An English Garner - Edited by Professor Arber and Thomas Seccombe
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AN ENGLISH GARNER
CRITICAL ESSAYS
AND
LITERARY FRAGMENTS
WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY
J. CHURTON COLLINS
1903
PUBLISHERS' NOTE
The texts contained in the present volume are reprinted with very slight
alterations from the _English Garner_ issued in eight volumes (1877-1890,
London, 8vo.) by Professor Arber, whose name is sufficient guarantee for
the accurate collation of the texts with the rare originals, the old
spelling being in most cases carefully modernised. The contents of the
original _Garner_ have been rearranged and now for the first time
classified, under the general editorial supervision of Mr. Thomas
Seccombe. Certain lacunae have been filled by the interpolation of fresh
matter. The Introductions are wholly new and have been written specially
for this issue. The references to volumes of the _Garner_ (other than the
present volume) are for the most part to the editio princeps, 8 vols.
1877-90.
CONTENTS
I. Extract from Thomas Wilson's _Art of Rhetoric_, 1554
II. Sir Philip Sidney's _Letter to his brother Robert_, 1580
III. Extract from Francis Meres's _Palladis Tamia_, 1598
IV. Dryden's _Dedicatory Epistle to the Rival Ladies_, 1664
V. Sir Robert Howard's _Preface to four new Plays_, 1665
VI. Dryden's _Essay of Dramatic Poesy_, 1668
VII. Extract from Thomas Ellwood's _History of Himself_, describing
his relations with Milton, 1713
VIII. Bishop Copleston's Advice to a Young Reviewer, 1807
IX. The Bickerstaff and Partridge Tracts, 1708
X. Gay's _Present State of Wit_, 1711
XI. Tickell's Life of Addison, 1721
XII. Steele's Dedicatory Epistle to Congreve, 1722
XIII. Extract from Chamberlayne's Angliae Notitia, 1669
XIV. Eachard's Grounds and Occasions of the Contempt of the Clergy
and of Religion, 1670
XV. Bickerstaff's Miseries of the Domestic Chaplain, 1710
XVI. Franklin's Poor Richard Improved, 1757
INTRODUCTION
The miscellaneous pieces comprised in this volume are of interest and
value, as illustrating the history of English literature and of an
important side of English social life, namely, the character and status
of the clergy in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. They
have been arranged chronologically under the subjects with which they are
respectively concerned. The first three--the excerpt from Wilson's _Art of
Rhetoric_, Sir Philip Sidney's _Letter_ to his brother Robert, and the
dissertation from Meres's _Palladis Tamia_--are, if minor, certainly
characteristic examples of pre-Elizabethan and Elizabethan literary
criticism. The next three--the _Dedicatory Epistle to the Rival Ladies_,
Howard's _Preface to Four New Plays_, and the _Essay of Dramatic
Poesy_--not only introduce us to one of the most interesting critical
controversies of the seventeenth century, but present us, in the last
work, with an epoch-marking masterpiece, both in English criticism and in
English prose composition. Bishop Copleston's brochure brings us to the
early days of the _Edinburgh Review_, and to the dawn of the criticism
with which we are, unhappily, only too familiar in our own time. From
criticism we pass, in the extract from Ellwood's life of himself, to
biography and social history, to the most vivid account we have of Milton
as a personality and in private life. Next comes a series of pamphlets
illustrating social and literary history in the reigns of Anne and George
I., opening with the pamphlets bearing on Swift's inimitable Partridge
hoax, now for the first time collected and reprinted, and preceding Gay's
_Present State of Wit_, which gives a lively account of the periodic
literature current in 1711. Next comes Tickell's valuable memoir of his
friend Addison, prefixed, as preface, to his edition of Addison's works,
published in 1721, with Steele's singularly interesting strictures on the
memoir, being the dedication of the second edition of the _Drummer_ to
Congreve. The reprint of Eachard's _Grounds and Occasions of the Contempt
of the Clergy and Religion Enquired into_, with the preceding extract from
Chamberlayne's _Angliae Notitia_ and the succeeding papers of Steele's in
the _Tatler_ and _Guardian_, throws light on a question which is not only
of great interest in itself, but which has been brought into prominence
through the controversies excited by Macaulay's famous picture of the
clergy of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Last comes what is by
general consent acknowledged to be one of the most valuable contributions
ever made to the literature of proverbs, Franklin's summary of the maxims
in _Poor Richard's Almanack_.
Our first excerpt is the preface to a work which is entitled to the
distinction of being the first systematic contribution to literary
criticism written in the English language. It appeared in 1553, and was
entitled _The Art of Rhetorique, for the use of all suche as are studious
of eloquence, sette foorthe in Englishe by Thomas Wilson_, and it was
dedicated to John Dudley, Earl of Warwick. Thomas Wilson--erroneously
designated Sir Thomas Wilson, presumably because he has been confounded
with a knight of that name--was born about 1525, educated at Eton and
subsequently at King's College, Cambridge, whence he graduated B.A. in
1549. In life he played many parts, as tutor to distinguished pupils,
notably Henry and Charles Brandon, afterwards Dukes of Suffolk, as
diplomatist and ambassador to various countries, as a Secretary of State
and a Privy Councillor, as one of the Masters of Requests, and as Master
of St. Catherine's Hospital at the Tower, at which place and in which
capacity he terminated a very full and busy life on June 16th, 1581. The
pupil of Sir John Cheke and of Sir Thomas Smith, and the intimate friend
of Roger Ascham, Wilson was one of the most accomplished scholars in
England, being especially distinguished by his knowledge of Greek. He is
the author of a translation, of a singularly vigorous translation, of the
_Olynthiacs_ and _Philippics_ of Demosthenes, published in 1570. His most
popular work, judging at least from the quickly succeeding editions,
appears to have been his first, _The Rule of Reason, conteinynge the Art
of Logique set forth in Englishe_, published by Grafton in 1551, and
dedicated to Edward VI. _The Art of Rhetorique_ is said to have been
published at the same time, but the earliest known copy is dated January
1553. The interest of this Art of Rhetoric is threefold. It is the work
of a writer intelligently familiar with the Greek and Roman classics, and
it thus stands beside Elyot's _Governour_, which appeared two years
before, as one of the earliest illustrations of the influence of the
Renaissance on our vernacular literature. It is one of the earliest
examples, not only of the employment of the English language in the
treatment of scholastic subjects, but of the vindication of the use of
English in the treatment of such subjects; and, lastly, it is remarkable
for its sound and weighty good sense. His friend, Ascham, had already
said: 'He that wyll wryte well in any tongue muste folowe thys councel of
Aristotle, to speake as the common people do, to think as wise men do, and
so shoulde every man understande hym. Many English writers have not done
so, but usinge straunge words, as Latin, French, and Italian, do make all
thinges darke and harde.' And it is indeed by no means improbable that
this work, which is written to inculcate all that Ascham upheld, may have
been suggested by Ascham. It is in three books, and draws largely on
Quintilian, the first two books being substantially little more than a
compilation, but a very judicious one, from the _Institutes of Oratory_.
But Wilson is no pedant, and has many excellent remarks on the nature of
the influence which the classics should exercise on English composition.
One passage is worth transcribing--
'Among all other lessons, this should first be learned, that we never
affect any straunge ynkhorne termes, but to speake as is commonly
received, neither seeking to be over fine, nor yet being over carelesse,
using our speeche as most men doe, and ordering our wittes as the fewest
have done. Some seke so far outlandishe English, that thei forget
altogether their mothers language. And I dare sweare this, if some of
their mothers were alive, thei were not able to tell what thei saie; and
yet these fine English clerkes will saie thei speake in their mother
tongue--if a man should charge them for counterfeityng the kinges
Englishe.... The unlearned or foolish phantasicalle that smelles but of
learnyng (suche fellowes as have seen learned men in their daies) will so
Latin their tongues that the simple can not but wonder at their talke, and
thinke surely thei speake by some revelation. I know them that thinke
Rhetorique to stand wholie upon darke woordes; and he that can catche an
ynke horne terme by the taile him thei coumpt to bee a fine Englisheman
and a good Rhetorician.'
In turning to Wilson's own style, we are reminded of Butler's sarcasm--
'All a rhetorician's rules
Teach nothing but to name his tools.'
He is not, indeed, deficient, as the excerpt given shows, in dignity and
weightiness, but neither there nor elsewhere has he any of the finer
qualities of style, his rhythm being harsh and unmusical, his diction
cumbrous and diffuse.
The excerpt which comes next in this miscellany is by the author of that
treatise which is, with the exceptions, perhaps, of George Puttenham's
_Art of English Poesie_ and Ben Jonson's _Discoveries_, the most precious
contribution to criticism made in the Elizabethan age; but, indeed, the
_Defence of Poesie_ stands alone: alone in originality, alone in
inspiring eloquence. The letter we print is taken from Arthur Collins's
_Sydney Papers_, vol. i. pp. 283-5, and was written by Sir Philip Sidney
to his brother Robert, afterwards (August 1618) second Earl of Leicester,
then at Prague. From letters of Sir Henry Sidney in the same collection
(see letters dated March 25th and October 1578) we learn that Robert,
then in his eighteenth year, had been sent abroad to see the world and to
acquire foreign languages, that he was flighty and extravagant, and had in
consequence greatly annoyed his father, who had threatened to recall him
home. 'Follow,' Sir Henry had written, 'the direction of your most loving
brother. Imitate his virtues, exercyses, studyes and accyons, hee ys a
rare ornament of thys age.' This letter was written at a critical time in
Sidney's life. With great courage and with the noblest intentions, though
with extraordinary want of tact, for he was only in his twenty-sixth
year, he had presumed to dissuade Queen Elizabeth from marrying the Duke
of Anjou. The Queen had been greatly offended, and he had had to retire
from Court. The greater part of the year 1580 he spent at Wilton with his
sister Mary, busy with the _Arcadia_. In August he had, through the
influence of his uncle Leicester, become reconciled with the Queen, and a
little later took up his residence at Leicester House, from which this
letter is dated. It is a mere trifle, yet it illustrates very strikingly
and even touchingly Sidney's serious, sweet, and beautiful character. The
admirable remarks on the true use of the study of history, such as 'I
never require great study in Ciceronianism, the chief abuse of Oxford,
_qui dum verba sectantur, res ipsas negligunt_,' remind us of the author
of the _Defence_; while the 'great part of my comfort is in you,' 'be
careful of yourself, and I shall never have cares,' and the 'I write this
to you as one that for myself have given over the delight in the world,'
show that he had estimated royal reconciliations at their true value, and
anticipate the beautiful and pathetic words with which he is said to have
taken leave of the world. Short and hurried as this letter is, we feel it
is one of those trifles which, as Plutarch observes, throw far more light
on character than actions of importance often do.
Between 1580 and the appearance of Meres's work in 1598 there was much
activity in critical literature. Five years before the date of Sidney's
letter George Gascogne had published his _Certayne Notes of Instruction
concerning the makyng of Verse in Rhyme_. This was succeeded in 1584 by
James I.'s _Ane Short Treatise conteining some rewles and cautelis to be
observit_. Then came William Webbe's _Discourse of English Poesie_, 1586,
which had been preceded by Sidney's charming _Defence of Poetry_, composed
in or about 1579, but not published till 1593. This and Puttenham's
elaborate treatise, _The Art of English Poesie contrived into three
books_ (1589), had indeed marked an epoch in the history of criticism.
Memorable, too, in this branch of literature is Harington's _Apologie for
Poetry_ (1591), prefixed to his translation of the _Orlando Furioso_. But
it was not criticism only which had been advancing. The publication of
the first part of Lyly's _Euphues_ and of Spenser's _Shepherd's Calendar_
in 1579 may be said to have initiated the golden age of our literature.
The next twenty years saw Marlowe, Greene, Peele, Kyd, Shakespeare,
Chapman, Decker, and Ben Jonson at the head of our drama; Spenser,
Warner, Daniel, and Drayton leading narrative poetry; the contributors to
_England's Helicon_, published a year later, at the head of our sonneteers
and lyric poets; and Sidney, Lyly, Greene, and Hooker in the van of our
prose literature. The history of Meres's work, a dissertation from which
is here extracted, is curious. In or about 1596, Nicholas Ling and John
Bodenham conceived the idea of publishing a series of volumes containing
proverbs, maxims, and sententious reflections on religion, morals, and
life generally. Accordingly in 1597 appeared a small volume containing
various apothegms, extracted principally from the Classics and the
Fathers, compiled by Nicholas Ling and dedicated to Bodenham. It was
entitled _Politeuphuia_: _Wits Commonwealth_. In the following year
appeared '_Palladis Tamia, Wits Treasury_: _Being the Second Part of Wits
Commonwealth_. By Francis Meres, Maister of Arts in both Universities.' On
the title-page is the motto '_Vivitur ingenio, cetera mortis erunt_.' It
was printed by P. Short for Cuthbert Burbie. From the address to the
reader, which does not appear in the first edition, though it was
apparently intended for that edition, we learn that it had been
undertaken because of the extraordinary popularity of _Wits
Commonwealth_, which 'thrice within one year had runne thorough the
Presse.' Meres's work differs importantly from _Wits Commonwealth_. It is
not merely a compilation, but contains original matter, generally by way
of commentary. The extracts are much fuller, many being taken from modern
writers, notably Robert Greene, Lyly, Warner, and Sir Philip Sidney. In
1634 the work was re-issued under another title, _Wits Commonwealth, The
Second Part: A Treasurie of Divine, Moral, and Phylosophical Similes and
Sentences generally useful. But more particular published for the Use of
Schools_. In 1636 it was again reprinted. The only part of Meres's work
which is of interest now is what is here reprinted. It belongs to that
portion of his compilation which treats of studies and reading, the
preceding sections discussing respectively of 'books,' of 'reading of
books,' of 'choice to be had in reading of books,' of 'the use of reading
many books,' of 'philosophers,' of 'poetry,' of 'poets,' consisting for
the most part of remarks compiled from Plutarch, and in one or two
instances from Sir Philip Sidney's _Defence of Poetry. A portion of the
passage which immediately precedes the _Discourse_ may be transcribed
because of its plain speaking about the indifference of Elizabeth and her
ministers to the fortune of poets; though this, with curious
inconsistency, is flatly contradicted, probably for prudential reasons,
in the _Discourse_ itself--
'As the Greeke and Latin Poets have wonne immortal credit to their
native speech, being encouraged and graced by liberal patrones and
bountiful benefactors; so our famous and learned Lawreate masters
of England would entitle our English to far greater admired
excellency, if either the Emperor Augustus or Octavia his sister
or noble Maecenas were alive to reward and countenance them; or if
witty Comedians and stately Tragedians (the glorious and goodlie
representers of all fine witte, glorified phrase and great action)
bee still supported and uphelde, by which meanes (O ingrateful and
damned age) our Poets are soly or chiefly maintained, countenanced
and patronized.'
Of the author of this work, Francis Meres or Meers, comparatively little
is known. He sprang from an old and highly respectable family in
Lincolnshire, and was born in 1565, the son of Thomas Meres, of Kirton in
Holland in that county. After graduating from Pembroke College, Cambridge,
in 1587, proceeding M.A. in 1591 at his own University, and subsequently
by _ad eundem_ at Oxford, he settled in London, where in 1597, having
taken orders, he was living in Botolf Lane. He was presented in July 1602
to the rectory of Wing in Rutland, keeping a school there. He remained at
Wing till his death, in his eighty-first year, January 29, 1646-7. As
Charles FitzGeoffrey, in a Latin poem in his _Affaniae_ addressed to
Meres, speaks of him as '_Theologus et poeta_', it is possible that the
'F.M.' who was a contributor to the _Paradise of Dainty Devices_ is to be
identified with Meres. In addition to the _Palladis Tamia_, Meres was the
author of a sermon published in 1597, a copy of which is in the Bodleian,
and of two translations from the Spanish, neither of which is of any
interest.
Meres's _Discourse_ is, like the rest of his work, mainly a compilation,
with additions and remarks of his own. Much of it is derived from the
thirty-first chapter of the first book of Puttenham; with these
distinctions, that Meres's includes the poets who had come into
prominence between 1589 and 1598, and instituted parallels, biographical
and critical, between them and the ancient Classics. It is the notices of
these poets, and more particularly the references to Shakespeare's
writings, which make this treatise so invaluable to literary students.
Thus we are indebted to Meres for a list of the plays which Shakespeare
had produced by 1598, and for a striking testimony to his eminence at
that date as a dramatic poet, as a narrative poet, and as a writer of
sonnets. The perplexing reference to _Love's Labour's Won_ has never
been, and perhaps never will be, satisfactorily explained. To assume that
it is another title for _All's Well that Ends Well_ in an earlier form is
to cut rather than to solve the knot. It is quite possible that it refers
to a play that has perished. The references to the imprisonment of Nash
for writing the _Isle of Dogs_, to the unhappy deaths of Peele, Greene,
and Marlowe, and to the high personal character of Drayton are of great
interest. Meres was plainly a man of muddled and inaccurate learning, of
no judgment, and of no critical power, a sort of Elizabethan Boswell
without Boswell's virtues, and it is no paradox to say that it is this
which gives his _Discourse_ its chief interest. It probably represents
not his own but the judgments current on contemporary writers in
Elizabethan literary circles. And we cannot but be struck with their
general fairness. Full justice is done to Shakespeare, who is placed at
the head of the dramatists; full justice is done to Spenser, who is
styled divine, and placed at the head of narrative poets; to Sidney, both
as a prose writer and as a poet; to Drayton, to Daniel, and to Hall,
Lodge, and Marston, as satirists. We are surprised to find such a high
place assigned to Warner, 'styled by the best wits of both our
universities the English Homer,' and a modern critic would probably
substitute different names, notably those of Lodge and Campion, for those
of Daniel and Drayton in a list of the chief lyric poets then in activity.
In Meres's remarks on painters and musicians, there is nothing to detain
us.
Of a very different order is the important critical treatise which comes
next, Dryden's _Essay of Dramatic Poesy_, to which are prefixed as
prolegomena Dryden's _Dedicatory Epistle to The Rival Ladies_, Sir Robert
Howard's _Preface to Four New Plays_, and, as supplementary, Howard's
_Preface to The Duke of Lerma_, and Dryden's _Defence of the Essay of
Dramatic Poesy_. As Dryden's _Essay_, like almost all his writings, both
in verse and prose, was of a more or less occasional character, it will
be necessary to explain at some length the origin of the controversy out
of which it sprang, as well as the immediate object with which it was
written.
The Restoration found Dryden a literary adventurer, with a very slender
patrimony and with no prospects. Poetry was a drug in the market;
hack-work for the booksellers was not to his taste; and the only chance
of remunerative employment open to him was to write for the stage. To
this he accordingly betook himself. He began with comedy, and his comedy
was a failure. He then betook himself to a species of drama, for which
his parts and accomplishments were better fitted. Dryden had few or none
of the qualifications essential in a great dramatist; but as a
rhetorician, in the more comprehensive sense of the term, he was soon to
be unrivalled. In the rhymed heroic plays, as they were called, he found
just the sphere in which he was most qualified to excel. The taste for
these dramas, which owed most to France and something to Italy and Spain,
had come in with the Restoration. Their chief peculiarities were the
complete subordination of the dramatic to the rhetorical element, the
predominance of pageant, and the substitution of rhymed for blank verse.
Dryden's first experiment in this drama was the _Rival Ladies_, in which
the tragic portions are composed in rhyme, blank verse being reserved for
the parts approaching comedy. In his next play, the _Indian Queen_,
written in conjunction with Howard, blank verse is wholly discarded. The
dedication of the _Rival Ladies_ to Orrery is appropriate. Roger Boyle,
Baron Broghill, and first Earl of Orrery, was at this time Lord President
of Munster, and it was he who had revived these rhymed plays in his _Henry
V._, which was brought out in the same year as Dryden's comedy. Whoever
has read this drama and Orrery's subsequent experiments, _Mustapha_
(1665), the _Black Prince_ (1667), _Tryphon_ (1668), will be able to
estimate Dryden's absurd flattery at its proper value.
But these dramatic innovations were sure not to pass without protest,
though the protest came from a quarter where it might least have been
expected. Sir Robert Howard was the sixth son of Thomas, first Earl of
Berkshire. He had distinguished himself on the Royalist side in the Civil
War, and had paid the penalty for his loyalty by an imprisonment in
Windsor Castle during the Commonwealth. At the Restoration he had been
made an Auditor of the Exchequer. Dryden seems to have made his
acquaintance shortly after arriving in London. In 1660 Howard published a
collection of poems and translations, to which Dryden prefixed an address
'to his honoured friend' on 'his excellent poems.' Howard's rank and
position made him a useful friend to Dryden, and Dryden in his turn was
no doubt of much service to Howard. Howard introduced him to his family,
and in December 1663 Dryden married his friend's eldest sister, the Lady
Elizabeth Howard. In the following year Dryden assisted his
brother-in-law in the composition of the _Indian Queen_. There had
probably been some misunderstanding or dispute about the extent of the
assistance which Dryden had given, which accounts for what follows. In
any case Howard published in 1665, professedly under pressure from
Herringman, four plays, two comedies, _The Surprisal_ and _The
Committee_, and two tragedies, the _Vestal Virgin_ and _Indian Queen_;
and to the volume he prefixed the preface, which is here reprinted. It
will be seen that though he makes no reference to Dryden, he combats all
the doctrines laid down in the preface to the _Rival Ladies_. He exalts
the English drama above the French, the Italian, and the Spanish; and
vindicates blank verse against rhymed, making, however, a flattering
exception of Orrery's dramas. If Dryden was not pleased, he appears to
have had the grace to conceal his displeasure. For he passed the greater
part of 1666 at his father-in-law's house, and dedicated to Howard his
_Annus Mirabilis_. But Howard was to have his answer. In the _Essay of
Dramatic Poesy_ he is introduced in the person of Crites, and in his
mouth are placed all the arguments advanced in the _Preface_ that they
may be duly refuted and demolished by Dryden in the person of Neander. At
this mode of retorting Howard became really angry; and in the _Preface to
the Duke of Lerma_, published in the middle of 1668, he replied in a tone
so contemptuous and insolent that Dryden, in turn, completely lost his
temper. The sting of Howard's _Preface_ lies, it will be seen, in his
affecting the air of a person to whom as a statesman and public man the
points in dispute are mere trifles, hardly worth consideration, and in
the patronising condescension with which he descends to a discussion with
one to whom as a mere _litterateur_ such trifles are of importance. The
_Defence of the Essay of Dramatic Poesy_ Dryden prefixed to the second
edition of the _Indian Emperor_, one of the best of his heroic plays. The
seriously critical portion of this admirable little treatise deals with
Howard's attacks on the employment of rhyme in tragedy, on the observance
of strict rules in dramatic composition, and on the observance of the
unities. But irritated by the tone of Howard's tract, Dryden does not
confine himself to answering his friend's arguments. He ridicules, what
Shadwell had ridiculed before, Howard's coxcombical affectation of
universal knowledge, makes sarcastic reference to an absurdity of which
his opponent had been guilty in the House of Commons, mercilessly exposes
his ignorance of Latin, and the uncouthness and obscurity of his English.
The brothers-in-law afterwards became reconciled, and in token of that
reconciliation Dryden cancelled this tract.