374 



THE POPULAR EDUCATOR. 



for some time driven Italian opera from the stage, and is by no 

 means forgotten yet. An accomplished critic has truly said of 

 Gay that in his ballads " there is a peculiar, hinted, pathetic 

 sweetness and melody. It charms and melts you. It is inde- 

 finable, but it exists ; and is the property of John Gay's and 

 Oliver Goldsmith's best verse, as fragrance is of a violet, or 

 freshness of a rose." 



A very different career was that of Matthew Prior. He was 

 of very humble origin, being the son of a vintner in Whitehall ; 

 and we find him in his after-days of prosperity and distinction 

 often reproached with his ignoble birth. His first literary 

 effort was "The Town and Country Mouse" of which he 

 wrote the greater part a burlesque poem intended to ridicule 

 Dryden's " Hind and the Panther." This brought him to the 

 knowledge of influential men, and was the source of his ad- 

 vancement in life. He became secretary to the embassy at the 

 Hague, and ultimately rose to the important post of British 

 ambassador in Paris for King William III. and Queen Anne. 

 Prior's poems are for the most part short lyrical pieces on 

 occasional subjects. They are little read now ; but they 

 are light, easy, and graceful, showing much knowledge of 

 men and much humour, though not without the taint of 

 coarseness. 



There are very few poets whose reputation has so clearly 

 illustrated the fluctuations in popular taste from age to age as 

 that of Edward Young. He was born in 1681 and died in 1765, 

 thus surviving for some years most of those of whom we have 

 to speak in this lesson. And indeed, except in the artificial 

 character of his poems, he has not very much in common with 

 the school of Pope. Young was a clergyman, though he seems 

 to have taken orders rather in disappointment at his want of 

 success in other employments than from any great devotion to 

 the sacred calling. In the Church, too, he seems ever to have 

 indulged hopes of success and advancement which were never 

 realised. He became a soured, disappointed, and discontented 

 man, unhappy in himself, and not very amiable or attractive 

 to those about him. His great work the only one which is 

 now much remembered is the " Night Thoughts," a series of 

 nine meditations on subjects whose solemn character is suited 

 to the Night, to which they are assigned. In these somewhat 

 gloomy meditations we may well suppose that Young sought 

 relief from his own vexation and bitterness. 



There are but a few more among the poets of this age who 

 ought not to pass wholly unnoticed, though we can do little 

 more than mention their names. Thomas Parnell was another 

 of Pope's literary friends and followers. He was an Irishman 

 by birth and education, and held a living in that country. The 

 work by which he is best known is his poetical tale of " The 

 Hermit." Sir Samuel Garth was a physician of eminence. He 

 is known by his poem, " The Dispensary." This poem is a fairly 

 successful example of that easiest of all forms of literature, the 

 burlesque. Sir Richard Blackmore was likewise a physician in 

 extensive practice. His works are enormously voluminous ; 

 epic after epic flowed from his pen, few of which were read at 

 the time, and none of them now. He is remembered chiefly by 

 Pope's satiric attacks upon him in the " Dunciad. 1 ' The same 

 may be said of Ambrose Philips, a writer of pastorals and 

 other shorter pieces. His reputation was great during his life. 

 His very name would probably hardly be remembered now, had 

 not Pope given him immortality. 



In our opening lesson in English Literature (Vol. IV., p. 50) 

 we gave brief but clear definitions of the eight great periods 

 into which the literature of our country, or of " English- 

 speaking nations," may be divided. Of these we have treated 

 six, in due order and succession, bringing under the notice 

 of our readers the most prominent writers in each, and the 

 most noted of their various works. The termination of the 

 sixth period from 1689 to 1727 is the close of what has been 

 termed the Augustan Age of English Literature, which boasted 

 of the exquisite taste and fancy of Addison, the correct and 

 polished style of Pope, the scathing satire of Swift, the spark- 

 ling wit of Arbuthnot, and the sound sense and facile language 

 of Steele. These men, with one exception, as it has been justly 

 observed, "corrected the indecency of the vicious school intro- 

 duced at the Restoration," and aa the pioneers of a better, 

 healthier state of English letters and learning, laid the founda- 

 tion of a new era of our literature, which, after smouldering 

 through the seventh period, that closed at the end of the 



eighteenth century or thereabouts, warmed and brightened aa 

 years passed on, until it culminated in the brilliant roll of 

 modern writers, of whom Scott and Byron, Hallam and 

 Macaulay, Prescott and Motley, Thackeray and Dickens, Ten- 

 nyson and Longfellow, and Ruskin and Carlyle, may bo re- 

 garded as the "bright particular stars." 



To do justice to the merits and writings of such men as these 

 would occupy more space than could conveniently be given ; 

 and we are therefore forced to bring these lessons to a close 

 with a very short sketch of each of the remaining periods 

 namely, that which is intermediate between the Augustan Ago 

 and the great revival of romantic literature at the end of the 

 eighteenth century, and that which was the dawn of the revived 

 romantic school. 



LESSONS IN SPANISH. XXIY. 



THE CONJUNCTION. 



CONJUNCTIONS are simple that is, such as consist of a singl& 

 word ; or conjunctive phrases, such as consist of more than one 

 word. They may bo divided according to their meaning into 

 the following classes : 



1. Copulative, which simply unite words or sentences together; 

 as, y, and; tambien, also. 



2. Disjunctive, which connect words or sentences at tho same 

 time that they disjoin the sense ; as, 6, or. 



3. Adversative, which express opposition of meaning while 

 they connect; as, mas, but; pero, but; sin embargo, notwith- 

 standing, 



4. Comparative, which serve to compare words or preposi- 

 tions ; as, como, as ; asi, so ; como si, as if. 



5. Conditional, which express a condition; as, si, if; con tal 

 que, provided that. 



6. Concessive, which serve .to express something granted ; as, 

 aunque, even if ; dado que, granted that. 



7. Conclusive, which express a conclusion or inference ; as, 

 do aqui, hence ; por esto, therefore. 



8. Causal, which express a cause or reason ; as, porque, be- 

 cause; pues que, since. 



9. Temporal, which serve to express a relation of time ; as, 

 antes que, before ; despues que, after. 



10. Final, which express an end or purpose ; as, para que, 

 that, in order that ; a fin do que. to the end that. 



MANNER OF USING CERTAIN CONJUNCTIONS. 



Sino, meaning but, is used aftor a negative, unless tho verb 

 be repeated ; and pero or was, also meaning but, is used when, 

 no negative precedes ; as 



El reino do Dios no esta en The kingdom of God is not in 

 palabras, sino en vertud, word, but in power. 



Ella es hermosa, paro (or mas) S/ia is beautiful, but she is not 

 no C3 prudeiite, prudent. 



If aftar a negative tha verb be repeated, pero or was is to b9 

 used instead of sino ; as 



Ella no lo di.jo a Juan, pero (or She did not tell it to John, but she 

 mas) lo dijo a Pedro, told it to Peter. 



Sino, meaning except, is used after an interrogation or after ?v 

 negative ; and mtnos, also meaning except, is used when no 

 interrogative or negative precedes, both words being rendered 

 in English by but ; as 



iQuien lo liizo sino el carpin- Who did it but the carpenter? ' 

 tero? 



Ninguno hay bueno sino solo There is no one good but GO& 



Dios, alone. 



Vinieron todos meuos el juez, They all came but the judge. 



The conjunction but is used in English with such a variety of 

 meanings that it is necessary, before rendering it into Spanish, 

 to find what other word or words it really represents, aa this 

 latter word or phrase is generally that which is used to repre- 

 sent it in Spanish ; thus 



I am distant from death but Un solo paso dislo yo d Zd 



(only) one stop, muerte. 



We have but (no more than) No tvnemos mas de cinco panes 



five loaves and two fishes, y dos peces. 



He arrived but (not till) yester- No llego hasta ayer. 

 day, 



I cannot but (do less than) go, To no pucdo mhws de ir. 



