CHAUCER. 287 



one substance with the poetry, but is a kind of carven 

 frame for it, whose figures lose their meaning, as they 

 cease to be contemporary. It was not a style that could 

 have much attraction for a nature so sensitive to the 

 actual, so observant of it, so interested by it as that of 

 Chaucer. He seems to have tried his hand at all the 

 forms in vogue, and to have arrived in his old age at the 

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

 instincts Avere 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 arid gayly to the actual world, 

 and drinking inspiration from sources open to all; in 

 turning away from a colorless abstraction to the solid 

 earth and to emotions common to every pulse ; in dis 

 covering 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 character 

 istically English literature. He has a hatred of cant as 

 hearty as Dr. Johnson's, though he has a slier way of 

 showing it ; he has the placid common-sense of Franklin, 

 the sweet, grave humor 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, in 

 deed, 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 



