A History of English Literature
A History of English Literature
A History of English Literature
Create successful ePaper yourself
Turn your PDF publications into a flip-book with our unique Google optimized e-Paper software.
<strong>of</strong> which have become familiar quotations, for example:<br />
He could distinguish, and divide,<br />
A hair 'twixt south and south-west side.<br />
Compound for sins they are inclined to<br />
By damning those they have no mind to.<br />
Though the king and Court took unlimited delight in 'Hudibras' they<br />
displayed toward Butler their usual ingratitude and allowed him to pass his<br />
latter years in obscure poverty.<br />
Some <strong>of</strong> the other central characteristics <strong>of</strong> the age appear in a unique<br />
book, the voluminous 'Diary' which Samuel Pepys (pronounced Peps), a<br />
typical representative <strong>of</strong> the thrifty and unimaginative citizen class, kept<br />
in shorthand for ten years beginning in 1660. Pepys, who ultimately became<br />
Secretary to the Admiralty, and was a hard-working and very able naval<br />
<strong>of</strong>ficial, was also astonishingly naif and vain. In his 'Diary' he records<br />
in the greatest detail, without the least reserve (and with no idea <strong>of</strong><br />
publication) all his daily doings, public and private, and a large part <strong>of</strong><br />
his thoughts. The absurdities and weaknesses, together with the better<br />
traits, <strong>of</strong> a man spiritually shallow and yet very human are here revealed<br />
with a frankness unparalleled and almost incredible. Fascinating as a<br />
psychological study, the book also affords the fullest possible information<br />
about all the life <strong>of</strong> the period, especially the familiar life, not on<br />
dress-parade. In rather sharp contrast stands the 'Diary' <strong>of</strong> John Evelyn,<br />
which in much shorter space and virtually only in a series <strong>of</strong> glimpses<br />
covers seventy years <strong>of</strong> time. Evelyn was a real gentleman and scholar who<br />
occupied an honorable position in national life; his 'Diary,' also,<br />
furnishes a record, but a dignified record, <strong>of</strong> his public and private<br />
experience.<br />
THE RESTORATION DRAMA. The moral anarchy <strong>of</strong> the period is most strikingly<br />
exhibited in its drama, particularly in its comedy and 'comedy <strong>of</strong> manners.'<br />
These plays, dealing mostly with love-actions in the setting <strong>of</strong> the Court<br />
or <strong>of</strong> fashionable London life, and carrying still further the general<br />
spirit <strong>of</strong> those <strong>of</strong> Fletcher and Shirley a generation or two earlier,<br />
deliberately ridicule moral principles and institutions, especially<br />
marriage, and are always in one degree or another grossly indecent.<br />
Technically they are <strong>of</strong>ten clever; according to that definition <strong>of</strong><br />
literature which includes a moral standard, they are not literature at all.<br />
To them, however, we shall briefly return at the end <strong>of</strong> the chapter.<br />
JOHN DRYDEN, 1631-1700. No other <strong>English</strong> literary period is so thoroughly<br />
represented and summed up in the works <strong>of</strong> a single man as is the<br />
Restoration period in John Dryden, a writer in some respects akin to Ben<br />
Jonson, <strong>of</strong> prolific and vigorous talent without the crowning quality <strong>of</strong><br />
genius.<br />
Dryden, the son <strong>of</strong> a family <strong>of</strong> Northamptonshire country gentry, was born in<br />
1631. From Westminster School and Cambridge he went, at about the age <strong>of</strong><br />
twenty-six and possessed by inheritance <strong>of</strong> a minimum living income, to<br />
London, where he perhaps hoped to get political preferment through his<br />
relatives in the Puritan party. His serious entrance into literature was<br />
made comparatively late, in 1659, with a eulogizing poem on Cromwell on the<br />
occasion <strong>of</strong> the latter's death. When, the next year, Charles II was<br />
restored, Dryden shifted to the Royalist side and wrote some poems in honor<br />
<strong>of</strong> the king. Dryden's character should not be judged from this incident and<br />
similar ones in his later life too hastily nor without regard to the spirit