After the first third of the eighteenth century, or rather-if we count from the dates of their birth-after the last quarter of the seventeenth century, Nature seemed to have felt herself exhausted, and sought repose from the creation of poets. A straggler arose here and there, just as if to show that the race was not extinct; and Thomson, Mallet, Blair (born in one year, 1700), Armstrong, Shenstone, Johnson, Glover, Gray, Collins, Akenside, Goldsmith, Churchill, Mason, Falconer, and others, carried on the line till a few years after George the Third ascended the throne. From several of these we have made selections. From Shenstone, that imitation of Spenser which Johnson pronounced to be his best. Rural, moral, and picturesque, his poetry and his Leasowes were popular; and the humanity and tenderness of some of his elegies, &c., recommend them still as favourite lessons for the young, in sweet, if not powerful verse. Cowper, Burns, and Beattie, lived to a later period, and saw the rising of the illustrious band who have made our own time as glorious as the brightest of the past. Again did the rested Parnassus, like the physical Etna with its fierce eruptions, flame resplendently with its intellectual and electric fires, and pour its lava floods of genius down the steeps to the admiring multitudes below-not, however, devastating by their heat, but glowing with a genial warmth, to quicken for a while, and cool down into fertile valleys covered with everything fruitful and refreshing for the sustenance and delight of human kind. Well may England be proud of this period! of her arms, her arts and sciences, and her minstrelsy. It is scarcely possible to contemplate the pinnacle she has reached, without being impressed with a vague dread that she has attained her culminating apotheosis, and can ascend no higher. But there is an undying hope in English energy. Look around. O'er half the habitable globe will the English race prevail, and the English tongue be spoken. The Golden age is literally returning. Redeunt Saturnia regna! and shall we not anticipate future glories and triumphal song, as immortal as ever has been, even when as Hesiod sang "Men lived like gods, with minds devoid of care, Away from toils and misery and all good things were theirs. The bounteous earth did of herself bring forth Fruit much and plenteous, and in quietness Their works midst numerous blessings they pursued "? With such a prospect to cheer us, we close our retrospect; and venture to prophesy, that happiness and poetry will again and again dwell on the earth, and flourish together. There are new worlds rising to welcome them; and may we not imagine that even so small a casket as this volume is, will preserve the magic spells to inspire the descendants of British race in every clime with the quenchless wish to drink from these original founts, and excel the noblest and mightiest of their ancestry? THE eight Poems contained in this part of our work extend over a period of three hundred years, beginning with CHAUCER, our first great poet, and ending near the advent of MILTON. The selection made is intended to show the progress of English literature, and at the same time, to afford good specimens of the powers of the several authors. Chaucer's "Floure and the Leafe" is undoubtedly one of his best productions, abounding in rich imagery of the purest character, and teaching the soundest wisdom in the most fascinating allegory. Dunbar's "Merle and Nightingale" is but little known, yet the reader will find it one of the noblest poems in our language. The author was a Scotchman, the father of Scottish, as Chaucer was of English poetry. Herbert's "Church Porch," and Spenser's "Oak and the Brier," are known to all readers of English poetry. Crashaw's "Music's Duel" is another of those enchanting allegorical poems which abound in our early literature. The versification is smoother than in Chaucer and Dunbar, while the imagery and thought are scarcely less excellent. The world-famed name of SHAKSPEARE requires no explanation. His productions, however, scarcely come within the scope of this work; but as he could not be passed over, we have culled a few stanzas from his Sonnets and several orations from the Plays. Want of space prevents further selection from authors of this period, among whom the works of Henrysone, Donne, Withers, Raleigh, Earl of Surrey, and Quarles, contain many beautiful poems. |