we shall be blest
With some new joys, cuts off what we possest.
Strange cozenage! none would live past years again;
Yet all hope pleasure in what yet remain.
And, from the dregs of life, think to receive
What the first sprightly running could not give.
I'm tir'd with waiting for this chemic gold,
Which fools us young and beggars us when old."
General Characteristics.--In point of time, Dryden is the first
great poet of the school of literary artists. His verse does not
tolerate the unpruned irregularities and exaggerations of many former
English poets. His command over language is remarkable. He uses words
almost as he chooses, but he does not invest them with the warm glow
of feeling. He is, however, something more than a great word artist.
Many of his ideas bear the stamp of marked originality.
In the field of satiric and didactic poetry, he is a master. The
intellectual, not the emotional, side of man's nature appeals strongly
to him. He heeds not the song of the bird, the color of the rose, nor
the clouds of evening.
Although more celebrated for his poetry than for his prose, he is the
earliest of the great modern prose stylists, and he displays high
critical ability.
DANIEL DEFOE, 1659?-1731
[Illustration: DANIEL DEFOE. _From a print by Vandergucht_.]
Varied Experiences.--Daniel Defoe was born in London, probably the
year before the Restoration. His father, a butcher in good
circumstances, sent the boy to a school in which English, instead of
Latin, was the medium of instruction. He was taught how to express
himself in the simple, forceful English for which he became famous.
His education was planned to make him a dissenting minister; but he
preferred a life of varied activity. He became a trader, a
manufacturer of tiles, a journalist, and a writer of fiction. By also
serving as a government agent and spy, he incurred the severe
criticism of contemporaries. It is doubtful if even Shakespeare had
more varied experiences or more vicissitudes in life.
For writing what would to-day be considered a harmless piece of irony,
_The Shortest Way with Dissenters_, in which Defoe, who was himself a
dissenter, advocated banishment or hanging, he suffered the
mortification of exposure for three days in the pillory and of
imprisonment in the pestilent Newgate jail. His business of making
tiles was consequently ruined. These experiences, with which his
enemies taunted him, colored his entire life and made him realize that
the support of his wife and six children necessitated care in his
choice and treatment of subjects.
His life was a succession of changing fortunes. He died in poverty in
1731 and was buried in Bunhill Fields, London. His grave was marked by
only a small headstone, but the English boys and girls who had read
_Robinson Crusoe_ in the Victorian age subscribed the money for a
monument with a suitable inscription. It is remarkable that Bunhill
Fields, which contains the graves of so many humble dissenters, should
be the final resting place of both Bunyan and Defoe, the authors of
the first two English prose works most often read to-day.
A Journalist and a Prolific Writer.--Defoe has at last come to be
regarded as the first great English journalist. He had predecessors in
this field, for as early as 1622 the _Coranto_, or journal of
"current" foreign news, appeared. In 1641, on the eve of the civil
war, the _Diurnall_ of domestic news was issued. In 1643, when
Parliament appointed a licenser, who gave copyright protection to the
"catchword" or newspaper title, journalists became a "recognized
body." "Newsbooks" and especially "newsletters" grew in popularity.
Only a few years after the Restoration, there appeared _The London
Gazette_, which has been continued to the present time as the medium
through which the government publishes its official news.
From 1704 to 1713 Defoe issued _The Review_, which appeared triweekly
for the greater part of the time, and gave the news current in England
and in much of Europe. _The Review_, an unusual achievement for the
age, shows Defoe to have been a journalist of great ability. This
paper had one department, called _The Scandal Club_, which furnished
suggestions for _The Tatler_ and _The Spectator_.
It has been computed that Defoe wrote for _The Review_ during the nine
years of its publication 5000 pages of essays, in addition to nearly
the same amount of other matter. He also issued many pamphlets, which
performed somewhat the same service as the modern newspaper with its
editorials. It is probable that he was the most prolific of all
English authors. Few have discussed as wide a range of matter. He
wrote more than two hundred and fifty separate works on subjects as
different as social conditions, the promotion of business, human
conduct, travels in England, and ghosts.
Fiction.--Defoe was nearly sixty when he began to write fiction. In
1719 he published the first part of _Robinson Crusoe_, the story of
the adventures of a sailor wrecked on a solitary island. The Frenchman
Daudet said of this work: "It is as nearly immortal as any book can
ever be." The nineteenth century saw more than one hundred editions of
it published in London alone. It has been repeatedly issued in almost
every language of Europe. The secret of the success of _Robinson
Crusoe_ has puzzled hundreds of writers who have tried to imitate it.
The world-wide popularity of _Robinson Crusoe_ is chiefly due (1) to
the peculiar genius of the author; (2) to his journalistic training,
which enabled him to seize on the essential elements of interest and
to keep these in the foreground; (3) to the skill with which he
presents matter-of-fact details, sufficient to invest the story with
an atmosphere of perfect reality; (4) to his style, which is as simple
and direct as the speech of real life, and which is made vivid by
specific words describing concrete actions,--such as hewing a tree,
sharpening a stake, hanging up grapes to dry, tossing a biscuit to a
wild cat, taking a motherless kid in his arms; and (5) to the skill
with which he sets a problem requiring for its solution energy,
ingenuity, self-reliance, and the development of the moral power
necessary to meet and overcome difficulties.
Young and old follow with intense interest every movement of the
shipwrecked mariner when he first swims to the stranded ship,
constructs a raft, and places on it "bread, rice, three Dutch cheeses,
five pieces of dried goat's flesh, a little remainder of European
corn, and the carpenter's chest." Readers do not accompany him
passively as he lands the raft and returns. They work with him; they
are not only made a part of all Crusoe's experience, but they react on
it imaginatively; they suggest changes; they hold their breath or try
to assist him when he is in danger. Defoe's genius in making the
reader a partner in Robinson Crusoe's adventures has not yet received
sufficient appreciation. The author could never have secured such a
triumph if he had not compelled readers to take an active part in the
story.
It was for a long time thought that Defoe was ignorant, that he
accidentally happened to write _Robinson Crusoe_ because he had been
told of the recent experience of Alexander Selkirk on a solitary
island in the Pacific. It is now known that Defoe was well educated,
versed in several languages, and the most versatile writer of his
time. _Robinson Crusoe_ was no more of an accident than any other
creation of genius.
Defoe's other principal works of fiction are: _Memoirs of a Cavalier_,
the story of a soldier's adventures in the seventeenth century; _The
Life, Adventures, and Piracies of the Famous Captain Singleton_, a
graphic account of adventures in a journey across Africa; _Moll
Flanders_, a story of a well-known criminal; and _A Journal of the
Plague Year_, a vivid, imaginative presentation, in the most realistic
way, of the horrors of the London plague in 1665. These works are
almost completely overshadowed by _Robinson Crusoe_; but they also
show Defoe's narrative power and his ability to make fiction seem an
absolute reality. In writing _Gulliver's Travels_, Swift received
valuable hints from Defoe. Stevenson's _Treasure Island_ is the most
successful of the almost numberless stories of adventure suggested by
_Robinson Crusoe_.
JONATHAN SWIFT, 1667-1745
[Illustration: JONATHAN SWIFT. _From the painting by C. Jervas,
National Portrait Gallery_.]
Life.--Swift, one of the greatest prose writers of the eighteenth
century, was born of English parents in Dublin in 1667. It is
absolutely necessary to know something of his life in order to pass
proper judgment on his writings. A cursory examination of his life
will show that heredity and environment were responsible for many of
his peculiarities. Swift's father died a few months before the birth
of his son, and the boy saw but little of his mother.
Swift's school and college life were passed at Kilkenny School and
Trinity College, Dublin. For his education he was indebted to an
uncle, who made the boy feel the bitterness of his dependence. In
after times he said that his uncle treated him like a dog. Swift's
early experience seems to have made him misanthropic and hardened to
consequences, for he neglected certain studies, and it was only by
special concession that he was allowed to take his A.B. degree in
1686.
After leaving college, he spent almost ten years as the private
secretary of Sir William Temple, at Moor Park in Surrey, about forty
miles southwest of London. Temple had been asked to furnish some
employment for the young graduate because Lady Temple was related to
Swift's mother. Here Swift was probably treated as a dependent, and he
had to eat at the second table. Finally, this life became so
intolerable that he took holy orders and went to a little parish in
Ireland; but after a stay of eighteen months he returned to Moor Park,
where he remained until Temple's death in 1699. Swift then went to
another little country parish in Ireland. From there he visited London
on a mission in behalf of the Episcopal Church in Ireland. He
quarreled with the Whigs, became a Tory, and assisted that party by
writing many political pamphlets. The Tory ministry soon felt that it
could scarcely do without him. He dined with ministers of state, and
was one of the most important men in London; but he advanced the
interests of his friends much better than his own, for he got little
from the government except the hope of becoming bishop. In 1713 he was
made dean of St. Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin. In 1714, Queen Anne
died, the Tories went out of power, and Swift returned to Ireland, a
disappointed man. He passed the rest of his life there, with the
exception of a few visits to England.
[Illustration: MOOR PARK. _From a drawing._]
When English politicians endeavored to oppress Ireland with unjust
laws, Swift championed the Irish cause. A man who knew him well, says:
"I never saw the poor so carefully and conscientiously attended to as
those of his cathedral." He gave up a large part of his income every
year for the poor. In Dublin he was looked upon as a hero. When a
certain person tried to be revenged on Swift for a satire, a
deputation of Swift's neighbors proposed to thrash the man. Swift sent
them home, but they boycotted the man and lowered his income £1200 a
year.
During the last years of his life, Swift was hopelessly insane. He
died in 1745, leaving his property for an asylum for lunatics and
incurables.
[Illustration: SWIFT AND STELLA. _From the painting by Dicksee._]
The mysteries in Swift's life may be partly accounted for by the fact
that during many years he suffered from an unknown brain disease. This
affection, the galling treatment received in his early years, and the
disappointments of his prime, largely account for his misanthropy, for
his coldness, and for the almost brutal treatment of the women who
loved him.
Swift's attachment to the beautiful Esther Johnson, known in
literature as Stella, led him to write to her that famous series of
letters known as the _Journal to Stella_, in which he gives much of
his personal history during the three sunniest years of his life, from
1710 to 1713, when he was a lion in London. Thackeray says: "I know of
nothing more manly, more tender, more exquisitely touching, than some
of these brief notes, written in what Swift calls his 'little
language' in his _Journal to Stella_."
A Tale of a Tub and the Battle of the Books.--Swift's greatest
satire, the greatest prose satire in English, is known as _A Tale of a
Tub_. The purpose of the work is to uphold the Episcopalians and
satirize opposing religious denominations. For those not interested in
theological arguments, there is much entertaining philosophy, as the
following quotation will show:--
"If we take an examination of what is generally understood by
happiness, as it has respect either to the understanding or the
senses, we shall find all its properties and adjuncts will herd
under this short definition,--that it is a perpetual possession of
being well deceived. And first, with relation to the mind or
understanding it is manifest what mighty advantages fiction has over
truth; and the reason is just at our elbow, because imagination can
build nobler scenes and produce more wonderful revolutions than
fortune or nature will be at expense to furnish."
Swift's satiric definition of happiness as the art "of being well
deceived" is a characteristic instance of a combination of his humor
and pessimistic philosophy.
In the same volume with _A Tale of a Tub_, there was published a prose
satire in almost epic form, _An Account of a Battle between the
Ancient and Modern Books in St. James Library_ (1704). Although this
satire apparently aims to demonstrate the superior merits of the great
classical writers, it is mainly an attack on pretentions to knowledge.
Our greatest surprise in this satire comes not only from discovering
the expression, "sweetness and light," made famous by Matthew Arnold
in the Victorian age, but also from finding that a satirist like Swift
assigned such high rank to these qualities. He says that the
"Ancients" thus expressed an essential difference between themselves
and the "Moderns":--
"The difference is that, instead of dirt and poison, we have rather
chosen to fill our lives with honey and wax, thus furnishing mankind
with the two noblest of things, which are Sweetness and Light."
Gulliver's Travels.--The world is always ready to listen to any one
who has a good story to tell. Neither children nor philosophers have
yet wearied of reading the adventures of Captain Lemuel Gulliver in
Lilliput and Brobdingnag. _Gulliver's Travels_ is Swift's most famous
work.
Gulliver makes four remarkable voyages to strange countries. He first
visits Lilliput, which is inhabited by a race of men about six inches
high. Everything is on a corresponding scale. Gulliver eats a whole
herd of cattle for breakfast and drinks several hogsheads of liquor.
He captures an entire fleet of warships. A rival race of pygmies
endeavors to secure his services so as to obtain the balance of power.
The quarrels between these little people seem ridiculous, and so petty
as to be almost beneath contempt.
Gulliver next visits Brobdingnag, where the inhabitants are sixty feet
tall, and the affairs of ordinary human beings appear petty and
insignificant. The cats are as large as three oxen, and the dogs
attain the size of four elephants. Gulliver eats on a table thirty
feet high, and trembles lest he may fall and break his neck. The baby
seizes Gulliver and tries to swallow his head. Afterward the hero
fights a desperate battle with two rats. A monkey catches him and
carries him to the almost infinite height of the house top. Certainly,
the voyages to Lilliput and Brobdingnag merit Leslie Stephen's
criticism of being "almost the most delightful children's book ever
written."
The third voyage, which takes him to Laputa, satirizes the
philosophers. We are taken through the academy at Lagado and are shown
a typical philosopher:--
"He had been eight years upon a project for extracting sunbeams
out of cucumbers, which were to be put in vials, hermetically
sealed, and let out to warm the air in raw, inclement summers. He
told me he did not doubt that in eight years more he should be able
to supply the governor's gardens with sunshine at a reasonable
rate."
In this voyage the Struldbrugs are described. They are a race of men
who, after the loss of every faculty and of every tie that binds them
to earth, are doomed to continue living. Dante never painted a
stronger or a ghastlier picture.
On his fourth voyage, he visits the country of the Houyhnhnms and
describes the Yahoos, who are the embodiment of all the detestable
qualities of human beings. The last two voyages are not pleasant
reading, and one might wish that the author of two such inimitable
tales as the adventures in Lilliput and Brobdingnag had stopped with
these.
Children read _Gulliver's Travels_ for the story, but there is much
more than a story in the work. In its pages the historian finds
allusions that throw much light on the history of the age. Among the
Lilliputians, for example, there is one party, known as the
Bigendians, which insists that all eggs shall be broken open at the
big end, while another party, called the Littleendians, contends that
eggs shall be opened only at the little end. These differences typify
the quarrels of the age concerning religion and politics. The
_Travels_ also contains much human philosophy. The lover of satire is
constantly delighted with the keenness of the thrusts.
General Characteristics.--Swift is one of the greatest of English
prose humorists. He is noted also for wit of that satiric kind which
enjoys the discomfiture of the victim. A typical instance is shown in
the way in which, under the assumed name of Isaac Bickerstaff, he
dealt with an astrologer and maker of prophetic almanacs, whose name
was Partridge. Bickerstaff claimed to be an infallible astrologer, and
predicted that Partridge would die March 29, 1708, at 11 P.M. When
that day had passed, Bickerstaff issued a pamphlet giving a
circumstantial account of Partridge's death. Partridge, finding that
his customers began to decrease, protested that he was alive.
Bickerstaff promptly replied that Partridge was dead by his own
infallible rules of astrology, and that the man now claiming to be
Partridge was a vile impostor.
Swift's wit frequently left its imprint on the thought of the time.
The results of this special prank with the astrologer were: first, to
cause the wits of the town to join in the hue and cry that Partridge
was dead; second, to increase the contempt for astrologers; and,
third, in the words of Scott: "The most remarkable consequence of
Swift's frolic was the establishment of the _Tatler_." Richard Steele,
its founder, adopted the popular name of Isaac Bickerstaff.
Taine says of Swift: "He is the inventor of irony, as Shakespeare of
poetry." The most powerful instance of Swift's irony is shown in his
attempt to better the condition of the Irish, whose poverty forced
them to let their children grow up ignorant and destitute, or often
even die of starvation. His _Modest Proposal_ for relieving such
distress is to have the children at the age of one year served as a
new dish on the tables of the great. So apt is irony to be
misunderstood and to fail of its mark, that for a time Swift was
considered merely brutal; but soon he convinced the Irish that he was
their friend, willing to contribute both time and money to aid them.
His ironical remarks on _The Abolishing of Christianity_ were also
misunderstood.
His poems, such as _A Description of a City Shower_, and _Cadenus and
Vanessa_, show the same general characteristics as his prose, but are
inferior to it.
We shall search Swift's work in vain for examples of pathos or
sublimity. We shall find his pages caustic with wit, satire, and
irony, and often disfigured with coarseness. One of the great
pessimists of all time, he is yet tremendously in earnest in whatever
he says, from his _Drapier's Letters_, written to protect Ireland from
the schemes of English politicians, to his _Gulliver's Travels_, where
he describes the court of Lilliput. This earnestness and
circumstantial minuteness throw an air of reality around his most
grotesque creations. He pretended to despise Defoe; yet the influence
of that great writer, who made fiction seem as real as fact, is
plainly apparent in Gulliver's remarkable adventures.
Although sublimity and pathos are outside of his range, his style is
remarkably well adapted to his special subject matter. While reading
his works, one scarcely ever thinks of his style, unless the attention
is specially directed to it. Only a great artist can thus conceal his
art. A style so natural as this has especial merits which will repay
study. Three of its chief characteristics are simplicity, flexibility,
and energetic directness.
JOSEPH ADDISON, 1672-1719
[Illustration: JOSEPH ADDISON. _From the painting by Sir Godfrey
Kneller, National Portrait Gallery._]
[Illustration: THE BIRTHPLACE OF ADDISON.]
Life.--Joseph Addison was born in the paternal rectory at Milston, a
small village in the eastern part of Wiltshire. He was educated at
Oxford. He intended to become a clergyman, but, having attracted
attention by his graceful Latin poetry, was dissuaded by influential
court friends from entering the service of the church. They persuaded
him to fit himself for the diplomatic service, and secured for him a
yearly pension of £300. He then went to France, studied the language
of that country, and traveled extensively, so as to gain a knowledge
of foreign courts. The death of King William in 1702 stopped his
pension, however, and Addison was forced to return to England to seek
employment as a tutor.
The great battle of Blenheim was won by Marlborough in 1704. As
Macaulay says, the ministry was mortified to see such a victory
celebrated by so much bad poetry, and he instances these lines from
one of the poems:
"Think of two thousand gentlemen at least,
And each man mounted on his capering beast;
Into the Danube they were pushed by shoals."
The Chancellor of the Exchequer went to Addison's humble lodgings and
asked him to write a poem in honor of the battle. Addison took the
town by storm with a simile in which the great general was likened to
the calm angel of the whirlwind. When people reflected how calmly
Marlborough had directed the whirlwind of war, they thought that no
comparison could be more felicitous. From that time Addison's fortunes
rose. Since his day no man relying on literary talents alone has risen
so high in state affairs. He was made assistant Secretary of State,
Secretary for Ireland, and finally chief Secretary of State.
Though Addison was a prominent figure in the political world, it is
his literary life that most concerns us. In his prime he wrote for
_The Tatler_ and _The Spectator_, famous newspapers of Queen Anne's
day, many inimitable essays on contemporary life and manners. Most
newspaper work is soon forgotten, but these essays are read by the
most cultivated people of to-day. In his own age his most meritorious
production was thought to be the dull tragedy of _Cato_, a drama
observing the classical unities. Some of his _Hymns_ are much finer.
Lines like these, written of the stars, linger in our memories:--
"Forever singing as they shine,
The hand that made us is divine."
Addison had a singularly pleasing personality. Though he was a Whig,
the Tories admired and applauded him. He was a good illustration of
the truth that if one smiles in the mirror of the world, it will
answer him with a smile. Swift said he believed the English would have
made Addison king, if they had been requested to place him on the
throne. Pope's jealous nature prompted him to quarrel with Addison,
but the quarrel was chiefly on one side. Men like Macaulay and
Thackeray have exerted their powers to do justice to the kindliness
and integrity of Addison.
Addison died at the age of forty-seven, and was buried in Westminster
Abbey.
[Illustration: RICHARD STEELE.]
Collaborates with Steele.--Under the pen name of Isaac Bickerstaff,
Richard Steele (1672-1729), a former schoolmate and friend of Addison,
started in 1709 _The Tatler_, a periodical published three times a
week. This discussed matters of interest in society and politics, and
occasionally published an essay on morals and manners. Steele was a
good-natured, careless individual, with a varied experience as
soldier, playwright, moralist, keeper of the official gazette, and
pensioner. He says that he always "preferred the state of his mind to
that of his fortune"; but his mental state was often fickle, and too
much dependent on bodily luxuries, though he was patriotic enough to
sacrifice his personal fortune for what he considered his country's
interest.
We find Addison a frequent contributor to _The Tatler_ after its
seventeenth number. Steele says: "I fared like a distressed prince who
calls in a powerful neighbor to his aid; I was undone by my auxiliary;
when I had once called him in, I could not subsist without dependence
on him."
_The Tatler_ was discontinued in 1711, and Steele projected the more
famous _Spectator_ two months later. Addison wrote the first number,
but the second issue, which came from Steele's pen, contains sketches
of those characters which have become famous in the _Sir Roger de
Coverley Papers_. Steele's first outline of Sir Roger is a creation of
sweetness and light:--
"His tenants grow rich, his servants look satisfied, all the young
women profess to love him, and the young men are glad of his
company. When he comes into a house he calls the servants by their
names, and talks all the way upstairs to a visit."
The influence of such a character must have been especially wholesome
on the readers of the eighteenth century. Without the suggestive
originality of Steele, we might never have had those essays of
Addison, which we read most to-day; but while Steele should have full
credit for the first bold sketches, the finished portraits in the De
Coverley gallery are due to Addison. Steele says of his associate, "I
claim to myself the merit of having extorted excellent productions
from a person of the greatest abilities, who would not have let them
appear by any other means."
It is well, however, to remember that Steele did much more work than
is popularly supposed. Beginning with March 1, 1711, there were 555
issues of _The Spectator_ published on succeeding week days. To these
were added 80 more numbers at irregular intervals. Of these 635
numbers, Steele wrote 236 and Addison 274.
In many respects each seemed to be the complement of the other.
Steele's writings have not the polish or delicate humor of Addison's,
but they have more strength and pathos. Addison had the greater
genius, and he was also more willing to spend time in polishing his
prose and making it artistic. From the far greater interest now shown
in Addison, the student should be impressed by the necessity of
artistic finish as well as of excellence in subject matter.
Addison's Essays--The greatest of Addison's _Essays_ appeared in
_The Spectator_ and charmed many readers in Queen Anne's age. The
subject matter of these _Essays_ is extremely varied. On one day there
is a pleasant paper on witches; on another, a chat about the new
woman; on another, a discourse on clubs. Addison is properly a moral
satirist, and his pen did much more than the pulpit to civilize the
age and make virtue the fashion. In _The Spectator_, he says: "If I
meet with anything in city, court, or country, that shocks modesty or
good manners, I shall use my utmost endeavors to make an example of
it." He accomplished his purpose, not by heated denunciations of vice,
but by holding it up to kindly ridicule. He remembered the fable of
the different methods employed by the north wind and the sun to make a
man lay aside an ugly cloak.
Addison stated also that one of his objects was to bring "philosophy
out of closets and libraries, schools and colleges, to dwell in clubs
and assemblies, at tea tables and coffeehouses." His papers on Milton
did much to diminish that great poet's unpopularity in an age that
loved form rather than matter, art rather than natural strength.
The Sir Roger de Coverley Papers.--The most famous of Addison's
productions are his papers that appeared in _The Spectator_,
describing a typical country gentleman, Sir Roger de Coverley, and his
friends and servants. Taine says that Addison here invented the novel
without suspecting it. This is an overstatement; but these papers
certainly have the interest of a novel from the moment Sir Roger
appears until his death, and the delineation of character is far in
advance of that shown in the majority of modern novels. We find
ourselves rereading the _De Coverley Papers_ more than once, a
statement that can be made of but few novels.
[Illustration: SIR ROGER IN CHURCH. _From a drawing by B.
Westmacott_.]
General Characteristics.--Addison ranks among the greatest of
English essayists. Some of his essays, like the series on _Paradise
Lost_, deal with literary criticism; but most people to-day read
little from his pen except the _Sir Roger de Coverley Papers_, which
give interesting pictures of eighteenth-century life and manners.
Before we have read many of Addison's essays, we shall discover that
he is a humorist of high rank. His humor is of the kind that makes one
smile, rather than laugh aloud. Our countenance relaxes when we
discover that his rules for an eighteenth-century club prescribe a
fine for absence except in case of sickness or imprisonment. We are
quietly amused at such touches as this in the delineation of Sir
Roger:--
"As Sir Roger is landlord to the whole congregation, he keeps them
in very good order, and will suffer nobody to sleep in it besides
himself; for, if by chance he has been surprised into a short nap at
sermon, upon recovering out of it, he stands up and looks about him,
and, if he sees anybody else nodding, either wakes them himself, or
sends his servants to them."
Addison is remarkable among a satiric group of writers because he
intended his humor to be "remedial,"--not merely to inflict wounds,
but to exert a moral influence, to induce human beings to forsake the
wrong and to become more kindly. We may smile at Sir Roger; but we
have more respect for his kindliness, after reading in _Spectator_ No.
383, how he selected his boatmen to row him on the Thames:--
"We were no sooner come to the Temple Stairs, but we were surrounded
with a crowd of watermen, offering us their respective services.
Sir Roger, after having looked about him very attentively, spied one
with a wooden leg, and immediately gave him orders to get his boat
ready. As we were walking towards it, 'You must know,' says Sir
Roger, 'I never make use of anybody to row me, that has not either
lost a leg or an arm. I would rather bate him a few strokes of his
oar than not employ an honest man that had been wounded in the
Queen's service. If I was a lord or a bishop, and kept a barge, I
would not put a fellow in my livery that had not a wooden leg.'"
Such humor, which finds its chief point in a desire to make the world
kindlier, must have appealed to the eighteenth century, or _The
Spectator_ could not have reached a circulation of ten thousand copies
a day. Addison would not now have his legion of warm admirers if his
humor had been personal, like Pope's, or misanthropical, like Swift's.
Of his style, Dr. Samuel Johnson says, "Whoever wishes to attain an
English style, familiar but not coarse, and elegant but not
ostentatious, must give his days and nights to the study of Addison."
Benjamin Franklin, as we know from his _Autobiography_, followed this
advice with admirable results. Addison's style seems as natural and
easy as the manners of a well-bred person. When we have given some
attention to dissecting his style, we may indeed discover that a prose
model for to-day should have more variety and energy and occasionally
more precision; but such a conclusion does not mean that any writer of
this century would like the task of surpassing the _De Coverley
Papers_.
ALEXANDER POPE, 1688-1744
[Illustration: ALEXANDER POPE. _From the portrait by William
Hoare_.]
Life.--Alexander Pope was born in London in 1688. His father, a
devout Catholic, was a linen merchant, who gave his son little formal
schooling, but allowed him to pick up his education by reading such
authors as pleased his fancy.
He was a very precocious child. At the age of twelve he was writing an
_Ode on Solitude_. He chose his vocation early, for writing poetry was
the business of his life.
In his childhood, his parents removed from London to Binfield, a
village in Berkshire, nine miles from Windsor. When he was nearly
thirty years old, his translation of the _Iliad_ enabled him to buy a
house and grounds at Twickenham on the Thames, about twelve miles
above London. He lived here for the rest of his life, indulging his
taste for landscape gardening and entertaining the greatest men of the
age.
After early middle life, his writings made him pecuniarily
independent, but he suffered much from ill health. In his _Lives of
the English Poets_, Dr. Samuel Johnson says of Pope:--
"By natural deformity, or accidental distortion, his vital functions
were so much disordered that his life was a long disease... When he
rose, he was invested in a bodice made of stiff canvas, being scarce
able to hold himself erect till they were laced, and he then put on
a flannel waistcoat. One side was contracted. His legs were so
slender that he enlarged their bulk with three pair of stockings...
"In all his intercourse with mankind, he had great delight in
artifice, and endeavored to attain all his purposes by indirect and
unsuspected methods. _He hardly drank tea without a stratagem._"
The publication of his correspondence tangled him in a mesh of
deceptions, because his desire to appear in a favorable light led him
to change letters that he had sent to friends. His double-dealing,
intense jealousy, and irritability, due to his physical condition,
caused him to become involved in many quarrels, which gave him the
opportunity to indulge to the utmost his own satiric tendency. In one
of his late satires, _The Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot_, he charged
Addison with the inclination to--
"Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer,
And without sneering, teach the rest to sneer."
On the basis of what he wrote, we may divide his life into three
periods. During his first thirty years, he produced various kinds of
verse, like the _Essay on Criticism_ and _The Rape of the Lock_. The
middle period of his life was marked by his translation of Homer's
_Iliad_ and _Odyssey_. In his third period, he wrote moral and
didactic poems, like the _Essay on Man_, and satires, like the
_Dunciad_.
[Illustration: POPE'S VILLA AT TWICKENHAM. _From an old print._]
Some Poems of the First Period: Essay on Criticism and The Rape of
the Lock.--Pope's first published poem, _The Pastorals_, which
appeared in 1709, was followed in 1711 by _An Essay on Criticism_,--an
exquisite setting of a number of gems of criticism which had for a
long time been current. Pope's intention in writing this poem may be
seen from what he himself says: "It seems not so much the perfection
of sense to say things that have never been said before, as to express
those best that have been said oftenest."
From this point of view, the poem is remarkable. No other writer,
except Shakespeare, has in an equal number of lines said so many
things which have passed into current quotation. Rare perfection in
the form of statement accounts for this. The poem abounds in such
lines as these:--
"For fools rush in where angels fear to tread."
"To err is human, to forgive divine."
"All seems infected that th' infected spy,
As all looks yellow to the jaundiced eye."
"In words, as fashions, the same rule will hold,
Alike fantastic if too new or old:
Be not the first by whom the new are tried,
Nor yet the last to lay the old aside."
_The Rape of the Lock_, which is Pope's masterpiece, is almost a
romantic poem, even though it is written in classical couplets. It was
a favorite with Oliver Goldsmith, and James Russell Lowell rightly say
says: "The whole poem more truly deserves the name of a creation than
anything Pope ever wrote." The poem is a mock epic, and it has the
supernatural machinery which was supposed to be absolutely necessary
for an epic. In place of the gods and goddesses of the great epics,
however, the fairy-like sylphs help to guide the action of this poem.
The poem, which is founded on an actual incident, describes a young
lord's theft of a lock of hair from the head of a court beauty. Pope
composed _The Rape of the Lock_ to soothe her indignation and to
effect a reconciliation. The whole of this poem should be read by the
student, as it is a vivid satiric picture of fashionable life in Queen
Anne's reign.
[Illustration: RAPE OF THE LOCK. _From a drawing by B. Westmacott_.]
Translation of Homer.--Pope's chief work during the middle period of
his life was his translation of the _Iliad_ and of the _Odyssey_ of
Homer. From a financial point of view, these translations were the
most successful of his labors. They brought him in nearly £9000, and
made him independent of bookseller or of nobleman.
The remarkable success of these works is strange when we remember that
Pope's knowledge of Greek was very imperfect, and that he was obliged
to consult translations before attempting any passage. The Greek
scholar Bentley, a contemporary of Pope, delivered a just verdict on
the translation: "A pretty poem, Mr. Pope, but you must not call it
Homer." The historian Gibbon said that the poem had every merit except
faithfulness to the original.
Homer is simple and direct. He abounds in concrete terms. Pope
dislikes a simple term and loves a circumlocution and an abstraction.
We have the concrete "herd of swine" translated into "a bristly care,"
"skins," into "furry spoils." The concrete was considered common and
undignified. Homer says in simple language: "His father wept with
him," but Pope translates this: "The father poured a social flood."
Pope used to translate thirty or forty verses of the _Iliad_ before
rising, and then to spend a considerable time in polishing them. But
half of the translation of the _Odyssey_ is his own work. He employed
assistants to finish the other half; but it is by no means easy to
distinguish his work from theirs.
[Illustration: ALEXANDER POPE. _From contemporary portrait_.]
Some Poems of his Third Period: "Essay on Man," and "Satires."--The
_Essay on Man_ is a philosophical poem with the avowed object of
vindicating the ways of God to man. The entire poem is an
amplification of the idea contained in these lines:--
"All nature is but art unknown to thee;
All chance, direction which thou canst not see;
All discord, harmony not understood;
All partial evil, universal good.
And spite of pride, in erring reason's spite,
One truth is clear, Whatever is, is right."
The chief merit of the poem consists in throwing into polished form
many of the views current at the time, so that they may be easily
understood. Before we read very far we come across such old
acquaintances as--
"The proper study of mankind is man."
"An honest man's the noblest work of God."
"Vice is a monster of so frightful mien
As, to be hated, needs but to be seen;
Yet, seen too oft, familiar with her face,
We first endure, then pity, then embrace."
The _Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot_ and _The Dunciad_ are Pope's greatest
satires. In _The Dunciad_, an epic of the dunces, he holds up to
ridicule every person and writer who had offended him. These were in
many cases scribblers who had no business with a pen; but in a few
instances they were the best scholars of that day. A great deal of the
poem is now very tiresome reading. Much of it is brutal. Pope was a
powerful agent, as Thackeray says, in rousing that obloquy which has
ever since pursued a struggling author. _The Dunciad_ could be more
confidently consulted about contemporary literary history, if Pope had
avoided such unnecessary misstatements as:--
"Earless on high, stood unabash'd De Foe."
This line is responsible for the current unwarranted belief that the
author of _Robinson Crusoe_ lost his ears in the pillory.
General Characteristics.---Pope has not strong imagination, a keen
feeling for nature, or wide sympathy with man. Leslie Stephen says:
"Pope never crosses the undefinable, but yet ineffaceable line, which
separates true poetry from rhetoric." The debate in regard to whether
Pope's verse is ever genuine poetry may not yet be settled to the
satisfaction of all; but it is well to recognize the undoubted fact
that his couplets still appeal to many readers who love clearness and
precision and who are not inclined to wrestle with the hidden meaning
of greater poetry. One of his poems, _The Rape of the Lock_, has
become almost a universal favorite because of its humor, good-natured
satire, and entertaining pictures of society in Queen Anne's time.
He is the poet who best expresses the classical spirit of the
eighteenth century. He excels in satiric and didactic verse. He
expresses his ideas in perfect form, and embodies them in classical
couplets, sometimes styled "rocking-horse meter"; but he shows no
power of fathoming the emotional depths of the soul.
In the history of literature, he holds an important place, because,
more than any other writer, he calls attention to the importance of
correctness of form and of careful expression. He is the prince of
artificial poets. Though he erred in exalting form above matter, he
taught his age the needed lesson of careful workmanship.
SUMMARY
The Restoration and the first part of the eighteenth century display a
low moral standard in both church and state. This standard had its
effect on literature. The drama shows marked decline. We find no such
sublime outbursts of song as characterize the Elizabethan and Puritan
ages. The writers chose satiric or didactic subjects, and avoided
pathos, deep feeling, and sublimity. French influence was paramount.
The classical school, which loved polished regularity, set the fashion
in literature. An old idea, dressed in exquisite form, was as welcome
as a new one. Anything strange, irregular, romantic, full of feeling,
highly imaginative, or improbable to the intellect, was unpopular.
Even in _Gulliver's Travels_, Swift endeavored to be as realistic as
if he were demonstrating a geometrical proposition.
Dryden and Pope are the two chief poets of the classical school. Both
use the riming couplet and are distinguished for their satiric and
didactic verse. Their poetry shows more intellectual brilliancy than
imaginative power. They display little sympathy with man and small
love for nature.
The age is far more remarkable for its prose than for its poetry.
French influence helped to develop a concise, flexible, energetic
prose style. The deterioration in poetry was partly compensated for by
the rapid advances in prose, which needed the influences working
toward artistic finish. Because of its cleverness, avoidance of long
sentences, and of classical inversions, Dryden's prose is essentially
modern. Defoe's _Robinson Crusoe_ is the world's most popular story of
adventure, told in simple and direct, but seemingly artless, prose. Of
all the prose writers since Swift's time, few have equaled him and
still fewer surpassed him in simplicity, flexibility, directness, and
lack of affectation. The essays of Steele and Addison constitute a
landmark. No preceding English prose shows so much grace of style,
delicate humor, and power of awakening and retaining interest as do
the _Sir Roger de Coverley Papers_.
The influence of this age was sufficient to raise permanently the
standard level of artistic literary expression. The unpruned,
shapeless, and extravagant forms of earlier times will no longer be
tolerated.
SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER STUDY
HISTORICAL
An account of the history of this period may be found in either
Gardiner,[3] Green, Walker, or Cheney. Vols. VIII. and IX. of the
_Political History of England_ give the history in greater detail. For
the social side, consult Traill, Vols. IV. and V., and Cheney's
_Industrial and Social History of England._ Lecky's _History of
England in the Eighteenth Century_ is an excellent work.
LITERARY
_The Cambridge History of English Literature,_ Vols. VIII., IX., X.
Courthope's _A History of English Poetry_, Vols. III., IV., and V.
Stephen's _English Literature in the Eighteenth Century_.
Taine's _History of English Literature_, Book III., Chaps. I., II.,
III.
Gosse's _History of Eighteenth Century Literature_ begins with 1660.
Garnett's _The Age of Dryden_.
Phillips's _Popular Manual of English Literature_, Vol. I.
Minto's _Manual of English Prose Literature_.
Saintsbury's _Life of Dryden_. (E.M.L.)
Macaulay's _Essay on Dryden_.
Lowell's _Essay on Dryden_ in _Among My Books_.
Dryden's _Essays on the Drama_, edited by Strunk.
Fowler's _Life of Locke_. (E.M.L.)
Stephen's _History of Thought in the Eighteenth Century_.
Dennis's _The Age of Pope_.
Thackeray's _English Humorists_ (Swift, Addison, Steele, Pope).
Stephen's _Life of Swift_. (E.M.L.)
Craik's _Life of Swift_.
Courthope's _Life of Addison_. (E.M.L.)
Macaulay's _Essay on Addison_.
Stephen's _Life of Pope_. (E.M.L.)
De Quincey's _Essay on Pope_, and _On the Poetry of Pope_.
Johnson's _Lives of the Poets_ (Dryden, Pope, Addison).
Lowell's _My Study Windows_ (Pope).
SUGGESTED READINGS WITH QUESTIONS AND SUGGESTIONS
Dryden.--From his lyrical verse, read _Alexander's Feast_ or _A Song
for St. Cecilia's Day_. The opening lines of _Religio Laici_ or of
_The Hind and the Panther_ will serve as a specimen of his
argumentative or didactic verse and _Absalom and Achitophel_ for his
satire. (Cassell's _National Library_, 15 cents.)
Selections are given in Ward,[4] II., 454-483; Bronson, III., 20-58;
Manly, I., 203-209; _Oxford Treasury_, III., 99-110; _Century_,
266-285.
For his critical prose, read _An Essay of Dramatic Poesy_ (Strunk's
edition of _Dryden's Essays on the Drama_). For selections see Craik,
III., 148-154; Manly, II., 146-163; _Century_, 276-285.
What is the chief subject matter of Dryden's verse? Point out typical
qualities in his argumentative and satiric verse. Give definite
instances of his power in argument and satire.
Why is his prose called modern? Point out some of its qualities.
Defoe.--Read or reread _Robinson Crusoe_ and point out where he
specially shows the skill of the journalist in the presentation of his
facts. Can you select passages that show the justice of the criticism?
How would the interest in the story have been affected, had Defoe,
like the author of _Swiss Family Robinson_, caused the shipwreck to
occur on an island where tropical fruits would have rendered
unnecessary Crusoe's labor to secure food?
Swift.--Caik's _English Prose Selections_, Vol. III., pp. 391-424,
contains representative selections from Swift's prose. The best of
these are _The Philosophy of Clothes_, from _A Tale of a Tub_ (Craik,
III., 398); _A Digression concerning Critics_, from the same (Craik,
III., 400); _The Emperor of Lilliput_ (Craik, III., 417) and _The King
of Brobdingnag_ (Craik, III., 419), from _Gulliver's Travels_.
Selections may be found also in Manly, II., 184-198; _Oxford
Treasury_, III., 125-129; _Century_, 299-323.
Is Swift's a good prose style? Does he use ornament? Can you find a
passage where he strives after effect? In what respects do the
subjects which he chooses and his manner of treating them show the
spirit of the age? Why is _Gulliver's Travels_ so popular? What are
the most important lessons which a young writer may learn from Swift?
In what is he specially lacking?
Addison and Steele.--From the _Sir Roger de Coverley Papers_ the
student should not fail to read _Spectator No. 112, A Country Sunday_.
He may then read _Spectator No. 2_, by Steele, which sketches the De
Coverley characters, and compare the style and characteristics of the
two authors. The student who has the time at this point should read
all the _De Coverley Papers_ (_Eclectic English Classics_, American
Book Company).
Good selections from both Addison and Steele may be found in Craik,
III., 469-535; Manly, II., 198-216; _Century_, 324-349.
In what did Addison and Steele excel? What qualities draw so many
readers to the _De Coverley Papers_? Why may they be called a prelude
to the modern novel?
Select passages which will serve to bring into sharp contrast the
style and humor of Swift and of Addison.
Pope.--Read _The Rape of the Lock_ (printed with the _Essay on Man_
in _Eclectic English Classics_, American Book Company, 20 cents).
Selections from this are given in Ward, III., 73-82. The _Essay on
Man_, Book I. (Ward, III., 85-91), will serve as a specimen of his
didactic verse. The _Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot_ (Ward, III., 103-105)
will illustrate his satire, and the lines from the _Iliad_ in Ward,
III., 82, will show the characteristics of his translation.
_The Rape of the Lock_ and full selections are given in Bronson, III.,
89-144; _Century_, 350-368; Manly, I., 228-253.
How does Pope show the spirit of the classical school? What are his
special merits and defects? Does an examination of his poetry convince
you that Leslie Stephen's criticism is right? Select lines from six
great poets of different periods. Place beside these selections some
of Pope's best lines, and see if you have a clearer idea of the
difference between rhetoric and true poetry.
FOOTNOTES TO CHAPTER VI:
[Footnote 1: _Essay on Criticism_, lines 297, 298.]
[Footnote 2: For a list of the chief dramatists of the Restoration and
their best work, see p. 626.]
[Footnote 3: For full titles, see p. 50.]
[Footnote 4: For full titles, see p. 6.]