English Literature
borders three great men--Clive in India, Wolfe on the Plains of Abraham,
Cook in Australia and the islands of the Pacific--were unfurling the banner
of St. George over the untold wealth of new lands, and spreading the
world-wide empire of the Anglo-Saxons.
LITERARY CHARACTERISTICS. In every preceding age we have noted especially
the poetical works, which constitute, according to Matthew Arnold, the
glory of English literature. Now for the first time we must chronicle the
triumph of English prose. A multitude of practical interests arising from
the new social and political conditions demanded expression, not simply in
books, but more especially in pamphlets, magazines, and newspapers. Poetry
was inadequate for such a task; hence the development of prose, of the
"unfettered word," as Dante calls it,--a development which astonishes us by
its rapidity and excellence. The graceful elegance of Addison's essays, the
terse vigor of Swift's satires, the artistic finish of Fielding's novels,
the sonorous eloquence of Gibbon's history and of Burke's orations,--these
have no parallel in the poetry of the age. Indeed, poetry itself became
prosaic in this respect, that it was used not for creative works of
imagination, but for essays, for satire, for criticism,--for exactly the
same practical ends as was prose. The poetry of the first half of the
century, as typified in the work of Pope, is polished and witty enough, but
artificial; it lacks fire, fine feeling, enthusiasm, the glow of the
Elizabethan Age and the moral earnestness of Puritanism. In a word, it
interests us as a study of life, rather than delights or inspires us by its
appeal to the imagination. The variety and excellence of prose works, and
the development of a serviceable prose style, which had been begun by
Dryden, until it served to express clearly every human interest and
emotion,--these are the chief literary glories of the eighteenth century.
In the literature of the preceding age we noted two marked tendencies,--the
tendency to realism in subject-matter, and the tendency to polish and
refinement of expression. Both these tendencies were continued in the
Augustan Age, and are seen clearly in the poetry of Pope, who brought the
couplet to perfection, and in the prose of Addison. A third tendency is
shown in the prevalence of satire, resulting from the unfortunate union of
politics with literature. We have already noted the power of the press in
this age, and the perpetual strife of political parties. Nearly every
writer of the first half of the century was used and rewarded by Whigs or
Tories for satirizing their enemies and for advancing their special
political interests. Pope was a marked exception, but he nevertheless
followed the prose writers in using satire too largely in his poetry. Now
satire--that is, a literary work which searches out the faults of men or
institutions in order to hold them up to ridicule--is at best a destructive
kind of criticism. A satirist is like a laborer who clears away the ruins
and rubbish of an old house before the architect and builders begin on a
new and beautiful structure. The work may sometimes be necessary, but it
rarely arouses our enthusiasm. While the satires of Pope, Swift, and
Addison are doubtless the best in our language, we hardly place them with
our great literature, which is always constructive in spirit; and we have
the feeling that all these men were capable of better things than they ever
wrote.
THE CLASSIC AGE. The period we are studying is known to us by various
names. It is often called the Age of Queen Anne; but, unlike Elizabeth,
this "meekly stupid" queen had practically no influence upon our
literature. The name Classic Age is more often heard; but in using it we
should remember clearly these three different ways in which the word
"classic" is applied to literature: (1) the term "classic" refers, in
general, to writers of the highest rank in any nation. As used in our
literature, it was first applied to the works of the great Greek and Roman
writers, like Homer and Virgil; and any English book which followed the
simple and noble method of these writers was said to have a classic style.
Later the term was enlarged to cover the great literary works of other
ancient nations; so that the Bible and the Avestas, as well as the Iliad
and the Aeneid, are called classics. (2) Every national literature has at
least one period in which an unusual number of great writers are producing
books, and this is called the classic period of a nation's literature. Thus
the reign of Augustus is the classic or golden age of Rome; the generation
of Dante is the classic age of Italian literature; the age of Louis XIV is
the French classic age; and the age of Queen Anne is often called the
classic age of England. (3) The word "classic" acquired an entirely
different meaning in the period we are studying; and we shall better
understand this by reference to the preceding ages. The Elizabethan writers
were led by patriotism, by enthusiasm, and, in general, by romantic
emotions. They wrote in a natural style, without regard to rules; and
though they exaggerated and used too many words, their works are delightful
because of their vigor and freshness and fine feeling. In the following age
patriotism had largely disappeared from politics and enthusiasm from
literature. Poets no longer wrote naturally, but artificially, with strange
and fantastic verse forms to give effect, since fine feeling was wanting.
And this is the general character of the poetry of the Puritan Age.[185]
Gradually our writers rebelled against the exaggerations of both the
natural and the fantastic style. They demanded that poetry should follow
exact rules; and in this they were influenced by French writers, especially
by Boileau and Rapin, who insisted on precise methods of writing poetry,
and who professed to have discovered their rules in the classics of Horace
and Aristotle. In our study of the Elizabethan drama we noted the good
influence of the classic movement in insisting upon that beauty of form and
definiteness of expression which characterize the dramas of Greece and
Rome; and in the work of Dryden and his followers we see a revival of
classicism in the effort to make English literature conform to rules
established by the great writers of other nations. At first the results
were excellent, especially in prose; but as the creative vigor of the
Elizabethans was lacking in this age, writing by rule soon developed a kind
of elegant formalism, which suggests the elaborate social code of the time.
Just as a gentleman might not act naturally, but must follow exact rules in
doffing his hat, or addressing a lady, or entering a room, or wearing a
wig, or offering his snuffbox to a friend, so our writers lost
individuality and became formal and artificial. The general tendency of
literature was to look at life critically, to emphasize intellect rather
than imagination, the form rather than the content of a sentence. Writers
strove to repress all emotion and enthusiasm, and to use only precise and
elegant methods of expression. This is what is often meant by the
"classicism" of the ages of Pope and Johnson. It refers to the critical,
intellectual spirit of many writers, to the fine polish of their heroic
couplets or the elegance of their prose, and not to any resemblance which
their work bears to true classic literature. In a word, the classic
movement had become pseudo-classic, i.e. a false or sham classicism; and
the latter term is now often used to designate a considerable part of
eighteenth-century literature.[186] To avoid this critical difficulty we
have adopted the term Augustan Age, a name chosen by the writers
themselves, who saw in Pope, Addison, Swift, Johnson, and Burke the modern
parallels to Horace, Virgil, Cicero, and all that brilliant company who
made Roman literature famous in the days of Augustus.
ALEXANDER POPE (1688-1744)
Pope is in many respects a unique figure. In the first place, he was for a
generation "the poet" of a great nation. To be sure, poetry was limited in
the early eighteenth century; there were few lyrics, little or no love
poetry, no epics, no dramas or songs of nature worth considering; but in
the narrow field of satiric and didactic verse Pope was the undisputed
master. His influence completely dominated the poetry of his age, and many
foreign writers, as well as the majority of English poets, looked to him as
their model. Second, he was a remarkably clear and adequate reflection of
the spirit of the age in which he lived. There is hardly an ideal, a
belief, a doubt, a fashion, a whim of Queen Anne's time, that is not neatly
expressed in his poetry. Third, he was the only important writer of that
age who gave his whole life to letters. Swift was a clergyman and
politician; Addison was secretary of state; other writers depended on
patrons or politics or pensions for fame and a livelihood; but Pope was
independent, and had no profession but literature. And fourth, by the sheer
force of his ambition he won his place, and held it, in spite of religious
prejudice, and in the face of physical and temperamental obstacles that
would have discouraged a stronger man. For Pope was deformed and sickly,
dwarfish in soul and body. He knew little of the world of nature or of the
world of the human heart. He was lacking, apparently, in noble feeling, and
instinctively chose a lie when the truth had manifestly more advantages.
Yet this jealous, peevish, waspish little man became the most famous poet
of his age and the acknowledged leader of English literature. We record the
fact with wonder and admiration; but we do not attempt to explain it.
LIFE. Pope was born in London in 1688, the year of the Revolution. His
parents were both Catholics, who presently removed from London and settled
in Binfield, near Windsor, where the poet's childhood was passed. Partly
because of an unfortunate prejudice against Catholics in the public
schools, partly because of his own weakness and deformity, Pope received
very little school education, but browsed for himself among English books
and picked up a smattering of the classics. Very early he began to write
poetry, and records the fact with his usual vanity:
As yet a child, nor yet a fool to fame,
I lisped in numbers, for the numbers came.
Being debarred by his religion from many desirable employments, he resolved
to make literature his life work; and in this he resembled Dryden, who, he
tells us, was his only master, though much of his work seems to depend on
Boileau, the French poet and critic.[187] When only sixteen years old he
had written his "Pastorals"; a few years later appeared his "Essay on
Criticism," which made him famous. With the publication of the _Rape of the
Lock_, in 1712, Pope's name was known and honored all over England, and
this dwarf of twenty-four years, by the sheer force of his own ambition,
had jumped to the foremost place in English letters. It was soon after this
that Voltaire called him "the best poet of England and, at present, of all
the world,"--which is about as near the truth as Voltaire generally gets in
his numerous universal judgments. For the next twelve years Pope was busy
with poetry, especially with his translations of Homer; and his work was so
successful financially that he bought a villa at Twickenham, on the Thames,
and remained happily independent of wealthy patrons for a livelihood.
Led by his success, Pope returned to London and for a time endeavored to
live the gay and dissolute life which was supposed to be suitable for a
literary genius; but he was utterly unfitted for it, mentally and
physically, and soon retired to Twickenham. There he gave himself up to