Literary Taste: How To Form It Part 3

I have not confined my choice to books of purely literary interest--that is to say, to works which are primarily works of literary art. Literature is the vehicle of philosophy, science, morals, religion, and history; and a library which aspires to be complete must comprise, in addition to imaginative works, all these branches of intellectual activity. Comprising all these branches, it cannot avoid comprising works of which the purely literary interest is almost nil.

On the other hand, I have excluded from consideration:--

i. Works whose sole importance is that they form a link in the chain of development. For example, nearly all the productions of authors between Chaucer and the beginning of the Elizabethan period, such as Gower, Hoccleve, and Skelton, whose works, for sufficient reason, are read only by professors and students who mean to be professors.

ii. Works not originally written in English, such as the works of that very great philosopher Roger Bacon, of whom this isle ought to be prouder than it is. To this rule, however, I have been constrained to make a few exceptions. Sir Thomas More's _Utopia_ was written in Latin, but one does not easily conceive a library to be complete without it. And could one exclude Sir Isaac Newton's _Principia_, the masterpiece of the greatest physicist that the world has ever seen? The law of gravity ought to have, and does have, a powerful sentimental interest for us.

iii. Translations from foreign literature into English.

Here, then, are the lists for the first period:

PROSE WRITERS s. d.

Bede, _Ecclesiastical History_: Temple Cla.s.sics. 0 1 6

Sir Thomas Malory, _Morte d'Arthur_: Everyman's Library (4 vols.) 0 4 0

Sir Thomas More, _Utopia_: Scott Library 0 1 0

George Cavendish, _Life of Cardinal Wolsey_: New Universal Library. 0 1 0

Richard Hakluyt, _Voyages_: Everyman's Library (8 vols.) 0 8 0

Richard Hooker, _Ecclesiastical Polity_: Everyman's Library (2 vols.) 0 2 0

Francis Bacon, _Works_: Newnes's Thinpaper Cla.s.sics. 0 2 0

Thomas Dekker, _Gull's Horn-Book_: King's Cla.s.sics. 0 1 6

Lord Herbert of Cherbury, _Autobiography_: Scott Library. 0 1 0

John Selden, _Table-Talk_: New Universal Library. 0 1 0

Thomas Hobbes, _Leviathan_: New Universal Library. 0 1 0

James Howell, _Familiar Letters_: Temple Cla.s.sics (3 vols.) 0 4 6

Sir Thomas Browne, _Religio Medici_, etc.: Everyman's Library. 0 1 0

Jeremy Taylor, _Holy Living and Holy Dying_: Temple Cla.s.sics (3 vols.) 0 4 6

Izaak Walton, _Compleat Angler_: Everyman's Library. 0 1 0

John Bunyan, _Pilgrim's Progress_: World's Cla.s.sics. 0 1 0

Sir William Temple, _Essay on Gardens of Epicurus_: King's Cla.s.sics. 0 1 6

John Evelyn, _Diary_: Everyman's Library (2 vols.) 0 2 0

Samuel Pepys, _Diary_: Everyman's Library (2 vols.) 0 2 0 _________ 2 1 6

The princ.i.p.al omission from the above list is _The Paston Letters_, which I should probably have included had the enterprise of publishers been sufficient to put an edition on the market at a cheap price.

Other omissions include the works of Caxton and Wyclif, and such books as Camden's _Britannia_, Ascham's _Schoolmaster_, and Fuller's _Worthies_, whose lack of first-rate value as literature is not adequately compensated by their historical interest. As to the Bible, in the first place it is a translation, and in the second I a.s.sume that you already possess a copy.

POETS s. d.

_Beowulf_, Routledge's London Library 0 2 6

GEOFFREY CHAUCER, _Works_: Globe Edition 0 3 6

Nicolas Udall, _Ralph Roister-Doister_: Temple Dramatists 0 1 0

EDMUND SPENSER, _Works_: Globe Edition 0 3 6

Thomas Lodge, _Rosalynde_: Caxton Series 0 1 0

Robert Greene, _Tragical Reign of Selimus_: Temple Dramatists 0 1 0

Michael Drayton, _Poems_: Newnes's Pocket Cla.s.sics 0 8 6

CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE, _Works_: New Universal Library 0 1 0

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, _Works_: Globe Edition 0 3 6

Thomas Campion, _Poems_: Muses' Library 0 1 0

Ben Jonson, _Plays_: Canterbury Poets 0 1 0

John Donne, _Poems_: Muses' Library (2 vols.) 0 2 0

John Webster, Cyril Tourneur, _Plays_: Mermaid Series 0 2 6

Philip Ma.s.singer, _Plays_: Cunningham Edition 0 3 6

Beaumont and Fletcher, _Plays_: a Selection Canterbury Poets 0 1 0

John Ford, _Plays_: Mermaid Series 0 2 6

George Herbert, _The Temple_: Everyman's Library 0 1 0

ROBERT HERRICK, _Poems_: Muses' Library (2 vols.) 0 2 0

Edmund Waller, _Poems_: Muses' Library (2 vols.) 0 2 0

Sir John Suckling, _Poems_: Muses' Library 0 1 0