Attempt > Volume 1 and Select writings

THE ATTEMPT
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No period of English history is adorned with so many great names as the
Elizabethan age can boast. The reign of Queen Anne is also a great epoch in
English literature. The writers of the two reigns differ, however, in almost every
respect.
Their subjects were very different. In the time of Elizabeth, society was not in
such an artificial state as in that of Anne. The spirit of chivalry had not entirely
died out—indeed the greatest chivalrous romance of the world, Spenser’s “ Faerie
Queen,” was written in this reign. Spenser, Shakespeare, and Hooker, are most
unlike Pope, Swift, and Addison. The language of the Elizabethan writers is much
more forcible, more spirited, more abundant in flowing images and graceful conceits,
than that of the writers who flourished in the reign of Anne. There is more polish
and more neatness in the language of the latter, but they lose in vigour what they gain
in elegance. The styles of the two reigns resemble each other about as much as one
of Salvator Eosa’s wild, glorious landscapes resembles a miniature on ivory.
Shakespeare is the poet of all times and of all places; Pope, the poet of the drawing¬
room. No one can help admiring the musical flow of Pope’s versification, and the
harmony of his admirably chosen expressions; but compare his finest passages with an
extract chosen almost at random from any of Shakespeare’s plays, and the refined !
finical poet, the chief of the authors who adorned the reign of Queen Anne, sinks
into nothingness when contrasted with the mighty master-mind, the chief not only of
the poets of England, but of the poets of the world.
The Elizabethan writers had also more originality of conception. Spenser’s j
“ Eaerie Queen” displays a more varied imagination, a more creative fancy, a more
exquisite grace of expression, than any other poem in our language. Spenser lived in
a different world from ours. His glowing fancy transported him far from the petty
strifes and debasing pleasures of the world. He lived within an enchanted circle,
peopled with noble knights and gentle ladies, cruel enchanters and graceful sprites.
July 1865.
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