266 CHAUCER. 



the truth, essential to all really great poetry, that his own 

 instincts were his safest guides, that there is nothing deeper 

 in life than life itself, and that to conjure an allegorical 

 significance into it was to lose sight of its real meaning. 

 He of all men could not say one thing and mean another, 

 unless by way of humorous contrast. 



In thus turning frankly and gaily to the actual world, 

 and drinking inspiration from sources open to all ; in turning 

 away from a colourless abstraction to the solid earth and to 

 emotions common to every pulse; in discovering that to 

 make the best of nature, and not to grope vaguely after 

 something better than nature, was the true office of Art ; 

 in insisting on a definite purpose, on veracity, cheerfulness, 

 and simplicity, Chaucer shows himself the true father and 

 founder of what is characteristically English literature. He 

 has a hatred of cant as hearty as Dr. Johnson s, though he 

 has a slyer way of showing it ; he has the placid common- 

 sense of Franklin, the sweet, grave humour of Addison, the 

 exquisite taste of Gray ; but the whole texture of his mind, 

 though its substance seem plain and grave, shows itself at 

 every turn iridescent with poetic feeling like shot silk. 

 Above all, he has an eye for character that seems to have 

 caught at once not only its mental and physical features, 

 but even its expression in variety of costume an eye, indeed, 

 second only, if it should be called second in some respects, 

 to that of Shakespeare, 



I know of nothing that may be compared with the prologue 

 to the &quot;Canterbury Tales,&quot; and with that to the story of the 

 &quot; Chanon s Yeoman,&quot; before Chaucer. Characters and por 

 traits from real life had never been drawn with such 

 discrimination, or with such variety, never with such bold 

 precision of outline, and with such a lively sense of the 

 picturesque. His Parson is still unmatched, though Dryden 

 and Goldsmith have both tried their hands in emulation of 

 him. And the humour also in its suavity, its perpetual 

 presence and its shy unobtrusiveness, is something wholly 

 new in literature. For anything that deserves to be called 

 like it in English we must wait for Henry Fielding. 



