by Todd in his edition of Spenser of 1803, where he says: "In the present edition, the antiquated spelling of the poet is altogether retained. It is sufficient if I may apply to this circumstance the just observation of Dr. Johnson, respecting the diction of Shakespeare "that the words are Spenser's" 1).

The diction of the neo-classicists lacked colour and imaginative appeal. There is no strangeness, no remoteness, no sense of mystery. It is all clear, precise and brilliant, but not suggestive or picturesque. Contrasted with the neo-classic diction the Spenserian was full of the qualities that go to make romance. Against the pallid vigour, the efficient grace, the hard perfection of Augustan diction, it shone with a certain glamour, a rare and alien charm, a glow of pristine chivalry, the revisiting spirit of an older world that yet had never been.

The use of Spenserian diction was constant in all the genuine Spenserian stanzas written up to 1771, both in the burlesque and in the serious imitations. The best work was all done in Spenser's stanza with the aid of Spenser's diction. This is of great significance. Spenserian diction continued in an unbroken line from Spenser himself down to Beattie. Throughout this long time there were both favourable and unfavourable criticisms of that manner. There was a steadily increasing attention to the romantic aspect of the diction of Spenser from his day down to the end of the eighteenth century, and that interest, that curiosity, continued almost without abatement until at the end of the eighteenth century it rose from latent life into the strange ecstasy of the romantic revival.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

BARSTOW, M. L., Wordsworth's Theory of Poetic Diction. Oxford, 1917. Mod. Lang. Notes, XXXIII, 1918.

1) Todd, Edition of Spenser. Preface. page IV.

JOHNSON, SAMUEL, A Dictionary of the English Language. In 2 vols. London, 1755.

KERSEY, J., Dictionarum Anglo-Britannicum: Or, a general Engl. Dictionary, etc. 2nd Edition. London, 1715.

LEE, V., The Handling of Words, and other Studies in Literary Psychology. London, 1923.

PHILIPS, E., The New World of Words or Universal English Dictionary. 7th Edition. London, 1720.

REUNING, K., Das Altertümliche im Wortschatz der Spensernachahmungen des 18. Jahrhunderts. Straszburg, 1912. (Quellen und Forschungen, Heft 116).

WAGNER, G., On Spenser's Use of Archaisms. Diss. Halle, 1879.

"In the England of the age of Elizabeth, what place is filled by the poetry of Spenser? What blank would be made by its disappearance? In what, for each of us who love that poetry, resides its special virtue? Shall we say in answer to these questions that Spenser is the weaver of spells, the creator of illusions, the enchanter of the Elizabethan age; and that his name is to us a word of magic by which we conjure away the pain of actual life, and obtain entrance into a world of faery? Was Spenser, as a poet of our own time names himself, "the idle singer" of his day that day not indeed "an empty day", but one filled with heroic daring and achievement? While Raleigh was exploring strange streams of the New World, while Drake was chasing the Spaniard, while Bacon was seeking for the principles of a philosophy which should enrich man's life, while Hooker, with the care of a wise master-builder, was laying the foundation of polity in the National Church, where was Spenser? Was he forgetful of England, forgetful of earth, lulled and lying in some bower of fantasy, or moving in a dream among imaginary champions of chivalry, distressed damsels, giants and dragons and satyrs and savage men, or shepherds who pipe and shepherdesses who dance forever in a serene Arcady?"

EDWARD DOWDEN in "Spenser, the Poet and Teacher."

CHAPTER V

ELIZABETHAN SPENSERIANS

The poets of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries who imitated the work of Edmund Spenser are to be divided into Elizabethan and Augustan Spenserians. The Elizabethan Spenserians admired the romantic quality of Spenser, they imitated his sensuous glow; the Augustan Spenserians admired the epic quality of Spenser, they imitated him in a mood of burlesque, which soon changed into a serious spirit. The two schools finally merged into the modern Spenserians, who applied Spenser's stanza in their own way and for their own purposes. Their Spenserian poems are allegorical or burlesque; romantic, social, historical, religious, descriptive and narrative. The last of the Elizabethan Spenserians was William Thompson, whose "Epithalamium on the Royal Nuptials in May, 1736" and "The Nativity: A College Exercise, 1736" were published in 1757. The first of the Augustan Spenserians was Alexander Pope, whose poem "The Alley" was written about the year 1705 and was published in 1727. The two currents were united in the work of Samuel Croxall, who was both a belated Elizabethan romanticist and a neo-classicist. His three Spenserian poems appeared in 1713 and 1714. The first of the modern Spenserians was James Beattie. In “The Minstrel" (1771-74) the author deems "neither the diction nor the allegory an inherent part of the poem"; he will be "either droll or pathetic, descriptive or senti

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COMMON GROUND; THE STANZA; BARNEFIELD

mental, tender or satirical, as the humor strikes me." Both Elizabethan and Augustan Spenserians admired and employed Spenser's allegory; both tried to vary or "improve" his stanza. The number of poems written in stanzas different from the regular Spenserian stanza, yet owing more or less to it, is surprisingly great. The seventeenth century produced one hundred and thirty such poems by thirty-six different poets 1); the number was even greater in the eighteenth century. How far Spenser's influence went in many of these is hard to say. Some are no doubt genuinely Spenserian in character, others have hardly anything in common with Spenser. For the present purpose it will be best to restrict enquiry mainly to poems written in the genuine Spenserian stanza, since only these are all undoubtedly Spenserian in form and diction. They fully suffice to show that there was no break in Spenser's fame and influence.

The most original and perhaps greatest contribution to English verse-form, the Spenserian stanza, was first used by Edmund Spenser in "The Faerie Queene" (1590, 1596). Spenser's contemporaries recognised him at once as a great poet, comparing him to Homer; yet they did not imitate him much 2).

The first poet who used the regular Spenserian stanza after Spenser was Richard Barnefield, a melodious Elizabethan poet. In 1595 he published a short poem of 17

1) See E. P. Morton, "The Spenserian Stanza before 1700". Modern Philology, Chicago, April 1907, p. 639 ff.

2) See inter alia W. Herbert's "A Prophesie of Cadwallader, last King of the Britaines" (1604). The address to king James includes enthusiastic praise of Spenser and Sidney.

In William Camden's "Remains of a Greater Worke" (1605) Spenser is mentioned as the second of great contemporaries: "These may suffice for some Poeticall descriptions of our auncient Poets, if I would come to our time, what a world could I present to you out of Sir Philipp Sidney, Ed. Spencer, Samuel Daniel, Hugh Holland, Ben Jonson, Th. Campion, Mich. Drayton, George Chapman, John Marston, William Shakespeare, and other most pregnant wits of these our times, whom succeeding ages may justly admire" (p. 8).