6 Prosscr Hall Fryc 



In the other it is the same rich soil under the same happy climate, that has 

 been laid out in walks and parterres, and cut into shape and beauty by the 

 skill of the gardener." 



What alone is singular in these statements is Addison's indul- 

 gence for the untutored genius, whom he affected rather more 

 than his time, which would hardly have agreed with him in con- 

 ceding that "both these classes of authors may be equally great." 

 Otherwise the paper is a sufficiently orthodox expression of eigh- 

 teenth century opinion. 



II 



But while it is all very well to propose correctness as an at- 

 tribute of poetry, there is one obvious difficulty. Without some 

 satisfactory definitionn and standard of correctness the prescrip- 

 tion is useless. In a certain limited sense such a standard is sup- 

 plied by the ordinances of grammar as well as those of rhyme 

 and meter. But sttch a standard is not very far-reaching. Al- 

 though as a matter of fact the writers of the century did not 

 always succeed in satisfying these elementary requirements, they 

 had in mind something more than mere mechanical accuracy. 

 The propriety to which they aspired was elegance rather than 

 exactitude. And of such a quality there is evidently no absolute 

 and indisputable standard. The difficulty is insuperable. Beyond 

 a merely mechanic accomplishment to which any one is capable 

 of attaining by study and industry, excellence is altogether a 

 matter of opinion. For the justification of their poetic perform- 

 ance, therefore, thev were obliged, in the last resort, to fall back, 

 like any one else, upon the imponderable arbitrament of taste. 

 But taste, while it can not perhaps be argued, may at least be 

 improved and cultivated like any other faculty. Indeed, 'as the 

 faculty of literary judgment, it depends very largely for its jus- 

 tice upon a knowledge of literature, — not upon a knowledge of 

 this or that author, or this or that period, or even this or that 

 literature, as we seem inclined to believe nowadays, but u])on a 

 knowledge of literature as a whole. For Pope and Dryden, how- 

 ever, literature as a whole was represented mainly by Greek and 

 Latin, particularly by the latter; for it is interesting to notice 



