466 
as every man of genius writing ina rude 
language has done and must do in every 
country. Monks, and minstrels, and 
ballad-singers, had preceded him; and 
the metrical romances to which he refers 
in his Rime of Sir ‘Thopas, however in- 
ferior in many other respects, are writ- 
ten in language as nearly, or more neat- 
ly, resembling modern English, and in 
metres more intricate and more harmo- 
nious, than any of his.productions. The 
remainder of this ‘chapter is employed 
upon the French, Provencal, and italian 
poets. 
Inthe next chapter, the Court of Love 
is analyzed. ‘This was the poet’s first 
production. ‘The faults and beauties of 
the plan are fairly appreciated, and 
some deductions inferred relative to the 
author himself. This is followed by 
some remarks upon ancient and modern 
English poetry. 
«© Nothing can be more perni¢idus than 
the epinion which idleness and an incurious 
te: per alone have hitherto sufficed to imein- 
tai, that the modern writers of yerse in any 
eountryare to be styled the poets of that coun- 
try. ‘his absurdity was never carricd toa 
greaterextieme than inthe book entitled Jolin- 
son's Livesof themosteminent Enetish Poets. 
‘The first poet in his series is Cowley ; andy 
if the title of his book were properly filled 
up, it would stand, Lives of the most emi- 
nent English poets, frem the decline of poe- 
try in England to the time of the author.— 
The brilliant and astonishing ages of our 
poetry are wholly omitted. Milton is the 
only author in Johnson’s series, who can 
lay claim to a true sublimity of conception, 
and an inexhaustible storehouse of imagery. 
Pope is an elegant writer, and expresses hiin- 
self with admirable neatness and compression ; 
Dryden is a man of an ardent and giant 
wind, who pours out his sentiments in a 
fervour and tumult of cloquence, and imparts 
an clectricity of pleasure to cvery reader ca- 
gable of understanding his excellence. But 
wt is not in Dryden and Pope, in their con- 
temporari¢s and successors, that we are told 
to look for the peentiar and appropriate fea- 
tures of poetry, for that which separates and 
distinguishes poctry from every other species 
of composition, It is Spenser, it is Shake- 
spear, it is letcher, with some of their con- 
temporaries and predecessars, who are our 
genuine posts, who are the men that an Eng- 
iishman, of a poetical soul would guther 
rounddim when he challenges all the world, 
aud stiwids up and proudly asks where, in 
ail the aees of literature and refinement, he 
js to find thelr Coropetilors and rivals? 
«di is easy to perceive, and has been 
verified in the example of all ages and ‘cli- 
mates, ibat poetry has been the genuine as- 
aweiave of che earlier stages of literature — 
BIOGRAPHY. 
There is then a freshmess in language adm 
rably adapted to those emotions which poetty 
delights to produce. Our words are then the 
images of things, the representatives of visi- 
ble and audible impressions: aftera while, 
too many of our words become cold and 
scientific, perfectly suited to the topies of 
reasoning, but wnfitted for imagery and pas- « 
sion; and dealing in abstractions and gene- 
{ 
: 
‘ralitics, instead of presenting tous afresh the 
impressions of scnse. 
‘<The attempts of the poet are boldest and 
most. successful when the whole field is open 
to lim, when he must seek for models in 
distant ages and countries, not when the ex= 
cellence to which he aspires is pre-oceupicd 
by poets in his own language, whose merits . — 
and reputation he cannot hope to equal.— 
Criticism too, though it may make many 
judges, never perhaps ripened one genius. 
it is a deadly foe to bold and. adventurous 
attempts, and scarcely leaves any hope of 
success, hut to him who aspixes to please us, 
just as we haye been pleased an hundred 
times before. 
*© One circumstance which has contribut- 
ed to the neglect into whieh the works of 
Chaucer have fatten, is the supposition. that 
his language is obsolete. It is not obsolete. 
It is not more obscure than the language of 
Spenser, and scarcely more than that of — 
Shakespear. Most of the English writers, ~— 
from the death of Chaucer-to the times of 
Elizabeth, are more obseure than our poet. 
The English tongue underwent litle altera- 
tion till the reign of that princess. 
«© Chaucer's style, in his principal works, 
is easy, flowing, and unaffected ; aud sucha 
style, whatever may have been the cireum- 
stances of the writcr, can almost never be ob-. 
scure. We take ten times more pains to 
familiarise ourselves with the idioms of Italy 
and France, than would be necessary to mas- 
ter that of the old English writers; while 
this latter acquisition would be forty times 
more useful, sinee, in addition to the intrin+ 
sic merits of their works, we should culti- 
vate the fine poctical- and moral feeling an- 
nexed to the contemplation of a venerable 
antiquity; and since ti is only by observing ~ 
the progressive stages of a language, that we — 
can become thoroughly acquainted with its — 
genius, its characteristic features, and its re- 
sources. All that repels us in the language © 
of Chaucer is merely superficial appearance — 
and first impression : contemplate it only — 
with a little perseverance, and what seemed — 
to be deformity will, in many instances, be = 
converted into beauty. A fortnight’s appli- — 
cation would be sufficient to make us feel 
ourselves perfectly at h ome with this patriarch — 
of our poctry” 2 
With the opinion here expressed, we § 
most fully and unequivocally agree. Mr. 
Godwin has, however, fallen into a very 
common but very unaccountable mis- 
take, in asserting.that the language of - 
