Page:Cassell's Illustrated History of England vol 2.djvu/603

] the age that was coming. On the whole, the period from the reign of Henry VII. to the end of that of Elizabeth was a period more kindred to our own than any which had gone before it. It produced prose writers whose minds still hold communion with and influence those of to-day. Its philosophy had assumed a more practical stamp, and was become pregnant with the elements of change and progress. Its poetry, which we have now to consider, reached the very highest pitch of human genius.

The earliest poet who has left any name of note is Stephen Hawes, whose principal work was "The Pastimes of Pleasure," which was printed by Wynkyn de Worde in 1517. It is an allegorical poem formed on the model of Lydgate, in which Grand Amour goes through the town of Doctrine, where he meets the Sciences, and falls in love with La Bell Parcel, whom he marries, and with whom he spends his life. It is said by the author "to contain the knowledge of the seven sciences, and the cause of man's life in this world." It would be in vain to look for poetry in such a subject according to our notions; yet, from Chaucer and Lydgate to this time, Hawes was about the only man who had done anything to arouse the imagination of a combative people and to improve their language. Hawes was a native of Suffolk, had travelled much, and by his proficiency in French and French literature acquired the favour of Henry VII., who had spent so many years of his life in France. Another poem, "The Temple of Glass," has been ascribed to Hawes, but is most probably Lydgate's, who, Hawes tells us, composed such a poem.



Next to Hawes comes Alexander Barclay, the author of numerous works in prose and poetry, as "The Castell of Labour," wherein is "Rychesse, Vertue, and Honour," an allegorical poem, translated from the French; "The Shyp of Poles of the Worlde," translated from Sebastian Brandt's German poem, "Das Narron Schiff;" "Egloges; or, the Miseries of Courts and Courtiers;" a treatise against Skelton the poet; a translation of Livy's "Wars of Jugurtha;" "Life of St. George," &c. &c. The work, however, which has handed down his name to posterity is the "Ship of Fools," which, by interspersing with original touches on the follies of his countrymen, he made in some degree his own. But the chief merit of the poem in our time is the evidence of the polish which the English language had acquired, and to which Barclay probably contributed, for he had travelled through Germany, Holland, France, and Italy, studying diligently the best authors of those countries. His birth-place is unknown; his name would point towards Scotland; but Warton, the historian of our poetry, says he was of Gloucestershire—in which county there is a place of his name—or of Devonshire. He was successively a prebendary of the college of St. Mary Ottery, a Benedictine monk, Vicar of Great Barlow, in Essex, of Wokey, in Somersetshire, and Hector of All Hallows, London, terminating his life at Croydon. A stanza or two will suffice to show the state of the language at the close of the reign of Henry VII. A man in orders is speaking:—

Eche is not lettred that nowe is made a lorde. Nor eche a clerke that hath a benefice: They are not all lawyers that plees do recorde, All that are promoted are not fully wise. On such chaunce nowe fortune throwes her dice That, though one knowe but the Yrishe game, Yet would he have a gentleman's name. ∗ ∗ ∗ ∗ ∗ I am like other clerkes which so frowardly them gyde, That after they are once come unto promotion, They give them to pleasure, their study set aside,