lay, Crist, of his grete mercie, foryeve me the sin: But, of the translation of Boes of Consolation, and other bokes of legends of Saintes and of Omelies, and moralitie and devotion, that thank I our Lord Jesu Crist, and his blissful mother, and all the Seintes in heven, beseeching them that they from henceforth unto my live's end send me grace to bewaile my giltes, and to stodien the salvation of my soule] and graunte me grace of very penance, confession and satisfaction to do in this present life, through the benign grace of Him, that is King of Kings, and Preste of all Prestes, that bought us with the precious blood of His herte, so that I may be one of them at the last day of doom, that shall be saved: qui cum Deo patre et Spiritu Sancto vivis et regnas Deus per omnia secula. Amen."

CHAPTER II.

The effect produced upon the English language by Chaucer's writings.— The grade and quality of his genius

Ir will not be deemed presumptuous, perhaps, if, without venturing to pronounce critically upon the effect that Chaucer's writings. had upon the English language and English poetry, we bring together the judgments of those who may be rightfully esteemed "doctors" upon that question.

It is worthy of observation that the two principal censors of Chaucer's style, are men who made no pretensions to poetical sensibility. They were mere verbal pedants, and their censures are based upon a servile adhesion to those rules of philology, which their minds recognized as of the first importance. Honest old Verstegan, and long after him Skinner, the celebrated philologist, censure Chaucer as having "deformed the English idiom by an immoderate admixture of French words." Diametrically opposed to these, and yet belonging to the same family of error, are they who deny that Chaucer imported words from the French, and who insist that he kept the language precisely as he found it. The most judicious critics stand upon a middle ground, and agree that he naturalized words both from the French and Provencal, and thereby improved and softened our barren and harsh tongue. This is the testimony of Dryden, who also asserts that from him the purity of the English tongue began. Warton also, the learned and elegant author of "The History of English Poetry," says, "Edward the Third, while he perhaps intended only to banish a badge of conquest, greatly contributed to establish the national

dialect, by abolishing the use of the Norman tongue in the public and judicial proceedings, and by substituting the national language of the country. But Chaucer first taught his countrymen to write English, and formed a style by naturalizing words from the Provencal, at that time the most polished dialect of any in Europe, and the best adapted to the purposes of poetical expression."1 A kindred writer, Henry Hallam, endorses this opinion with a slight reservation: "As the first original English poet, if we except Langland, as an improver, though with too much innovation, of our language, and as a faithful witness to the manners of his age, Chaucer would deserve our reverence, if he had not also intrinsic claims for excellences which do not depend upon any collateral considerations." Ritson, the querulous but indefatigable collector of Ancient English Metrical Romances, also affirms that "the language was greatly improved and enlarged by Chaucer," but thinks at the same time, that owing to the poverty of our tongue, he was forced to borrow words from the French and Provencal, especially in his translations. And lastly, Tyrwhitt, the eminent critic upon Chaucer, and the ablest editor of his works, proves beyond cavil, by an appeal to antecedent and contemporaneous history, the falsity of the charge that Chaucer had corrupted the language by an immoderate admixture of Gallicisms, inasmuch as that evil was chiefly attributable to the Nor

1 The following is an extract from the famous statute to which Warton refers: For this that it is oftentimes shown to the King, by the prelates, dukes, earls, barons, and all the commonalty, the great mischiefs which are come to many of this realm, for this that the laws, customs and statutes of the realm are not commonly known in the same realm, because they are pleaded, shown and judged in the French language, which is too much unknown in the same realm, so that the persons who plead or are impleaded in the courts of the King, and the courts of others, have not understanding of that which is said for or against them by their sergeants and other pleaders, be it ordained that all pleas which shall be to plead, be pleaded in the English language."

man Conquest, from the effects of which the language was just recovering. He admits that Chaucer selected and naturalized many words and phrases from the French and Provencal, but contends for the truth of the general principle, "that the English language must have imbibed a strong tincture of the French long before the age of Chaucer; and, consequently, that he ought not to be charged as the importer of words and phrases, which he only used after the example of his predecessors, and in common with his contemporaries." If we add to this, that Horne Tooke quotes him continually, and with more frequency than any of his contemporaries, as authority for his Saxon derivations, the case would seem to be conclusively in favor of the more moderate theory.

The great merit of Chaucer's style is not, however, the selection of words or phrases, and their naturalization from any foreign idiom: but consists in his judicious combination and apt choice of such as, by their strength, simplicity, and musical inflexion, most fully express the sentiment he aims to convey. And his proficiency here was owing to that "perpetual fountain of good sense," which irrigates all his writings, and which "taught him what to say, and when to leave off, and caused him to follow nature everywhere, but restrained him from the boldness of going beyond her."

Thus much for the matter of Chaucer's style. The quality and grade of his genius now remain to be examined; and the effect that his writings produced upon English poetry. We can arrive at a more correct notion of the former point, perhaps, if we first examine the latter.

The translations and inventions of Chaucer first admitted the people who spoke our tongue, to a companionship with the Muses; and laid the foundations upon which the English language was elevated to its present dignity. Before, and until the time of our

1 Dryden's Preface to Palamon and Arcite.

poet, the language was considered semi-barbarous, both at home and abroad, and there was no institution of learning where English was suffered to be taught. "Children in scole (says a nearly contemporaneous writer),' agenst the usage and manir of all other nations, beeth compelled for to leve hire own language, and for to construe hir lessons and hir thynges in Frenche: also gentilmen's children beeth taught to speke Frensche from the time that they beeth rokked in hire cradles." Late in the reign of Edward the Third, this custom was somewhat changed, as Treviza bears witness, but Chaucer's youthful Muse was found to struggle with it; and it followed him on close to manhood, for the students of the Universities were also compelled to converse in French or Latin. So prevalent was this language, that not only the letters and dispatches of the King were always written in French," but "the minutes of the corporation of London, recorded in the Town Clerk's office, were in French, as well as the proceedings of Parliament."" Joined to these obstacles, was the intense ignorance which so universally prevailed during this century, that it was quite an unusual thing for a layman, even of the higher ranks, to know how to sign his name or read; and Kings and Emperors shared the barren heritage. Books were scarce as rubies and as highly prized; and the transfer of one from one library to another, was an event duly recorded, and invested with many solemn legal observances. Wickliffe's Bible was not yet written; and Sir John Mandeville's Book of Travels-the first English book—was written, A.D., 1356, when Chaucer was in his twenty-eighth year, and after he had written the Court of Love and translated Boethius. There was not a single historian in English prose, even among the clergy, before A.D., 1385,' in the reign of Richard the Second, when a translation of Randal Higden's Polychronicon, by John Treviza, was dignified by the name of History. And

1 Higden, who lived in the time of Richard the Second.

2 Ritson.

3 Hallam's Lit. Eur., p. 47, vol. 1.

4 Ritson.