New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1882-01-15
NEW PUBLICATIONS.
,rrp ATTIRE OF POETIC CRITICISM.


the Clarendon Press 1887.
The class of critical oxpositions to which Pro-
fcssor Shairps volume belongs is larger thah ui,
critical readers would be apt 10 imagine, ana
larger. without doubt 10 the language i'll when No
writes than in any of the Languages oi n'o"o'n
Europe The nsinuat:On that criticism scluoh APP
nears IN literature until the creative pc'iou vi
that literature is passed Is contradlcIed ny "h'V
uo knoy alout criticism in English literature.
sxhere II arpeared before the full choir OF It's I'M
mortas had begun to sing. 1t is true that the Morn
ing Star of English Song had been snent then ior
nearly two centuries and that of the brood oil glory
excellent VIII, succeeded HIM, Cover and Lydgate
and Dunbar mad been silent for a century ana
half. hut il is also true that neither Spenser nor
Sidney nor Lyly nor Greene, nor Peele. nor Lodge
nor Marlowe had discovered their own Jup'ian'
s1fts Sponsor, young gentleman OF twenty-tl ice'
sras lounging III dependence at femproke nan
sboLes,oorc a boy of eleven. his satchel on his
ho,k was ereeping like snai, unwillnGly to STRAIT
ford Grammar School; and Ben Jonson' sturdy
babe of two was sucking his thumbs IN craoIe'
under the roof of mis- brick-aying stepiather III
uor,sborn Lane. The first to take the aspects OF
poetry in England Master George GaScoiehe'
a student at Cambridge aud afterward an Ancient
Mt Gray's Inn he was disuhertcd by his father ior
caring more for literature than for the common
Law. n scholar he adapted trag cdy. Jocasta, from
the Phpnisse OIL EuripIdes which was the first actcd
version of a Greek play in English, and he MADE
Translation of one of the comedies OF Ariosto' when
was the first prose comedy III English; sold'er' nc
fou :ht stOutly against the Spanlards, IN the 10"
Countries under William of Orange; poet he
sang of all the moods and experiences OF a lover
and a courtier he described the prlncely pleasures
of KeniwOrth, with which Scott has made us All
familiar In 1873. two years before his death' he
sounded Certain Notes of Instruction Concerning
the Making of Verse or Rhine in English, which
were much common led by his contemporaries
Sneps,r and Raleigh thought highly of him, and
the satirist Nash declared that it was he who hrst
heat the path to that perfection which our poets
have asuired to since his departure, whereby he
did ascend by comparing the Italian with the Eng
lish as Tully did GrGcd cum LGtRis. Webbe called
him witty gentleman, ana the very chef OF our
late rhvmers; even prosy Puttenham distinguished
him for = good metre and plentiful VEN. Nobody
except an uuweaIed student now thinks OF readihg
Gascogne's poetry, which IS sth and cnmhrous'
though not without a certain heavy music OF us
own but his prose, or so much of it as survives III
these Noes of Instruction. valuable being the
earliest known example of criticism OF poetry III
English 1t is labored and pedantc. and as thickly
bespriukled with authoritative names as the ency-
clone lie pages of st. Elmo but it was written in
good faith to the best of Gascoignes aDihy ana IL
will repay perusal-once'
The next adveuturcr into tho field of criticism
was Stephen Gosson. free lance, who rode
furiously up and down fitting at supposed adver-
sories 4 Young Oxford graduate, who had studied
at Christ Church. and taken his B.A., lie Went mp
to London the year after Gascoigne had sounded
his notes and attaching himself to the theatres
wrote three dramatic compositions when are lost
II was an inopportune time for Master Gosson' for
the next wear the plague broke ont in The metTOp0-
lis ana the Puritan clergy turned 1t TO plous ac-
count The canse of the plague was sin, they
argued and the cause of sin was plays; therefore
the cause Of the plague was plays III was not a
nrolound argument but GossOn nevertheless
convinced by it, or enough 80 to abandon the
theatres.-if they had not already abandoned him,
and to attack his quondam fellows IN prose
tract. which he Justly chrstened 90 The School of
Abusen and which contained what he was grimly
nleased TO call pleasant invecivc against poets,
miners players testers and such like catcrpars OF
n commtnu ealth. Published IN tile summer OF
1879. il was followed in the autumn OF the same
wear by "a second tract. An Apology oil the Sch"oi
OF Abuse" OF which it Is enough to say that as an
analogy il aggravated the original offence. GoSson
dedicated these tracts to Sidney, and was for ms
labor scorned if it were in the goodness of that
nature to scOrD. So Sponsor wrote TO Gabriel
Harvey between whom and himself letters were
passing three of which, printed IN the year after
Gossons Apology. were described by the stat"her a.
rroper and witty familiar letters between two Uni
yersitv men. The conjunction of Shakespeare and
the musical glasses, in the comedy writing of two
centuries later. was appioxmatcd to by the topics
IN these letters which touched upon the earth
ouake IN April last 1850. and our English re-
formed versfylng, This English reformed versify-
ing was "A bee in the bonnet of honest Harvey an
ardent Clceronian, who had lectured on rhetoric at
Cambridge aud was known as the author OF sundry
Latin poems. two of which were addressed by MN
20 Oueen Elizabeth ION the occasion OF her VISIT to
Saffron Walden. where his father was prosperous
rope-makerl who declared that She could not deny
him her hand, and advised Leicester to send him
forthwith to Italy for already he had an Italian
face and the look of n mau: y should hardly have
taken him for an Engll,hmau." 1t was in other
bonnets also this bewiidering bee,-n Dyer's,
Fnlke Greyilles, Sponsors, Sdney's who put their
vonnr heads together and hearkcned to its buz-
yinys which resolved themselves into an attempt to
abolish rhyme and introduce the Latin system OF
quantity into English verse,-heXa;neteTS, FeNa'
meters and other pedantic barbarisms. THIS aber
ration enforced by the proper and witty familiar
letters of Harvey and SpenSer and by the practice
of DYER Fnlke Greyille, Sidney and Srenser was OF
short continuance and nonehect IN the poetry OF the
two last as the readers of Astrophe and Stella ana
q The Farie Queene" need hardly be reminded.
The folly not to regard beforehand the inclina-
tiou and quality of those TO whom we dedicate our
books was experienced 10y poor GoSsOn i'll his dedl-
cation to Sidney who very naturally resented his
abnse of poets The result of Sidney'S resentment
was an Apology for Poetry lafterward printed as
a Defence of Poetry in a stream of prose of unr-
vailed simplicity and eloquence, grave, weghty.
eloouent-the most dignihed and the least man
nered of all his writings, revelation OF what
English prose would attain 10 when the alterations
OF the going and the pedantries of the coming
period should have passed away. Three hundred