English Poets of the Eighteenth Century - Selected and Edited with an Introduction by Ernest Bernbaum
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ENGLISH POETS
OF THE
EIGHTEENTH CENTURY
SELECTED AND EDITED WITH AN INTRODUCTION
BY
ERNEST BERNBAUM
PROFESSOR OF ENGLISH AT THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS
1918
PREFACE
The text of this collection of poetry is authentic and not bowdlerized.
The general reader will, I hope, be gratified to find that its pages
display no pedantic or scholastic traits. His pleasure in the poetry
itself will not be distracted by a marginal numbering of the lines; by
index-figures and footnotes; or by antiquated peculiarities of spelling,
capitalization, and elision. Except where literal conventions are
essential to the poet's purpose,--as in _The Castle of Indolence, The
Schoolmistress_, or Chatterton's poems,--I have followed modern usage.
Dialect words are explained in the glossary; and the student who may wish
to consult the context of any passage will find the necessary references
in the unusually full table of contents. Whenever the title of a poem
gives too vague a notion of its substance, or whenever its substance is
miscellaneous, I have supplied [bracketed] captions for the extracts;
except for these, there is nothing on the pages of the text besides the
poets' own words.
Originality is not the proper characteristic of an anthologist, and in
the choice of extracts I have rarely indulged my personal likings when
they conflicted with time-honored preferences; yet this anthology,--the
first published in a projected series of four or five volumes comprising
the English poets from Elizabethan to Victorian times,--has certain minor
features that may be deemed objectionably novel. Much the greater portion
of the volume has of course, as usual, been given to those poems (by
Pope, Thomson, Collins, Gray, Goldsmith, Crabbe, Cowper, and Burns) which
have been loved or admired from their day to our own. But I have ventured
to admit also a few which, though forgotten to-day, either were popular
in the eighteenth century or possess marked historical significance. In
other words, I present not solely what the twentieth century considers
enduringly great in the poetry of the eighteenth, but also a
little--proportionately very little--of what the eighteenth century
itself (perhaps mistakenly) considered interesting. This secondary
purpose accounts for my inclusion of passages from such neglected authors
as Mandeville, Brooke, Day, and Darwin. The passages of this sort are too
infrequent to annoy him who reads for aesthetic pleasure only; and to the
student they will illustrate movements in the spirit of the age which
would otherwise be unrepresented, and which, as the historical
introduction points out, are an integral part of its thought and feeling.
The inclusion of passages from "Ossian," though almost unprecedented,
requires, I think, no defense against the literal-minded protest that
they are written in "prose."
Students of poetical history will find it illuminating to read the
passages in chronological order (irrespective of authorship); and in
order to facilitate this method I have given in the table of contents the
date of each poem.
E. B.
CONTENTS
JOHN POMFRET
THE CHOICE (1700)
DANIEL DEFOE
THE TRUE-BORN ENGLISHMAN (1701),
ll. 119-132, 189-228, 312-321
A HYMN TO THE PILLORY (1703),
STANZAS 1, 3, 5-6, 28-30
JOSEPH ADDISON
THE CAMPAIGN (1704),
ll. 259-292
DIVINE ODE (1712)
MATTHEW PRIOR
TO A CHILD OF QUALITY (1704)
TO A LADY (1704)
THE DYING HADRIAN TO HIS SOUL (1704)
A BETTER ANSWER (1718)
BERNARD DE MANDEVILLE
THE GRUMBLING HIVE (1705, 1714),
ll. 1-6, 26-52, 149-156, 171-186,
198-239, 327-336, 377-408
ISAAC WATTS
THE HAZARD OF LOVING THE CREATURES (1706)
THE DAY OF JUDGMENT (1709)
O GOD, OUR HELP IN AGES PAST (1719)
A CRADLE HYMN (1719)
ALEXANDER POPE
AN ESSAY ON CRITICISM (1711),
ll. 1-18, 46-51, 68-91, 118-180,
215-423, 560-577, 612-642
THE RAPE OF THE LOCK (1714),
CANTOS II AND III
TRANSLATION OF THE ILIAD, BOOK VI (1717),
ll. 562-637
AN ESSAY ON MAN (1733-34),
EPISTLE I; 11, 1-18; IV, 93-204, 361-398
MORAL ESSAYS, EPISTLE II (1735),
ll. 1-16, 87-180, 199-210, 231-280
EPISTLE TO DR. ARBUTHNOT (1735),
ll. 1-68, 115-214, 261-304, 334-367, 389-419
FIRST EPISTLE OF THE SECOND BOOK OF HORACE IMITATED (1737),
ll. 23-138, 161-296, 338-347
EPILOGUE TO THE SATIRES (1738), DIALOGUE II, ll. 208-223
THE DUNCIAD (1728-43), BOOK i, ll. 28-84, 107-134; iv. 627-656
LADY WINCHILSEA
TO THE NIGHTINGALE (1713)
A NOCTURNAL REVERIE (1713)
JOHN GAY
RURAL SPORTS (1713), ll. 91-106
THE SHEPHERD'S WEEK: THURSDAY; OR, THE SPELL (1714),
ll. 5-14, 49-60, 83-136
TRIVIA (1716), BOOK II, ll. 25-64
SWEET WILLIAM'S FAREWELL TO BLACK-EYED SUSAN (1720)
MY OWN EPITAPH (1720)
SAMUEL CROXALL
THE VISION (1715), ll. 41-56
THOMAS TICKELL
ON THE DEATH OF MR. ADDISON (1721), ll. 9-46, 67-82
THOMAS PARNELL
A NIGHT-PIECE ON DEATH (1721), ll. 1-70
A HYMN OF CONTENTMENT (1721)
ALLAN RAMSAY
THE GENTLE SHEPHERD: PATIE AND ROGER (1721),
ll. 1-52, 59-68, 135-202
AMBROSE PHILIPS
TO MISS CHARLOTTE PULTENEY, IN HER MOTHER'S ARMS (1725)
JOHN DYER
GRONGAR HILL (1726)
GEORGE BERKELEY
VERSES ON THE PROSPECT OF PLANTING ARTS AND
LEARNING IN AMERICA (WR. c. 1726; PUBL. 1752)
JAMES THOMSON
THE SEASONS (1726-30)
WINTER, ll. 223-358
SUMMER, ll. 1630-1645
SPRING, ll. 1-113, 846-876
AUTUMN, ll. 950-1003
A HYMN
RULE, BRITANNIA (1740)
THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE (1748), STANZAS 1-11, 20, 57-59
EDWARD YOUNG
LOVE OF FAME: SATIRES V-VI (1727-28),
SATIRE V, ll. 227-246, 469-484; VI, 393-462
NIGHT-THOUGHTS (1742-45), NIGHT I, ll. 68-90;
III, 325-342; IV, 201-233; VII, 253-323
ANONYMOUS
THE HAPPY SAVAGE (1732)
SOAME JENYNS
AN ESSAY ON VIRTUE (1734), ll. 148-165, 170-183, 189-199
PHILIP DODDRIDGE
SURSUM (1735?)
WILLIAM SOMERVILLE
THE CHASE (1735), BOOK II, ll. 119-171
HENRY BROOKE
UNIVERSAL BEAUTY (1735), BOOK III, ll. 1-8, 325-364;
V, 282-297, 330-339, 361-384
PROLOGUE TO GUSTAVUS VASA (1739)
CONRADE, A FRAGMENT (WR. 1743?, PUBL. 1778), ll. 1-26
MATTHEW GREEN
THE SPLEEN (1737), ll. 89-110, 624-642
WILLIAM SHENSTONE
THE SCHOOLMISTRESS (1737), STANZAS 6, 8, 18-20, 23, 28
WRITTEN AT AN INN AT HENLEY (1764)
JONATHAN SWIFT
THE BEASTS' CONFESSION (1738), ll. 1-128, 197-220
VERSES ON THE DEATH OF DR. SWIFT (1739),
ll. 39-66, 299-338, 455-482
CHARLES WESLEY
FOR CHRISTMAS-DAY (1739)
FOR EASTER-DAY (1739)
IN TEMPTATION: JESU, LOVER OF MY SOUL (1740)
WRESTLING JACOB (1742)
ROBERT BLAIR
THE GRAVE (1743), ll. 28-44, 56-84, 750-767
WILLIAM WHITEHEAD
ON RIDICULE (1743), ll. 27-52, 153-171, 225-226, 233-236, 287-301
THE ENTHUSIAST (1754)
MARK AKENSIDE
THE PLEASURES OF IMAGINATION (1744), BOOK I, ll. 34-43, 113-124;
III, 515-535, 568-633
JOSEPH WARTON
THE ENTHUSIAST; OR, THE LOVER OF NATURE (1744),
ll. 1-20, 26-38, 87-103, 167-244
JOHN GILBERT COOPER
THE POWER OF HARMONY (1745), BOOK II, ll. 35-51, 125-140, 330-343
WILLIAM COLLINS
ODE WRITTEN IN 1746 (1746)
ODE TO EVENING (1746)
ODE ON THE POETICAL CHARACTER (1746)
THE PASSIONS (1746)
ODE ON THE POPULAR SUPERSTITIONS OF THE HIGHLANDS
(WR. 1749, PUBL. 1788)
THOMAS WARTON
THE PLEASURES OF MELANCHOLY (1747), ll. 28-69, 153-165, 196-210
THE GRAVE OF KING ARTHUR (1777), ll. 31-74
SONNET WRITTEN IN A BLANK LEAF OF DUGDALE'S MONASTICON (1777)
SONNET WRITTEN AT STONEHENGE (1777)
SONNET TO THE RIVER LODON (1777)
THOMAS GRAY
AN ODE ON A DISTANT PROSPECT OF ETON COLLEGE (1747)
HYMN TO ADVERSITY (1748)
ELEGY WRITTEN IN A COUNTRY CHURCHYARD (1751)
THE PROGRESS OF POESY (1757)
THE BARD (1757)
THE FATAL SISTERS (1768)
ODE ON THE PLEASURE ARISING FROM VICISSITUDE (1775)
SAMUEL JOHNSON
THE VANITY OF HUMAN WISHES (1749), ll. 99-118,
133-160, 189-220, 289-308, 341-366
RICHARD JAGO
THE GOLDFINCHES (1753), STANZAS 3-10
JOHN DALTON
A DESCRIPTIVE POEM (1755), ll. 222-227, 238-257, 265-272, 279-290
JANE ELLIOT
THE FLOWERS OF THE FOREST (WR. 1756)
CHARLES CHURCHILL
THE ROSCIAD (1761), ll. 963-986
THE GHOST (1762), BOOK II, ll. 653-676
JAMES MACPHERSON
"TRANSLATIONS" FROM OSSIAN
FINGAL, AN EPIC POEM (1762), BOOK VI, Sec.Sec. 10-14
THE SONGS OF SELMA (1762), Sec.Sec. 4-8, 20-21
CHRISTOPHER SMART
A SONG TO DAVID (1763), ll. 451-516
OLIVER GOLDSMITH
THE TRAVELLER (1764), ll. 51-64, 239-280, 423-438
THE DESERTED VILLAGE (1770)
RETALIATION (1774), ll. 29-42, 61-78, 93-124, 137-146
JAMES BEATTIE
THE MINSTREL, BOOK I (1771), STANZAS 4-5, 16, 22, 32-33, 52-55
LADY ANNE LINDSAY
AULD ROBIN GRAY (WR. 1771)
JEAN ADAMS
THERE'S NAE LUCK ABOUT THE HOUSE (c. 1771)
ROBERT FERGUSSON
THE DAFT DAYS (1772)
ANONYMOUS
ABSENCE (c. 1773?)
JOHN LANGHORNE
THE COUNTRY JUSTICE, PART I (1774), ll. 132-165
AUGUSTUS MONTAGU TOPLADY
ROCK OF AGES (1775)
JOHN SKINNER
TULLOCHGORUM (1776)
THOMAS CHATTERTON
SONGS FROM AELLA (1777)
THE BODDYNGE FLOURETTES BLOSHES ATTE THE LYGHTE
O, SYNGE UNTOE MIE ROUNDELAIE
AN EXCELENTE BALADE OF CHARITIE
THOMAS DAY
THIS DESOLATION OF AMERICA (1777), ll. 29-53, 279-299,
328-335, 440-458, 489-501
GEORGE CRABBE
THE LIBRARY (1781), ll. 1-12, 99-110, 127-134,
AND A COMMONLY OMITTED PASSAGE FOLLOWING l. 594
THE VILLAGE (1783), BOOK I, ll. 1-78, 109-317; II, 63-100
JOHN NEWTON
A VISION OF LIFE IN DEATH (1779?)
WILLIAM COWPER
TABLE TALK (1782), ll. 716-739
CONVERSATION (1782), ll. 119-162
TO A YOUNG LADY (1782)
THE SHRUBBERY (1782)
THE TASK (1785), BOOK I, ll. 141-180; II, 1-47, 206-254;
III, 108-l33; IV, 1-41; V, 379-445; VI, 56-117, 560-580
ON THE RECEIPT OF MY MOTHER'S PICTURE (1798)
TO MARY (WR. c. 1795, PUBL. 1803)
THE CASTAWAY (WR. c. 1799, PUBL. 1803)
WILLIAM LISLE BOWLES
EVENING (1789)
DOVER CLIFFS (1789)
ROBERT BURNS
MARY MORISON (WR. 1784?, PUBL. 1800)
THE HOLY FAIR (WR. 1785, PUBL. 1786)
TO A LOUSE (WR. 1785, PUBL. 1786)
EPISTLE TO J. LAPRAIK (WR. 1785, PUBL. 1786), STANZAS 9-13
THE COTTER'S SATURDAY NIGHT (WR. 1785-86, PUBL. 1786)
TO A MOUSE (1786)
TO A MOUNTAIN DAISY (1786)
EPISTLE TO A YOUNG FRIEND (1786)
A BARD'S EPITAPH (1786)
ADDRESS TO THE UNCO GUID (1787)
JOHN ANDERSON, MY Jo (WR. c. 1788, PUBL. 1790)
THE LOVELY LASS OF INVERNESS (WR. c. 1788, PUBL. 1796)
A RED, RED ROSE (WR. c. 1788, PUBL. 1796)
AULD LANG SYNE (WR. c. 1788, PUBL. 1796)
SWEET AFTON (WR. c. 1789, PUBL. 1796)
THE HAPPY TRIO (WR. 1789, PUBL. 1796)
TO MARY IN HEAVEN (WR. 1789, PUBL. 1796)
TAM O' SHANTER (WR. 1790, PUBL. 1791)
AE FOND KISS (WR. 1791, PUBL. 1792)
DUNCAN GRAY (WR. 1792, PUBL. 1798)
HIGHLAND MARY (WR. 1792, PUBL. 1799)
SCOTS, WHA HAE (WR. 1793, PUBL. 1794)
IS THERE FOR HONEST POVERTY (WR. 1794, PUBL. 1795)
LAST MAY A BRAW WOOER (WR. c. 1795, PUBL. 1799)
O, WERT THOU IN THE CAULD BLAST (WR. 1796, PUBL. 1800)
ERASMUS DARWIN
THE BOTANIC GARDEN (1789-92), PART I, CANTO I, ll. 1-38;
PART II, CANTO I, ll. 299-310
WILLIAM BLAKE
TO WINTER (1783)
SONG: FRESH FROM THE DEWY HILL (1783)
TO THE MUSES (1783)
INTRODUCTION TO SONGS OF INNOCENCE (1789)
THE LAMB (1789)
THE LITTLE BLACK BOY (1789)
A CRADLE SONG (1789)
HOLY THURSDAY (1789)
THE DIVINE IMAGE (1789)
ON ANOTHER'S SORROW (1789)
THE BOOK OF THEL (1789)
THE FRENCH REVOLUTION (PRINTED 1791), ll, 198-240
A SONG OP LIBERTY (c. 1792), Sec.Sec. 1-3, 12, 18-20, AND CHORUS
THE FLY (1794)
THE TIGER (1794)
HOLY THURSDAY (1794)
THE GARDEN OF LOVE (1794)
A LITTLE BOY LOST (1794)
THE SCHOOL-BOY (1794)
LONDON (1794)
AUGURIES OF INNOCENCE (WR. c. 1801-03), LL. 1-44, 73-90
VERSES FROM "MILTON" (ENGRAVED c. 1804)
AND DID THOSE FEET IN ANCIENT TIME
REASON AND IMAGINATION
VERSES FROM "JERUSALEM" (ENGRAVED c. 1804-11)
TO THE DEISTS
GEORGE CANNING
THE PROGRESS OF MAN (1798), CANTO XXIII, ll. 7-16, 17-30
THE NEW MORALITY (1798), ll. 87-157
CAROLINA, LADY NAIRNE
THE LAND O' THE LEAL (WR. 1798)
INTRODUCTION
I. ORTHODOXY AND CLASSICISM QUIESCENT (1700-1725) The clearest portrayal
of the prominent features of an age may sometimes be seen in poems which
reveal what men desire to be rather than what they are; and which express
sentiments typical, even commonplace, rather than individual. John
Pomfret's _Choice_ (1700) is commonplace indeed; it was never deemed
great, but it was remarkably popular. "No composition in our language,"
opined Dr. Johnson, "has been oftener perused,"--an opinion quite
incredible until one perceives how intimately the poem harmonizes with
the prevalent mood of its contemporary readers. It was written by a
clergyman (a circumstance not insignificant); its form is the heroic
couplet; its content is a wish, for a peaceful and civilized mode of
existence. And what; is believed to satisfy that longing? A life of
leisure; the necessaries of comfort plentifully provided, but used
temperately; a country-house upon a hillside, not too distant from the
city; a little garden bordered by a rivulet; a quiet-study furnished with
the classical Roman poets; the society of a few friends, men who know the
world as well as books, who are loyal to their nation and their church,
and whose; conversation is intellectually vigorous but always polite; the
occasional companionship of a woman of virtue, wit, and poise of manner;
and, above all, the avoidance of public or private contentions. Culture
and peace--and the greater of these is peace! The sentiment characterizes
the first quarter of the eighteenth century.
The poets of that period had received an abundant heritage from the
Elizabethans, the Cavaliers, Dryden, and Milton. It was a poetry of
passionate love, chivalric honor, indignant satire, and sublime faith.
Much of it they admired, but their admiration was tempered with
fear. They heard therein the tones of violent generations,--of men whose
intensity, though yielding extraordinary beauty and grandeur, yielded
also obscurity and extravagance; men whom the love of women too often
impelled to utter fantastic hyperbole, and the love of honor to glorify
preposterous adventures; quarrelsome men, who assailed their opponents
with rancorous personalities; doctrinaires, who employed their fiery
energy of mind in the creation of rigid systems of religion and
government; uncompromising men, who devoted to the support of those
systems their fortunes and lives, drenched the land in the blood of a
civil war, executed a king, presently restored his dynasty, and finally
exiled it again, thus maintaining during half a century a general
insecurity of life and property which checked the finer growths of
civilization. Their successors trusted that the compromise of 1688 had
reduced political and sectarian affairs to a state of calm equilibrium;
and they desired to cultivate the fruits of serenity by fostering in all
things the spirit of moderation. In poetry, as in life, they tended more
and more to discountenance manifestations of vehemence. Even the poetry
of Dryden, with its reflections of the stormy days through which he had
struggled, seemed to them, though gloriously leading the way toward
perfection, to fall short of equability of temper and smoothness of form.
To work like Defoe's _True-Born Englishman_ (1701) and _Hymn to the
Pillory_ (1703), combative in spirit and free in style, they gave only
guarded and temporary approval.
Inevitably the change of mood entailed losses. Sir Henry Wotton's
_Character of a Happy Life_ (c. 1614) treats the same theme as Pomfret's
_Choice_; but Pomfret's contemporaries were rarely if ever visited by
such gleams as shine in Wotton's lines describing the happy man as one
who never understood
How deepest wounds are given by praise,
and as one
Who God doth late and early pray
More of his grace than gifts to lend.
Such touches of penetrative wisdom and piety, like many other precious
qualities, are of an age that had passed. In the poetry of 1700-1725,
religion forgoes mysticism and exaltation; the intellectual life, daring
and subtlety; the imagination, exuberance and splendor. Enthusiasm for
moral ideals declines into steadfast approval of ethical principles. Yet
these were changes in tone and manner rather than in fundamental views.
The poets of the period were conservatives. They were shocked by the
radicalism of Mandeville, the Nietzsche of his day, who derided the
generally accepted moralities as shallow delusions, and who by means of a
clever fable supported a materialistic theory which implied that in the
struggle for existence nothing but egotism could succeed:
Fools only strive
To make a great and honest hive.
Obloquy buried him; he was a sensational exception to the rule. As a
body, the poets of his time retained the orthodox traditions concerning
God, Man, and Nature.
Their theology is evidenced by Addison, Watts, and Parnell. It is a
Christianity that has not ceased to be stern and majestic. In Addison's
_Divine Ode_, the planets of the firmament proclaim a Creator whose power
knows no bounds. In the hymns of Isaac Watts, God is as of old a jealous
God, obedience to whose eternal will may require the painful sacrifice
of temporal earthly affections, even the sacrifice of our love for our
fellow-creatures; a just God, who by the law of his own nature cannot
save unrepentant sin from eternal retribution; yet an adored God, whose
providence protects the faithful amid stormy vicissitudes,--
Under the shadow of whose throne
The saints have dwelt secure.
Spirits as gentle and kindly as Parnell insist that the only approach
to happiness lies through a religious discipline of the feelings, and
protest that death is not to be feared but welcomed--as the passage from
a troublous existence to everlasting peace. In most of the poetry of
the time, religion, if at all noticeable, is a mere undercurrent; but
whenever it rises to the surface, it reflects the ancient creed.
Traditional too is the general conception of human character. Man is
still thought of as a complex of lofty and mean qualities, widely
variable in their proportion yet in no instance quite dissevered. To
interpret--not God or Nature--but this self-contradictory being, in both
his higher and his lower manifestations and possibilities, remains the
chief vocation of the poets. They have not ceased the endeavor to lend
dignity to life by portraying its nobler features. Addison, in _The
Campaign_, glorifies the national hero whose brilliant victories thwarted
the great monarch of France on his seemingly invincible career toward
the hegemony of Europe, the warrior Marlborough, serene of soul amid the
horror and confusion of battle. Tickell, in his noble elegy on Addison,
not only, while voicing his own grief, illustrates the beauty of
devoted friendship, but also, when eulogizing his subject, holds up to
admiration, as a type to be revered, the wise moralist, cultured and
versatile man of letters, and adept in the art of virtuous life. Pope,
in the most ambitious literary effort of the day, his translation of the
_Iliad_, labors to enrich the treasury of English poetry with an epic
that sheds radiance upon the ideals and manners of an heroic age. In such
attempts to exalt the grander phases of human existence, the poets were,
however, owing to their fear of enthusiasm, never quite successful. It is
significant that though most critics consider Pope's Homer no better than
a mediocre performance, none denies that his _Rape of the Lock_ is, in
its kind, perfection.
Here, as in the _vers de societe_ of Matthew Prior and Ambrose Philips,
the age was illuminating with the graces of poetry something it really
understood and delighted in,--the life of leisure and fashion; and here,
accordingly, is its most original and masterly work. _The Rape of the
Lock_ is the product of a society which had the good sense and good
breeding to try to laugh away incipient quarrels, and which greeted with
airy banter the indiscreet act of an enamoured young gallant,--the kind
of act which vulgarity meets with angry lampoons or rude violence. The
poem is an idyll quite as much as a satire. The follies of fashionable
life are treated with nothing severer than light raillery; and its
actually distasteful features,--its lapses into stupidity, its vacuous
restlessness, its ennui,--are cunningly suppressed. But all that made it
seem the height of human felicity is preserved, and enhanced in charm.
"Launched on the bosom of the silver Thames," one glides to Hampton Court
amid youth and gayety and melting music; and for the nonce this realm of
"airs, flounces, and furbelows," of merry chit-chat, and of pleasurable
excitement, seems as important as it is to those exquisite creatures of
fancy that hover about the heroine, assiduous guardians of her "graceful
ease and sweetness void of pride." Of that admired world likewise are the
lovers that Matthew Prior creates, who woo neither with stormy passion
nor with mawkish whining, but in a courtly manner; lovers who deem
an epigram a finer tribute than a sigh. So the tender fondness of a
middle-aged man for an infant is elevated above the commonplace by
assuming the tone of playful gallantry.
The ignobler aspects of life,--nutriment of the comic sense,--were not
ignored. The new school of poets, however deficient in the higher vision,
were keen observers of actuality; and among them the satiric spirit,
though not militant as in the days of Dryden, was still active. The value
which they attached to social culture is again shown in the persistence
of the sentiment that as man grew in civility he became less ridiculous.
The peccadilloes of the upper classes they treated with comparatively
gentle humor, and aimed their strokes of satire chiefly against the
lower. Rarely did they idealize humble folk: Gay's _Sweet William's
Farewett to Black-Eyed Susan_ is in this respect exceptional. Their
typical attitude is seen in his _Shepherd's Week_, with its ludicrous
picture of rustic superstition and naive amorousness; and in Allan
Ramsay's _Gentle Shepherd_, where the pastoral, once remote from life,
assumes the manners and dialect of the countryside in order to arouse
laughter.
The obvious fact that these poets centered their attention upon
Man, particularly in his social life, and that their most memorable
productions are upon that theme, led posterity to complain that they
wholly lacked interest in Nature, were incapable of delineating it, and
did not feel its sacred influence. The last point in the indictment,--and
the last only,--is quite true. No one who understood and believed, as
they did, the doctrines of orthodoxy could consistently ascribe divinity
to Nature. To them Nature exhibited the power of God, but not his will;
and the soul of Man gained its clearest moral light directly from a
_super_natural source. This did not, however, imply that Nature was
negligible. The celebrated essays of Addison on the pleasures of the
imagination (_Spectator_, Nos. 411-414) base those pleasures upon the
grandeur of Nature; upon its variety and freshness, as of "groves,
fields, and meadows in the opening of the Spring"; and upon its beauty of
form and color. The works of Nature, declares Addison, surpass those of
art, and accordingly "we always find the poet in love with a country
life." Such was the theory; the practice was not out of accord therewith.
Passages appreciative of the lovelier aspects of Nature, and not, despite
the current preference for general rather than specific terms, inaccurate
as descriptions, were written between 1700 and 1726 by Addison himself,
Pope, Lady Winchilsea, Gay, Parnell, Dyer, and many others. Nature
worshippers they were not. Nature lovers they can be justly styled,--if
such love may discriminate between the beautiful and the ugly aspects
of the natural. It is characteristic that Berkeley, in his _Prospect of
Planting Arts and Learning in America_, does not indulge the fancy that
the wilderness is of itself uplifting; it requires, he assumes, the aid
of human culture and wisdom,--"the rise of empire and of arts,"--to
develop its potentialities.
A generation which placidly adhered to the orthodox sentiments of its
predecessors was of course not moved to revolutionize poetical theories
or forms. Its theories are authoritatively stated in Pope's _Essay on
Criticism_; they embrace principles of good sense and mature taste which
are easier to condemn than to confute or supersede. In poetical diction
the age cultivated clearness, propriety, and dignity: it rejected words
so minutely particular as to suggest pedantry or specialization; and
it refused to sacrifice simple appropriateness to inaccurate vigor of
utterance or meaningless beauty of sound. Its favorite measure, the
decasyllabic couplet, moulded by Jonson, Sandys, Waller, Denham, and
Dryden, it accepted reverently, as an heirloom not to be essentially
altered but to be polished until it shone more brightly than ever. Pope
perfected this form, making it at once more artistic and more natural. He
discountenanced on the one hand run-on lines, alexandrines, hiatus, and
sequence of monosyllables; on the other, the resort to expletives and the
mechanical placing of caesura. If his verse does not move with the "long
resounding pace" of Dryden at his best, it has a movement better suited
to the drawing-room: it is what Oliver Wendell Holmes terms