The commonwealth. (Scotland Neck, N.C.) 1882-1884, 1883-04-26


fact its flow was never entirely inter-
rupted by the dominant literature at
the Restoration. Simple English was
banished from high places, but in OBJ
, s"ure and neglected regions it con-
tinued TO flow through all that period
in many q sparkling and musical rill
to freshen and beautify the garden OF
humber society. In that marvellous
prose poem, The Pilgrims Progress"
Bunyan, in his simple, ,idioma1ic style.
his sense Of the pure and beautiful.
and his sympathy with men. antici-
pated the age in which we haye the
| gocd fortune to live. Long neglect
Ell by the elite of literature, the genius
| of Bunyan was crystal spring.
hich the Philis,ines of the Court
! were never quite able 10 close up.
| The trne successor Of the Bedford
dreamer was DefOe. whose sympa-
thies were invariably ranged on the
popular side, and whose felicitiOus
t:ctions mere facinate the reader than
the NEST attractive histories. hese
men o.: superb genius did something
to hold in honor the peoples English
III days when it was despised and
spit upon by the lordly masters OF
tue Restoration. In spite Of contempt
and aspersion, they fought their way
, to recognition, and to-day the produc
tions of even tue proudest of their
enemie, appear mean beside "Pil-
:5rm's Progress and Robinson
| Crusoe." The one dealt in beauty
Of form, which passes away tfe other
! in substance, which erdures.
By some the place Of honor, rs the
precursor of the modern age, would
be accorded to- Thompson, the au-
thor of The Seasons" rather than
Gray, But Thompson belongs es-
sentia.l to the Restoration period.
: He wrote. indeed, in simple, ele
giant style, and with a genuine.
though not profound, appreciation OF
nature. His pictures of scenery
koiten striking and beautiful, are 8
, play On the surface: the color does
not penetrate the material. and gives
t one little idea Of the substance be
low. Like all those of theTClassit
Period, his ictures are objective ane
distant. The autoblographic element
= so pleasing in Cowper and Words
worth. is entirely wanting in them
In reading his descriptions the sou
, never warns and glows. He is clea
t. and elegant, but it is the clearnes
It AMI elegance Of a white cloud or al
/. aurora whose corruscations sugges
# distance and rigorous climate. Blu
e in reading Gray's ''Lleey'' you begin
# TO golw and ethuse; the autho
e comes to ou; the picture is tinget
e by his own life's blood and wet witt
his own tears.
3 The position of Byron IS. in som
r. respects, imilar to that of Gray
IS though he did much TO hasten til
he revolution in English poetry, h
s. never came into full sympathy wit
"a he lew movement. s.None of tn
"a writer's of this PERIOD" says Macal
!o lay, mot even Sir Walter Scott COZ
10 tributed so much to the consumm.
oi tion as Lord Byron yet he contrib,
'e ted TO it unwillingly and with sci
e. reproach and shame. All his incl
sd nations and tastes led him to tab
as part with the school of poetry tn:
Ae was going out against the schO'
LII which was coming in. OF Pope |
u spake with ex ravagant admiration
sc He, in fact, belonged to both the ol
NJ and new schools. With tastes Fl
ne the one, he was, like Gray, drif.e
til toward the other. In his best poetl
Gu Byron is antobiographic. You fe
IN the man with his spleen and misa
lie throphy ; you hear his walls ard a
Oh mortified at his curses. Extract tn
u personal element aud the charm
el- his writings will have disappeare
us In a word, Byron came only late
'id a position attained by Gray half
century before.
t" But the first to, emerge conscious
he and of set purp 'se into the new a.
'er of English poetry was William Co
'as per, who despised the lauguid ma
ch ner, 1.-The creamy smoothness,' a,
ell the meretricious ornamentation
ms the classic school. He turned fro
"a form to substance. Instead Of clas
Il ical subjects. he glorifed, by the ct
are ruscations of his genius, the thin
nd Of common life. In deep and tend
,he SVrnOathv with nature he infused