A Brief History of the English Language and Literature Part 14

Almost all educated persons in the fourteenth century could read and write with tolerable and with almost equal ease, English, French, and Latin. His three poems are the +Speculum Meditantis+ ("The Mirror of the Thoughtful Man"), in French; the +Vox Clamantis+ ("Voice of One Crying"), in Latin; and +Confessio Amantis+ ("The Lover's Confession"), in English. No ma.n.u.script of the first work is known to exist. He was buried in St Saviour's, Southwark, where his effigy is still to be seen-- his head resting on his three works. Chaucer called him "the moral Gower"; and his books are very dull, heavy, and difficult to read.

6. WILLIAM LANGLANDE (+1332-1400+), a poet who used the old English head-rhyme, as Chaucer used the foreign end-rhyme, was born at Cleobury-Mortimer in Shropshire, in the year 1332. The date of his death is doubtful. His poem is called the +Vision of Piers the Plowman+; and it is the last long poem in our literature that was written in Old English alliterative rhyme. From this period, if rhyme is employed at all, it is the end-rhyme, which we borrowed from the French and Italians. The poem has an appendix called +Do-well, Do-bet, Do-best+-- the three stages in the growth of a Christian. Langlande's writings remained in ma.n.u.script until the reign of Edward VI.; they were printed then, and went through three editions in one year. The English used in the +Vision+ is the Midland dialect-- much the same as that used by Chaucer; only, oddly enough, Langlande admits into his English a larger amount of French words than Chaucer. The poem is a distinct landmark in the history of our speech. The following is a specimen of the lines.

There are three alliterative words in each line, with a pause near the middle--

"A voice {l}oud in that {l}ight to {L}ucifer cried, '{P}rinces of this {p}alace {p}rest[16] undo the gates, For here {c}ometh with {c}rown the {k}ing of all glory!'"

[Footnote 16: Quickly.]

7. GEOFFREY CHAUCER (+1340-1400+), the "father of English poetry," and the greatest narrative poet of this country, was born in London in or about the year 1340. He lived in the reigns of Edward III., Richard II., and one year in the reign of Henry IV. His father was a vintner. The name _Chaucer_ is a Norman name, and is found on the roll of Battle Abbey. He is said to have studied both at Oxford and Cambridge; served as page in the household of Prince Lionel, Duke of Clarence, the third son of Edward III.; served also in the army, and was taken prisoner in one of the French campaigns. In 1367, he was appointed gentleman-in-waiting (_valettus_) to Edward III., who sent him on several emba.s.sies. In 1374 he married a lady of the Queen's chamber; and by this marriage he became connected with John of Gaunt, who afterwards married a sister of this lady. While on an emba.s.sy to Italy, he is reported to have met the great poet Petrarch, who told him the story of the Patient Griselda. In 1381, he was made Comptroller of Customs in the great port of London-- an office which he held till the year 1386. In that year he was elected knight of the shire-- that is, member of Parliament for the county of Kent. In 1389, he was appointed Clerk of the King's Works at Westminster and Windsor. From 1381 to 1389 was probably the best and most productive period of his life; for it was in this period that he wrote the +House of Fame+, the +Legend of Good Women+, and the best of the +Canterbury Tales+. From 1390 to 1400 was spent in writing the other +Canterbury Tales+, ballads, and some moral poems. He died at Westminster in the year 1400, and was the first writer who was buried in the Poets' Corner of the Abbey. We see from his life-- and it was fortunate for his poetry-- that Chaucer had the most varied experience as student, courtier, soldier, amba.s.sador, official, and member of Parliament; and was able to mix freely and on equal terms with all sorts and conditions of men, from the king to the poorest hind in the fields. He was a stout man, with a small bright face, soft eyes, dazed by long and hard reading, and with the English pa.s.sion for flowers, green fields, and all the sights and sounds of nature.

8. +Chaucer's Works.+-- Chaucer's greatest work is the +Canterbury Tales+. It is a collection of stories written in heroic metre-- that is, in the rhymed couplet of five iambic feet. The finest part of the Canterbury Tales is the +Prologue+; the n.o.blest story is probably the +Knightes Tale+. It is worthy of note that, in 1362, when Chaucer was a very young man, the session of the House of Commons was first opened with a speech in English; and in the same year an Act of Parliament was pa.s.sed, subst.i.tuting the use of English for French in courts of law, in schools, and in public offices. English had thus triumphed over French in all parts of the country, while it had at the same time become saturated with French words. In the year 1383 the Bible was translated into English by Wyclif. Thus Chaucer, whose writings were called by Spenser "the well of English undefiled," wrote at a time when our English was freshest and newest. The grammar of his works shows English with a large number of inflexions still remaining. The Canterbury Tales are a series of stories supposed to be told by a number of pilgrims who are on their way to the shrine of St Thomas (Becket) at Canterbury. The pilgrims, thirty-two in number, are fully described-- their dress, look, manners, and character in the Prologue. It had been agreed, when they met at the Tabard Inn in Southwark, that each pilgrim should tell four stories-- two going and two returning-- as they rode along the gra.s.sy lanes, then the only roads, to the old cathedral city. But only four-and-twenty stories exist.

9. +Chaucer's Style.+-- Chaucer expresses, in the truest and liveliest way, "the true and lively of everything which is set before him;" and he first gave to English poetry that force, vigour, life, and colour which raised it above the level of mere rhymed prose. All the best poems and histories in Latin, French, and Italian were well known to Chaucer; and he borrows from them with the greatest freedom. He handles, with masterly power, all the characters and events in his Tales; and he is hence, beyond doubt, the greatest narrative poet that England ever produced. In the Prologue, his masterpiece, Dryden says, "we have our forefathers and great-grand-dames all before us, as they were in Chaucer's days." His dramatic power, too, is nearly as great as his narrative power; and Mr Marsh affirms that he was "a dramatist before that which is technically known as the existing drama had been invented." That is to say, he could set men and women talking as they would and did talk in real life, but with more point, spirit, _verve_, and picturesqueness. As regards the matter of his poems, it may be sufficient to say that Dryden calls him "a perpetual fountain of good sense;" and that Hazlitt makes this remark: "Chaucer was the most practical of all the great poets,-- the most a man of business and of the world. His poetry reads like history." Tennyson speaks of him thus in his "Dream of Fair Women":--

"Dan Chaucer, the first warbler, whose sweet breath Preluded those melodious bursts that fill The s.p.a.cious times of great Elizabeth, With sounds that echo still."

10. JOHN BARBOUR (+1316-1396+).-- The earliest Scottish poet of any importance in the fourteenth century is John Barbour, who rose to be Archdeacon of Aberdeen. Barbour was of Norman blood, and wrote Northern English, or, as it is sometimes called, Scotch. He studied both at Oxford and at the University of Paris. His chief work is a poem called +The Bruce+. The English of this poem does not differ very greatly from the English of Chaucer. Barbour has _fechtand_ for _fighting_; _pressit_ for _pressed_; _theretill_ for _thereto_; but these differences do not make the reading of his poem very difficult. As a Norman he was proud of the doings of Robert de Bruce, another Norman; and Barbour must often have heard stories of him in his boyhood, as he was only thirteen when Bruce died.

CHAPTER III.

THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY.

1. The fifteenth century, a remarkable period in many ways, saw three royal dynasties established in England-- the Houses of Lancaster, York, and Tudor. Five successful French campaigns of Henry V., and the battle of Agincourt; and, on the other side, the loss of all our large possessions in France, with the exception of Calais, under the rule of the weak Henry VI., were among the chief events of the fifteenth century. The Wars of the Roses did not contribute anything to the prosperity of the century, nor could so unsettled and quarrelsome a time encourage the cultivation of literature. For this among other reasons, we find no great compositions in prose or verse; but a considerable activity in the making and distribution of ballads. The best of these are +Sir Patrick Spens+, +Edom o' Gordon+, +The Nut-Brown Mayde+, and some of those written about +Robin Hood+ and his exploits. The ballad was everywhere popular; and minstrels sang them in every city and village through the length and breadth of England. The famous ballad of +Chevy Chase+ is generally placed after the year 1460, though it did not take its present form till the seventeenth century. It tells the story of the Battle of Otterburn, which was fought in 1388. This century was also witness to the short struggle of Richard III., followed by the rise of the House of Tudor. And, in 1498, just at its close, the wonderful apparition of a new world-- of +The New World+-- rose on the horizon of the English mind, for England then first heard of the discovery of America. But, as regards thinking and writing, the fifteenth century is the most barren in our literature. It is the most barren in the +production+ of original literature; but, on the other hand, it is, compared with all the centuries that preceded it, the most fertile in the dissemination and +distribution+ of the literature that already existed. For England saw, in the memorable year of +1474+, the establishment of the first printing-press in the Almonry at Westminster, by +William Caxton+. The first book printed by him in this country was called 'The Game and Playe of the Chesse.' When Edward IV. and his friends visited Caxton's house and looked at his printing-press, they spoke of it as a pretty toy; they could not foresee that it was destined to be a more powerful engine of good government and the spread of thought and education than the Crown, Parliaments, and courts of law all put together. The two greatest names in literature in the fifteenth century are those of +James I.+ (of Scotland) and +William Caxton+ himself. Two followers of Chaucer, +Occleve+ and +Lydgate+ are also generally mentioned. Put shortly, one might say that the chief poetical productions of this century were its +ballads+; and the chief prose productions, +translations+ from Latin or from foreign works.

2. JAMES I. OF SCOTLAND (+1394-1437+), though a Scotchman, owed his education to England. He was born in 1394. Whilst on his way to France when a boy of eleven, he was captured, in time of peace, by the order of Henry IV., and kept prisoner in England for about eighteen years. It was no great misfortune, for he received from Henry the best education that England could then give in language, literature, music, and all knightly accomplishments. He married Lady Jane Beaufort, the grand-daughter of John of Gaunt, the friend and patron of Chaucer. His best and longest poem is +The Kings Quair+ (that is, Book), a poem which was inspired by the subject of it, Lady Jane Beaufort herself. The poem is written in a stanza of seven lines (called +Rime Royal+); and the style is a close copy of the style of Chaucer. After reigning thirteen years in Scotland, King James was murdered at Perth, in the year 1437. A Norman by blood, he is the best poet of the fifteenth century.

3. WILLIAM CAXTON (+1422-1492+) is the name of greatest importance and significance in the history of our literature in the fifteenth century.

He was born in Kent in the year 1422. He was not merely a printer, he was also a literary man; and, when he devoted himself to printing, he took to it as an art, and not as a mere mechanical device. Caxton in early life was a mercer in the city of London; and in the course of his business, which was a thriving one, he had to make frequent journeys to the Low Countries. Here he saw the printing-press for the first time, with the new separate types, was enchanted with it, and fired by the wonderful future it opened. It had been introduced into Holland about the year 1450. Caxton's press was set up in the Almonry at Westminster, at the sign of the Red Pole. It produced in all sixty-four books, nearly all of them in English, some of them written by Caxton himself. One of the most important of them was Sir Thomas Malory's +History of King Arthur+, the storehouse from which Tennyson drew the stories which form the groundwork of his _Idylls of the King_.

CHAPTER IV.

THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.

1. The Wars of the Roses ended in 1485, with the victory of Bosworth Field. A new dynasty-- the House of Tudor-- sat upon the throne of England; and with it a new reign of peace and order existed in the country, for the power of the king was paramount, and the power of the n.o.bles had been gradually destroyed in the numerous battles of the fifteenth century. Like the fifteenth, this century also is famous for its ballads, the authors of which are not known, but which seem to have been composed "by the people for the people." They were sung everywhere, at fairs and feasts, in town and country, at going to and coming home from work; and many of them were set to popular dance-tunes.

"When Tom came home from labour, And Cis from milking rose, Merrily went the tabor, And merrily went their toes."

The ballads of +King Lear+ and +The Babes in the Wood+ are perhaps to be referred to this period.

2. The first half of the sixteenth century saw the beginning of a new era in poetry; and the last half saw the full meridian splendour of this new era. The beginning of this era was marked by the appearance of +Sir Thomas Wyatt+ (1503-1542), and of the +Earl of Surrey+ (1517-1547).

These two eminent writers have been called the "twin-stars of the dawn,"

the "founders of English lyrical poetry"; and it is worthy of especial note, that it is to Wyatt that we owe the introduction of the +Sonnet+ into our literature, and to Surrey that is due the introduction of +Blank Verse+. The most important prose-writers of the first half of the century were +Sir Thomas More+, the great lawyer and statesman, and +William Tyndale+, who translated the New Testament into English. In the latter half of the century, the great poets are +Spenser+ and +Shakespeare+; the great prose-writers, +Richard Hooker+ and +Francis Bacon+.

3. SIR THOMAS MORE'S (+1480-1535+) chief work in English is the +Life and Reign of Edward V+. It is written in a plain, strong, nervous English style. Hallam calls it "the first example of good English-- pure and perspicuous, well chosen, without vulgarisms, and without pedantry."

His +Utopia+ (a description of the country of _Nowhere_) was written in Latin.

4. WILLIAM TYNDALE (+1484-1536+)-- a man of the greatest significance, both in the history of religion, and in the history of our language and literature-- was a native of Gloucestershire, and was educated at Magdalen Hall, Oxford. His opinions on religion and the rule of the Catholic Church, compelled him to leave England, and drove him to the Continent in the year 1523. He lived in Hamburg for some time. With the German and Swiss reformers he held that the Bible should be in the hands of every grown-up person, and not in the exclusive keeping of the Church. He accordingly set to work to translate the Scriptures into his native tongue. Two editions of his version of the +New Testament+ were printed in 1525-34. He next translated the five books of Moses, and the book of Jonah. In 1535 he was, after many escapes and adventures, finally tracked and hunted down by an emissary of the Pope's faction, and thrown into prison at the castle of Vilvoorde, near Brussels. In 1536 he was brought to Antwerp, tried, condemned, led to the stake, strangled, and burned.

5. +The Work of William Tyndale.+-- Tyndale's translation has, since the time of its appearance, formed the basis of all the after versions of the Bible. It is written in the purest and simplest English; and very few of the words used in his translation have grown obsolete in our modern speech. Tyndale's work is indeed, one of the most striking landmarks in the history of our language. Mr Marsh says of it: "Tyndale's translation of the New Testament is the most important philological monument of the first half of the sixteenth century,-- perhaps I should say, of the whole period between Chaucer and Shakespeare.... The best features of the translation of 1611 are derived from the version of Tyndale." It may be said without exaggeration that, in the United Kingdom, America, and the colonies, about one hundred millions of people now speak the English of Tyndale's Bible; nor is there any book that has exerted so great an influence on English rhythm, English style, the selection of words, and the build of sentences in our English prose.

6. EDMUND SPENSER (+1552-1599+), "The Poet's Poet," and one of the greatest poetical writers of his own or of any age, was born at East Smithfield, near the Tower of London, in the year 1552, about nine years before the birth of Bacon, and in the reign of Edward VI. He was educated at Merchant Taylors' School in London, and at Pembroke Hall, Cambridge. In 1579, we find him settled in his native city, where his best friend was the gallant Sir Philip Sidney, who introduced him to his uncle, the Earl of Leicester, then at the height of his power and influence with Queen Elizabeth. In the same year was published his first poetical work, +The Shepheard's Calendar+-- a set of twelve pastoral poems. In 1580, he went to Ireland as Secretary to Lord Grey de Wilton, the Viceroy of that country. For some years he resided at Kilcolman Castle, in county Cork, on an estate which had been granted him out of the forfeited lands of the Earl of Desmond. Sir Walter Raleigh had obtained a similar but larger grant, and was Spenser's near neighbour.

In 1590 Spenser brought out the first three books of +The Faerie Queene+. The second three books of his great poem appeared in 1596.

Towards the end of 1598, a rebellion broke out in Ireland; it spread into Munster; Spenser's house was attacked and set on fire; in the fighting and confusion his only son perished; and Spenser escaped with the greatest difficulty. In deep distress of body and mind, he made his way to London, where he died-- at an inn in King Street, Westminster, at the age of forty-six, in the beginning of the year 1599. He was buried in the Abbey, not far from the grave of Chaucer.

7. +Spenser's Style.+-- His greatest work is +The Faerie Queene+; but that in which he shows the most striking command of language is his +Hymn of Heavenly Love+. +The Faerie Queene+ is written in a nine-lined stanza, which has since been called the _Spenserian Stanza_. The first eight lines are of the usual length of five iambic feet; the last line contains six feet, and is therefore an Alexandrine. Each stanza contains only three rhymes, which are disposed in this order: _a b a b b c b c c_. --The music of the stanza is long-drawn out, beautiful, involved, and even luxuriant. --The story of the poem is an allegory, like the 'Pilgrim's Progress'; and in it Spenser undertook, he says, "to represent all the moral virtues, a.s.signing to every virtue a knight to be the patron and defender of the same."[17] Only six books were completed; and these relate the adventures of the knights who stand for _Holiness_, _Temperance_, _Chast.i.ty_, _Friendship_, _Justice_, and _Courtesy_. The +Faerie Queene+ herself is called +Gloriana+, who represents _Glory_ in his "general intention," and Queen Elizabeth in his "particular intention."

[Footnote 17: This use of the phrase "the same" is antiquated English.]

8. +Character of the Faerie Queene.+-- This poem is the greatest of the sixteenth century. Spenser has not only been the delight of nearly ten generations; he was the study of Shakespeare, the poetical master of Cowley and of Milton, and, in some sense, of Dryden and Pope. Keats, when a boy, was never tired of reading him. "There is something," says Pope, "in Spenser that pleases one as strongly in old age as it did in one's youth." Professor Craik says: "Without calling Spenser the greatest of all poets, we may still say that his poetry is the most poetical of all poetry." The outburst of national feeling after the defeat of the Armada in 1588; the new lands opened up by our adventurous Devonshire sailors; the strong and lively loyalty of the nation to the queen; the great statesmen and writers of the period; the high daring shown by England against Spain-- all these animated and inspired the glowing genius of Spenser. His rhythm is singularly sweet and beautiful.

Hazlitt says: "His versification is at once the most smooth and the most sounding in the language. It is a labyrinth of sweet sounds." Nothing can exceed the wealth of Spenser's phrasing and expression; there seems to be no limit to its flow. He is very fond of the Old-English practice of alliteration or head-rhyme-- "hunting the letter," as it was called.

Thus he has--

"In woods, in waves, in wars, she wont to dwell.

Gay without good is good heart's greatest loathing."

9. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE (+1564-1616+), the greatest dramatist that England ever produced, was born at Stratford-on-Avon, in Warwickshire, on the 23d of April-- St George's Day-- of the year 1564. His father, John Shakespeare, was a wool dealer and grower. William was educated at the grammar-school of the town, where he learned "small Latin and less Greek"; and this slender stock was his only scholastic outfit for life.

At the early age of eighteen he married Anne Hathaway, a yeoman's daughter. In 1586, at the age of twenty-two, he quitted his native town, and went to London.

10. +Shakespeare's Life and Character.+-- He was employed in some menial capacity at the Blackfriars Theatre, but gradually rose to be actor and also adapter of plays. He was connected with the theatre for about five-and-twenty years; and so diligent and so successful was he, that he was able to purchase shares both in his own theatre and in the Globe.

As an actor, he was only second-rate: the two parts he is known to have played are those of the _Ghost_ in +Hamlet+, and _Adam_ in +As You Like It+. In 1597, at the early age of thirty-three, he was able to purchase New Place, in Stratford, and to rebuild the house. In 1612, at the age of forty-eight, he left London altogether, and retired for the rest of his life to New Place, where he died in the year 1616. His old father and mother spent the last years of their lives with him, and died under his roof. Shakespeare had three children-- two girls and a boy. The boy, Hamnet, died at the age of twelve. Shakespeare himself was beloved by every one who knew him; and "gentle Shakespeare" was the phrase most often upon the lips of his friends. A placid face, with a sweet, mild expression; a high, broad, n.o.ble, "two-storey" forehead; bright eyes; a most speaking mouth-- though it seldom opened; an open, frank manner, a kindly, handsome look,-- such seems to have been the external character of the man Shakespeare.

11. +Shakespeare's Works.+-- He has written thirty-seven plays and many poems. The best of his rhymed poems are his Sonnets, in which he chronicles many of the various moods of his mind. The plays consist of tragedies, historical plays, and comedies. The greatest of his tragedies are probably +Hamlet+ and +King Lear+; the best of his historical plays, +Richard III.+ and +Julius Caesar+; and his finest comedies, +Midsummer Night's Dream+ and +As You Like It+. He wrote in the reign of Elizabeth as well as in that of James; but his greatest works belong to the latter period.

12. +Shakespeare's Style.+-- Every one knows that Shakespeare is great; but how is the young learner to discover the best way of forming an adequate idea of his greatness? In the first place, Shakespeare has very many sides; and, in the second place, he is great on every one of them.

Coleridge says: "In all points, from the most important to the most minute, the judgment of Shakespeare is commensurate with his genius-- nay, his genius reveals itself in his judgment, as in its most exalted form." He has been called "mellifluous Shakespeare;" "honey-tongued Shakespeare;" "silver-tongued Shakespeare;" "the thousand-souled Shakespeare;" "the myriad-minded;" and by many other epithets. He seems to have been master of all human experience; to have known the human heart in all its phases; to have been acquainted with all sorts and conditions of men-- high and low, rich and poor; and to have studied the history of past ages, and of other countries. He also shows a greater and more highly skilled mastery over language than any other writer that ever lived. The vocabulary employed by Shakespeare amounts in number of words to twenty-one thousand. The vocabulary of Milton numbers only seven thousand words. But it is not sufficient to say that Shakespeare's power of thought, of feeling, and of expression required three times the number of words to express itself; we must also say that Shakespeare's power of expression shows infinitely greater skill, subtlety, and cunning than is to be found in the works of Milton. Shakespeare had also a marvellous power of making new phrases, most of which have become part and parcel of our language. Such phrases as _every inch a king_; _witch the world_; _the time is out of joint_, and hundreds more, show that modern Englishmen not only speak Shakespeare, but think Shakespeare. His knowledge of human nature has enabled him to throw into English literature a larger number of genuine "characters" that will always live in the thoughts of men, than any other author that ever wrote. And he has not drawn his characters from England alone and from his own time-- but from Greece and Rome, from other countries, too, and also from all ages. He has written in a greater variety of styles than any other writer. "Shakespeare," says Professor Craik, "has invented twenty styles." The knowledge, too, that he shows on every kind of human endeavour is as accurate as it is varied. Lawyers say that he was a great lawyer; theologians, that he was an able divine, and unequalled in his knowledge of the Bible; printers, that he must have been a printer; and seamen, that he knew every branch of the sailor's craft.

13. +Shakespeare's contemporaries.+-- But we are not to suppose that Shakespeare stood alone in the end of the sixteenth and the beginning of the seventeenth century as a great poet; and that everything else was flat and low around him. This never is and never can be the case. Great genius is the possession, not of one man, but of several in a great age; and we do not find a great writer standing alone and unsupported, just as we do not find a high mountain rising from a low plain. The largest group of the highest mountains in the world, the Himalayas, rise from the highest table-land in the world; and peaks nearly as high as the highest-- Mount Everest-- are seen cleaving the blue sky in the neighbourhood of Mount Everest itself. And so we find Shakespeare surrounded by dramatists in some respects nearly as great as himself; for the same great forces welling up within the heart of England that made _him_ created also the others. +Marlowe+, the teacher of Shakespeare, +Peele+, and +Greene+, preceded him; +Ben Jonson+, +Beaumont+ and +Fletcher+, +Ma.s.singer+ and +Ford+, +Webster+, +Chapman+, and many others, were his contemporaries, lived with him, talked with him; and no doubt each of these men influenced the work of the others.

But the works of these men belong chiefly to the seventeenth century. We must not, however, forget that the reign of Queen Elizabeth-- called in literature the +Elizabethan Period+-- was the greatest that England ever saw,-- greatest in poetry and in prose, greatest in thought and in action, perhaps also greatest in external events.

14. CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE (+1564-1593+), the first great English dramatist, was born at Canterbury in the year 1564, two months before the birth of Shakespeare himself. He studied at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, and took the degree of Master of Arts in 1587. After leaving the university, he came up to London and wrote for the stage. He seems to have led a wild and reckless life, and was stabbed in a tavern brawl on the 1st of June 1593. "As he may be said to have invented and made the verse of the drama, so he created the English drama." His chief plays are +Dr Faustus+ and +Edward the Second+. His style is one of the greatest vigour and power: it is often coa.r.s.e, but it is always strong.

Ben Jonson spoke of "Marlowe's mighty line"; and Lord Jeffrey says of him: "In felicity of thought and strength of expression, he is second only to Shakespeare himself."