I I A' f 11 i,Il II 1 I i. EARLY TUDOR POETRY 1485-1547 KI _; --—::~; i ~ ~: ~: - -L' ~~a__ l: ~ ~- ~~~~ ---I- - ~}Jf hIV ~;i I i:*: i r:, s;?:,:-~~I — ia~ si~:l I ~~ ri i;^ t" r _*r-~ ~ I~I ( i;i —i ";'I~~;~ I~-"'9J:i ^::t-::: -w;n:'" ik ~i"~ i ~ ~-'-.I~ r*: -.e rr.(re. ~r,:g- zr~ :i,* ~1"Zrfl;:.I~_ =I:"~ * P; :,c:t~:*-. I*;t It-i J'"'~ r,-i: "' -; i ; — fierTX _\T$ rt I:)$L E cc ~; F8:ii t)r ~s ~ ---:~^ t~li I i.i r d rxa,:T' a; P:~~ -.I1S-;i -~~;i:h Cy:it.r-~ -i~-: i:1 s-il ^.. i~ - Cn s1:~ ria ~ — ~-;"rl~I::r.):~~'" ~i x:~:L' 6' i f.:1 I t j - ":5-,7 ~- frr _; %di'' jr~".,~.i,i r.* i:i, -~1 —:XII ~~~ ul]..,.;:~ r3c ~~.. rLC-?F`-~il t:.t.;-:st IBt... iP", "i~-~~;-~U *;.~.~ I cnr I1ESR1' EI()ARI),, ilZL OF S1'""'"",Irrri r !btuoiro in Tubor it~ierature EARLY TUDOR POETRLY I1485-I1547 BY JOHN M. BERDAN THE SHOE STRING PRESS, INC. FIRST PUBLISHED, 1920 THE MACMILLAN COMPANY, NEW YORK REPRINTED 1961 WITH PERMISSION PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA To C. B. T. Goe little boo/ce: thy selfe prefent, As child whofe parent is un/cent: To him that if the prefident Of nobleffe and of cheualree... INTRODUCTION When a writer offers a new work on an old subject, the scholarly public rightly demands both fresh handling of the old material and fresh material itself. True as this is as a general proposition, it is still more applicable in the case of Early Tudor literature, because here the subject itself is usually considered to lack interest. That the authors, whose works form the subjects for the following discussions, are unread is evident, because there are few modern editions, and those few in the publications of learned, or antiquarian, societies inaccessible to the general public. There is fashion in scholarship, just as there is in everything else. The drama of the sixteenth century has been elaborately studied. To the nineteenth century, the most fascinating writer in literature was probably Shakespeare. Any fact, any book, however remotely connected with his work, was valued. This interest embraced his contemporaries, his predecessors, and the predecessors of his predecessors, until the whole development of the drama in England has been extensively studied. For this reason the dramatic problems are omitted in this work, except as they appear in connection with the poetry. The case of the poetry, on the other hand, is quite different. Spenser, intangible, incomprehensible and very diffuse, has never proved so interesting a protagonist. Much less so his predecessors. It sounds a paradox when I affirm that the period is interesting! This paradox is apparent only. Interest may arise from many causes; here the interest is not in the literature of the age so much as in the succeeding literature of the time of Elizabeth, which it conditioned. That is regarded as one of the great periods. To understand it is the function of the scholar, and to appreciate it is the privilege of the reader. But its roots lie back in the first half of the century. When Spenser was going to college in 1569, Hawes was one of the great English poets with two editions in 1555, Skelton's works had just been collected in 1568, Barclay had his collected edition in 1570, and Heywood was alive, the Dean of English literature. Tottel's Miscellany, from its first vii viii INTRODUCTION appearance in 1557, had eight editions before the close of the century. Students that begin English literature with the accession of Elizabeth act upon the illogical assumption that those writers had no literary past. As Mr. Colby wittily expresses it: "They have no patience with development or kindliness for beginnings; they would condemn every tadpole as a sort of apostate frog." That the tadpole is a tadpole must be frankly realized. I wish to protest against the sentimentalism which finds undiscovered "beauties of our worthy" in work which the world has agreed to forget. Dr. Johnson with good common sense protests to the effect that life is surely given us for other purposes than to gather what our ancestors have wisely thrown away and to appreciate work that has no value except that it has been forgotten. On the other hand, aesthetic appreciation is heightened by intellectual comprehension. Your enjoyment of a symphony is increased by the knowledge of the effects the musician is trying to produce. Your appreciation of the power of an artist is supplemented by an understanding of the limitations under which he produced his masterpiece. Knowledge is the handmaiden of appreciation. But such knowledge is acquired only at the cost of studying much admittedly inferior work. The moment that such work is placed in the scheme of things, that it is seen in relation to work admittedly superior, it gains a reflected interest. As in a great poem Ars est celare artem, the earlier, cruder work shows traits which in the masterpiece have defied your analysis. Pope misjudged Shakespeare, not because he did not know Shakespeare, but because his ignorance of pre-Shakespearean dramatists prevented him from understanding the canon of the Elizabethan drama and by so doing he was unable to perceive the finesse of Shakespeare's art. Yet the plays of Peele and Greene and Kyd are scarcely exhilarating reading. So with Spenser. Many of the moder criticisms of the Faerie Queene would surprise no one so much as the poet himself. He is praised for what he did not do and blamed for what he conscientiously tried to do. Surely the first objective in good criticism is a realization of the writer's aim. And that realization must come from a careful study of the preceding writers. To this extent the period may be said to have interest. To claim interest for one period solely because of its relations to another period is to damn with faint praise. It is a negative INTRODUCTION ix advantage. Before the student takes up the study of Early Tudor literature with enthusiasm something positive must be shown him. To do this requires a discussion of the nature of literature. That is psychological. As the writings of an individual are indications of his mental processes, so the writings of an age combine to give an impression of the mental life and outlook of that age. This is the reason for the well known phenomenon that the literature of a given period can all be recognized as belonging to that period by the possession of common characteristics. The Hero and Leander is as definitely Elizabethan, as the Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot is definitely Augustan, or as In Memoriam is definitely MidVictorian. In other words, if Tennyson had lived two hundred and fifty years previously, or Marlowe a hundred and fifty years later, they would have written, if at all, in quite a different manner. A battalion moves as a single unit only because the separate personalities composing it have surrendered the initiative. But in the army of literature that condition does not hold. Each writer proudly proclaims the fact that he is captain of his soul, that he writes as seems to him good, that he is a conscious innovator turning his back on the past, —and behold! each fits into his place in the great procession, the text-books label him Elizabethan, Jacobean, Restoration, or what not, exactly as though his one desire had been perfect conformity, and in a survey of literature as a whole, it is possible to speak of the Augustan Age, the Romantic Movement, etc., and to have studies on the Elizabethan Drama, the development of the novel, the Georgian poets, etc. But for this undoubted fact there must be some explanation. Brunetigre explains it by applying the Darwinian doctrine of natural selection. But what is the survival of the fittest in literature? Is there a struggle between books? Joseph Andrews was conceived in ridicule of Pamela and yet both are still read. Is it possible to imagine two authors whose appeal is more opposite in kind than Dumas and Jane Austen? Yet The Three Musketeers and Pride and Prejudice,-the same person enjoys them both. At the mid-century romance seemed dead. Dickens and Thackeray and Trollope charmed by drawing pictures of modern life. Heigh-ho comes Stevenson and we all hunt pirates or engage in Scottish brawls. Although the doctrine of evolution seems inapplicable, yet there must be some explanation. X INTRODUCTION If we start de novo, then, there are three factors which combine to condition a writer's work: the literary past as known to him, the present state of thought in his particular world, and his own personality. These are the three unknown factors in the equation. He is conditioned by the past, because we inherit both our language and our forms of expression. Surely it is the use only of the language that is personal; few men have invented even a single word, and the expression "to choose your words" means merely to select from your pitifully small proportion of the three hundred thousand words in the New English Dictionary the best words at your command. The choice of what language shall be your mother tongue is as far from your power as is the selection of your grandparents. But on the other hand, just as you are you and not the incarnation of any grandparent, the fact that your speech is inherited does not prevent you from expressing your own personality in your use of it. Quite the contrary in fact, since in your conversation you give your past, your education, your home surroundings and your character, and in thus expressing your own individuality, you yet necessarily speak the language of your epoch. The English of today is not the English of Shakespeare, of Dryden, of Addison, of Wordsworth, or of Tennyson; nor is it the English to be used in the year 2000. The change in language is slow, but certain. If this be true of language, the material of which literature is compounded, it is also true of the forms through which it finds expression. Verse forms, such as the rime-royal, the sonnet, the rondeau, etc., are rarely the invention of one man. The form, as we know it, is the result of indefinite modifications and combinations and is the product of many hands. Even back of the Spenserian stanza, for example, are numberless poems in the seven-line rimeroyal and the ottava rima of eight lines. Tradition required that Spenser should use a stanza for the type of poem he contemplated. By combining these two well-known stanzas and by adding an alexandrine his supreme metrical genius evolved a new form. But to assume that Spenser in conceiving his stanza was unconscious of the past and forgetful of what others had done before him is illogical. His stanza, however original, is yet the outcome of other stanzas. The same reasoning applies to the form of the poem as a whole. The type of poem was naturally thoroughly well-known INTRODUCTION xi to him as it existed both in England and in Italy. The chivalric element, the allegorization and the political allusion were not new. In writing a poem in which they figure, he' felt that he was following traditional lines,-as he was. And, to repeat the illustration used before, our difficulty in judging the Faerie Queene is due largely to our ignorance of the literary past as known to him. A great deal of the unfavorable criticism directed against his work is due to a failure to recognize the peculiarities and the limitations of the type. The critic must bear in mind the aim of the artist. The first question is, then, to what extent has he succeeded in accomplishing what he set out to do. The second is to what extent is that aim laudable. Otherwise criticism becomes merely the expression of personal preference, and one is brought to the blank wall of De gustibus non est disputandum. And unless the particular problem of the artist is clearly recognized, intellectual anarchy results. The delicate frescoes of Julio Romano in the Palazzo del Te are discussed in the terms suitable for Leonardo's Last Supper. The problem of Puvis de Chavannes in covering the blank spaces of a wall requires utterly different treatment from that in painting an easel portrait. I am using illustrations borrowed from Art because the truth of the position becomes obvious from the mere statement. In the allied art of literature, unhappily, the same truth is not so universally accepted. The generalizations that a writer is conditioned by the type of work he has chosen and that the chosen type is conditioned by the literary past are still tacitly ignored by many critics. And to accept them as truths is not an easy matter, since such acceptation requires a withholding of judgment until a well-rounded understanding of previous work as known to the author has been gained. The first requirement for the critic is not taste, not appreciation, however valuable and desirable they may be,-it is a knowledge of literary history. But if a knowledge of the literary past of an author is essential in judging his work, so also is a knowledge of his literary present, his literary environment, so to speak. Each man is in essentials a product of his age. Our mental point of view is affected necessarily by our physical surroundings. Modern sanitation and privacy make for a higher sense of modesty and decency; increased facility in transportation gives us a wider outlook and an interest in world affairs. The American born in 1900, by that fact, has more varied xii INTRODUCTION interests than the American born in 1800. Judged according to absolute standards he may be better, or he may be worse; that is not the point at issue. He is different from his forefathers, not through any quality inherent in him or for which he deserves either praise or blame, but because of the accident of the date of his birth. The same condition applies equally to the intangible intellectual factors. Certain conceptions characterize any given epoch. For example, it is impossible to over-emphasize the doctrine of evolution as originated with Darwin and amplified by Herbert Spencer. It affects our ideas on every subject. Again the outlook on life of the man of 1900 differs from that of the man of 1800 because he was born a hundred years later. This difference may seem more marked in the contrast between some epochs, but it always exists to some extent. The son is never identical with the father. The literature of every age, therefore, exhibits the peculiarities of its time. It follows from such reasoning as that in the preceding paragraph that he who most thoroughly expresses the desires and longing of his own age is the writer most popular in his own age. This can be tested by the selling power of the book. From one point of view, literature may be regarded as a marketable commodity. A man buys a poem because there he finds expressed emotions of which he is conscious in himself, but which in himself are inarticulate. As a man is said to be known by his friends, so also is he known by the books. he reads. Curiosity may account for the momentary success of a piece of work; enduring popularity must be ascribed to other factors. For a month the Hymn of Hate was probably the most widely read poem in England and America, but the explanation of that popularity was due to purely temporary conditions. When those conditions changed, the poem lost its interest to the reading public. Or, the large sale of a book may be due to clever exposition of a political situation, due to the use of personal references, scandalous or otherwise. Momentary popularity, then, the best-seller of the age, does not predicate literary immortality; it means only that for that particular moment men found the work of interest. On the other hand, enduring literary reputation means that many men throughout the centuries find the book of interest. Clearly the chances are better for an author to arouse the interest of the men of the future ages, whom he does INTRODUCTION X4.l xml not know, if he can arouse the interest of the men of his own age, whom he does know. As human nature changes slowly the intensity of the interest will be about proportionate. This may of course be upset by local conditions. A man may be publishing fine work at a time when the whole strength of the nation is devoted to ends the reverse of literary. Herrick's Hesperides appeared in 1648, when the nation was distraught with political dissension, the year before the execution of the king. Naturally the book found few readers and was lost in the confusion. Or a writer for any given reason may be out of the current of his age. Milton retired to the country for six years to surrender himself to a study of classic models. For an age that wished short poems exhibiting intellectual agility, he wrote long poems, slow in movement. Naturally he found comparatively few readers. In an age which believed in authority, he wrote a poem in which his sympathy, certainly, is with rebellion. Again, naturally, he found few readers. But, in general, in spite of the common view to the contrary, the writer whose work posterity acclaims, has been accepted as great by the men of his own generation. Chaucer, Shakespeare, Dryden, Pope, Wordsworth, Tennyson, Browning, each before his death was accepted as a great poet. Scott, Dickens, and Thackeray,-no one can question their contemporary popularity. Each was regarded by his age as being a chosen interpreter. The converse of the proposition is that the historian of literature, who expects to interpret the age, must go back to those writers particularly who in their time were popular. Theoretically, then, if the past and the present of any writer be known, by subtraction we should be able to understand what was his contribution to the literature of the nation. Today such an operation is exceedingly difficult. Knowledge is so widely diffused, books of all types are so accessible, libraries are so numerous, that the past of any individual writer is almost beyond conjecture except what may be deduced from his work. And equally his reception, except in a very few cases, is a matter of doubt. As Brander Matthews says somewhere, it is no longer a question of a reading public, but reading publics. A piece of work may be very popular in one locality and fail completely in another. The whole woof of modern society is so complex that it is very difficult to see the pattern. Still more difficult is it to estimate correctly xiv INTRODUCTION what elements will be chosen as valuable by the succeeding ages. Therefore, although the generalization applies now as it has applied in the past, to illustrate it one must go back to the past. For this purpose the literature of the first half of the sixteenth century is peculiarly happy. The literary past of the men is made comparatively simple since there is a partial break in the continuity, due to the Wars of the Roses and a modification of the language. In this part of our literature, consequently, the problems are simple and it is possible to arrive at definite solutions. And those solutions are important because upon them will rest the interpretation of the great literature of the age of Elizabeth. The following work aims by analysis to give an intellectual comprehension of the conditions which caused the various authors to write as they did. The question always before the reader is not, How did they write, but, Why did they write in such a form. Surely the second question is clearly answered, if he can be given a comprehension of their aims and their limitations; if he can be put back to a state analogous to that of the author's time, he can read his work with a fullness of emotional sympathy otherwise impossible. And with the knowledge thus gained he may turn to Elizabethan poetry with the same fullness of understanding that a friend of the parents brings to the son. So the interest which the reader is invited to find in this period is two-fold: first, because one sees here the beginnings of great work; second, because, owing to the partial break with the past, the separate strains in the literature, more easily than in other periods, can be submitted to analysis. This view has been criticised adversely as "mechanical". I confess that I do not see the justice of the criticism. History, if the study of it has any value whatsoever, teaches that the individual is merged in the many. It is not the biography of great men; it is the record of great movements. The history of England is not in the lives of her kings and queens; it is in the development of the English people, in which very often the great man has not been on the throne. To apply this view to literature can, surely, be neither new nor startling. It does, however, bring writers into fresh juxtapositions. For instance, Heywood as a follower of the Medieval Tradition, or Skelton as a Medieval Latinist, may cause surprise. On the other hand, if by such juxtaposition the significance of the work be INTRODUCTION XV comes more clearly evident, the method is justified. To what extent such fresh interpretation is sound, the reader must decide. Since the purpose of the book is to give an understanding of the literary forces in the first half of the sixteenth century and how each force affected the individual writer., I have allowed myself the privilege of abundant quotation. Such excerpts are in the nature of documents in evidence. They are the facts which support the reasoning, and, as such, must be known to the reader. I have had the less hesitancy in doing this, however, because many of the books from which the quotations are taken are not easily accessible; sometimes, even when the books are accessible, in the effort to make my position clear, I have quoted passages, instead of merely giving the references, in the belief that the time of the student will be saved thereby. For the same reason I have omitted a general bibliography, which seems to me both pedantic and futile. In a subject such as this, which includes renaissance works in six languages, it would be easy to create the impression of great learning. On the other hand, the title of a book or article is deceptive. It may contain nothing but age-old surmises and misinformation; or it may be the most profound treatment of the question. And the unhappy student dares not run the risk of neglecting it. Therefore, I have tried to indicate in my notes what particular value each work possesses. And, although I would not wish to make the assumption that I know all the work done in my field,-humanly speaking that is impossible,-the works noted are merely a fraction of what I have read, the ones most helpful to me. As such I offer them as a guide to the student. My great fear is that I have used work and have not acknowledged it. After years of reading along certain lines, the mind forgets the source of a thought or fact, and so assimilates the idea that it seems original. I am afraid that such a condition has occurred in my work; I can only plead that I am the first reader to be deceived and that corrections will most gratefully be acknowledged. There is one more point to be added, before I finish this explanation of the mechanism of the book. I have divided it into six monographs, each one distinct and able to be read as a whole. The gain here is that a student of a particular movement will find that treated without having to wade through a mass of preliminary matter; the corresponding loss, however, is that a certain amount of repetition is unavoidable. xvi INTRODUCTION I have tried to reduce the amount as much as possible by means of cross-references and a full index both of the work and to the notes. Now I come to the pleasant task of acknowledging the very great help I have received from many quarters. The particular places where aid has been rendered will, I trust, be found recorded in the notes. Here I wish to confess to a debt of a different nature, general rather than specific. Many of my friends have given me the advantage of airing my positions before them, of exposing my ignorance to their knowledge. To over-estimate the gain to this work from such contact would be impossible; to acknowledge it is mere honesty. On the other hand, it must be as clearly stated that the responsibility for the various heresies contained in the following pages is my own; sometimes I misunderstood their reasonings, sometimes I dared to disagree. With this clear understanding that the guilt is mine, I take pleasure in thanking Professor Keller for his suggestions on the sociological part of the work, Professor Goodell for helping me with the Greek, and Professor Morris and Professor Hendrickson for their untiring kindness in discussing with me the Latin background. To these last gentlemen I owe much more than mere scholastic gratitude for the warmth of the encouragement. Professor Luquiens must have a feeling of accomplishment on seeing this work completed, since he has put so much of his energy into it. For such kindness I cannot adequately phrase my sense of indebtedness. In conclusion I must express the recognition of my obligation to Mr. Keogh and the officials of the Yale Library who put the resources of that great institution personally at my disposal. Professor Bolton of Syracuse has verified my references, Mr. Raymond Jenkins read part of the manuscript, and Miss Underwood with most gracious patience has revised the proof. I hope that they realize how grateful I am. Finally in a separate paragraph I must confess that from the first page of the manuscript to the last page of the proof this work has passed beneath the scrutinizing eye of my dear wife. That there are not more errors in diction is due to her persistency. But she should receive no credit. Is it not her book? J. M. B. Yale University. CONTENTS CHAPTER I THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE.............................. 1 Four main Factors-(1) Humanism-The contrast between the Christian and the pagan philosophy of life-Its effect in art —On living conditionsIn entertainments-On dress-On jewelry-O.n dining-On moralityOn the attitude toward children-On the attitude toward marriage(i) The Copernican system-The medieval conception of the supernatural-The medieval attitude toward nature-Sanitation of old LondonDisease-Remedies-Cheapness of death-(S) The geographic discoveries-The desire for communication with the Far East-The diffusion of this idea-The extension of it in practice-Its effect upon literature(4) The invention of printing-Fifteenth century England-Scanty population-Two planes of literature-The political situation-Henry VII-The problems arising from his accession to the throne-The personality of Henry VIII. CHAPTER II THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION........................................... 48 The effect upon literature of the historical situation-The change in pronunciation-The difficulty in writing-Chaucer surviving largely by his content-Lydgate the great source of inspiration-The formal literary tradition-Its characteristics-The Flower and the Leaf-The Assembly of Ladies-The Court of Love-Its language-Its content-Stephen Hawes -His theory of poetry-The Example of Virtue-The Pastime of Pleasure-The similarity between them-The sources-The Godfrey Gobelive episode-The romantic elements-The Comfort of Lovers-Hawes verse experiments-His reputation-Skelton-The Bowge of Court-Its concreteness-Its satire-His relation to Barclay-The interpretation of the allegory-Heywood-The Spider and the Flye —Its characteristics-Its interpretation-The use of comic detail-The use of the dilemma-The use of alliteration-Pseudo-Chaucerian influence. CHAPTER III THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION.......................................... 120 The dominance of the Church-The familiarity with Medieval Latin-Its extensive use-The medieval poetics-Influence on English for the form only-The Colores-In arrangement of words —Latin tags-The effect xvii mlI xviii CONTENTS PAGE upon English vocabulary-The rithm-The stanza forms-The Notbrowne Mayde-Skelton-His reading-His humanism-His lyrics-His use of Latin-The Skeltonic verse-Its origin-His satires-The problem of dating-His loyalty-Colin Clout-His attack upon Wolsey-Why Come Ye Not to Court?-The continuation of Colin Clout-The Replycacion-The theory of poetry-Its dedication-Polemic dialogues-A Proper Dialogue-Rede Me and Be nott Worthe-Phillip Sparrow-Elynour Rummyng-Skelton and the Humanists-London Lickpenny-Cocke Lorrelles Bote-The Hye Way to the Spittal Hous-Realism. CHAPTER IV H UM AN ISM..................................................... 930 The connotation of Humanism-Its gradual growth-Skelton as a Humanist-Italy the pioneer-Humanism in England-Alexander BarclayThe Eclogues-Ship of Fools-Mirror of Good Manners-Henry Bradshaw-John Heywood-Humanism of the Oxford group-Its artificialityIts morality-Its relation to the Reformation-Sir Thomas MoreUtopia-Its modernity-Its criticism-Its intellectuality-ErasmusHis feeling toward England-His popularity-His morality-His rationalism-Colloquia-His attitude toward reform-Humanism versus Scholasticism in education-The aim-The three great theorists-The growth of the movement in England-The aim-Physical exerciseClassic heroes-Expurgations-The effect upon English literature-The effect on teaching-On the vernacular-Education of Women-English Verse - Tottel's Miscellany - Wyatt - Uncertain Authors - Nicholas Grimald-His pedantry-Origin of blank verse-Ascham the theorist and Grimald the exponent. CHAPTER V THE INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURES...................... 361 The effect of Spanish upon English-Celestina-Lord Berners-Golden Book-Its popularity-Its content-Image of Governance-Sir Francis Bryan-Dispraise of the Life of a Courtier-Germany-Trade relationsReformation-The Assertio-Situation in England-Literary resultsTyndale's New Testament-Supplicacyon for the Beggars-More's replyThe polemic dialogue-Rede me and be not wrothe-Coverdale-Sternhold -The jest books-Salomon and Marcolphus-Van Doesborgh-Laurens Andrewe-Parson of Kalenborowe-Tyll Howleglas-Realism-FranceThe effect upon the language-Castle of Labour-Colyn Blowbol's Testament - Jyl of Brentford's Testament - Ballade - Rondeau - Clement Marot-The Court-Tottels Miscellany-Wyatt-Italy-Wyatt-Uncertain Authors-The prose-Morte Darthur-Froissart-Huon of Burdeaux -Kalendayr ofshyppards. CONTENTS xix CHAPTER VI HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY..................................... 504 The text doubtful-Surrey's rank-His family connections-His character-His religious feeling-His death-"Fair Geraldine"-Compared with Wyatt-His language-Marot-Uncertain Authors-His medievalism-Psalms-Vergil-Blank verse-Summary. EARLY TUDOR POETRY 1485-1547 EARLY TUDOR POETRY CHAPTER I THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE That which separates peoples, far more than geographical boundaries or "the unplumbed, salt, estranging sea," is the basic philosophy that underlies their national life, the unwritten assumptions that, like axioms in geometry, are accepted without the need of proof. The difficulty of the difference in language may be surmounted. The denotation of a word is given in any dictionary; it is the connotation which counts. An American may learn to speak Turkish, but it is impossible for him to think like a Turk because he is an American. If this be true today when personal contact is possible, it is still more true in dealing with the languages of the past. Words at best are tricky instruments, and Marlowe, that great master of self-expression, complains of their inadequacy. Yet to his contemporaries his mighty line must have come charged with a fullness of meaning that we can only guess at, and it is probable that no one would be more surprised at the elucidations of the commentators than Shakespeare himself. To comprehend a poem written three hundred years ago requires creative imagination. The negative part of such creation is not difficult. It is not difficult to strip the world of steam, electricity and gasoline and to picture to ourselves the result. But positively for the modern American to adopt the point of view of the sixteenth century Englishman, to see that life unmodified either by the glamour of romanticism or by the working of his own personal equation, and fully to appreciate the unconscious and unexpressed motives for their actions, is impossible. Nevertheless the degree of our success in achieving this impossibility measures the value of our literary judgments. An attempt at least to realize this ideal is essential in dealing with works composed during an age of transition. As the term EARLY TUDOR POETRY "age of transition" implies, living conditions are in a flux and ideas of the outworn past jostle ideas of the yet unborn future. History is not the record of battles and of murders, of kings or of councils,-rather is it the study of the modifications of the social fabric resulting from new thoughts. As the body politic is composed of many individuals, so these modifying thoughts come not from one but from many. And it is a slow process. Take, for example, the discovery of gunpowder. Probably not many ideas have more completely revolutionized human society. It made for democracy, since the armed peasant became the equal of the mailed knight. Feudalism, based as it was upon the defensive power of armor, with its fundamental conception of innate superiority, was thus doomed. The application of this discovery extends over centuries. Writing in the middle of the thirteenth century Roger Bacon gave the formula for the composition of gunpowder, yet in the sixteenth century Henry VIII held his jousts and his tournaments and encouraged the practice in the use of the long bow. But the discovery of gunpowder, shaking though it did the very framework of human society, was only one of a number of factors that silently, slowly, inevitably remodelled the human spirit. The revival of an interest in the civilizations of Greece and Rome, the substitution of the Copernican for the Ptolemaic system of astronomy, the extension of geographical knowledge, and the invention of printing with movable type, each aided in transforming the medieval into the modern man. Of this change the literature is the record. It shows the continued struggle to force the old medieval forms to express the new Renaissance conceptions, to charge the old bottles with new wine, and the slow evolution of suitable forms. The old and the new are here intermingled. It is an age of transition. The first of these mental factors is the apparently insignificant revival of the study of the classic literatures. The Latin language, of course, had never been forgotten; it was used in the Church; to a certain extent, Roman writers were read in every age and, to a still less extent, imitated. But the effect of a book depends upon the spirit in which it is read. It is one thing to know Vergil and Ovid as entertaining pagans outside the pale, to search their works for prophetical intimations of the coming of Christianity, and to allegorize their poems into Christian myths, and quite another THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE 3 to accept them reverently as masters. The medieval Vergil is not even the Dantesque shade. He was remembered rather as the undignified wizard of the fabliaux and admiration for him found expression in the sortes Vergilianae. This monstrous conception of Vergil appears in English as late as 1520. But, in general, the fourteenth century witnessed a change in the point of view. This change is associated with the revival of the study of Greek, and may be said to have begun when Petrarch in his old age began the reading of Homer. It is difficult for the modern student to grasp the importance of this introduction of the classic philosophy of living. To us there is no novelty in the classic point of view; translations of all the principal writers abound; and, moreover, for the past four hundred years modern literatures have assimilated and discussed the leading tenets of classic thought to so great a degree that on reading the original author we are already necessarily familiar with the general conceptions and our attention is held only by the comparatively minor points. And the case is, as it were, judged before it is brought into court. It requires, therefore, an effort of the imagination for us to conceive an age when this thought, so familiar to us, had all the charm of novelty and when a knowledge of Greek connoted radical thinking in matters religious and political. For the antipodal contrast between Christian and pagan ideals in one respect must be remembered. During the Middle Ages the stress was laid, not upon this life, but upon the next. Even from the beginning the promise implied in the fact of the Resurrection was one of the main causes for the spread of Christianity. This was further amplified by the belief in the millenium, common in the first four centuries and appearing sporadically later. The second coming of the Saviour, so fiercely anticipated by Tertullian, logically transfers the interest from the merely temporal concerns of this life to the all-engrossing subject of the eternal life. Such is still the attitude of many of our hymns, especially those adapted from the Latin, that death with its prospect of heaven brings a happy release from earthly woe. Brief life is here our portion; Brief sorrow, short-lived care; The life that knows no ending, The tearless life is there. 4 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Oh happy retribution! Short toil, eternal rest. For mortals and for sinners, A mansion with the blest.L There is no need to multiply illustrations. The medieval hymnology teaches that this world is a temporary place of trial, that it is a battle-ground, that we are pilgrims journeying to our eternal home where the faithful will be recompensed. Nunc tribulatio; Tunc recreatio, Sceptra, coronse; Tune nova gloria Pectora sobria Clarificabit, Solvet aenigmata, Veraque sabbata Continuabit. Patria splendida, Terraque florida, Libera spinis, Danda fidelibus Est ibi civibus Hic peregrinis. That such an extreme was practiced by society at large at any time is, of course, untrue; it would imply the cessation of the business of living, and during the middle ages, as in every other age, men were chiefly occupied by their petty private concerns. Yet it was (and is) realized in some religious establishments and was held as an ideal by the world in general, and affected every human relationship. Care of the body was considered as a concession to the weakness of the flesh; the love of parents, home, wife, country, or the approbation of the community was regarded, theoretically at least, as a distraction from the pursuit of the highest life. This may be illustrated by the life of Saint Alexis. Hic breve vivitur, 0 retributio! Hic breve plangitur, Stat brevis actio, Hic breve fletur; Vita perennis; Non breve vivere, O retributio! Non breve plangere, Celica mansio Retribuetur; Stat lue plenis.. THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE 5 To free himself from all earthly attachments, Alexis abandoned on his wedding night his wife, his parents and his country; having been made abbot for his austerities, he again abandoned his responsibilities; at last for the sake of greater humiliation he lived as a mendicant in his father's palace; and at his death he was miraculously recognized as a saint. The teaching is that, although such a life is not possible for all, it is beautiful and pleasing to God. The external manifestation of such philosophy is shown in the dominance of the religious element in architecture and in art; the internal, in the essentially Christian virtues of humility and selfsacrifice and in an introspective and subjective mental attitude. By the Greeks, on the other hand, immortality was conceived in terms of this life; in some vague way it was a continuation and prolongation of this life. The Orpheus and Eurydice story, and perhaps the Eleusinian mysteries, indicate a belief in a life hereafter. The Phaedo of Plato discusses it. But there is no radical difference in the conception of the two existences. In classic poetry the future is presented as a shadowy place of doubtful ghosts. Death is merely an inevitable evil. It was the present that was important, and man's relation to his fellow men in the world about him. Attention was directed not to the individual but to the community. As the cathedral expresses a typical phase of the middle ages, so the agora, or forum, represents the classic civilization. Civic consciousness existed in a far higher degree than in the later age. And the Londoner, or Parisian, of 1500 found in the Rome of Augustus a civilization much more complex and elaborately organized than any with which he was familiar. Constant contact with humanity, however it may dull the sensibilities, drives away morbid introspection. Owing to this fact classic writing has been characterized as possessing "the two noblest of things, sweetness and light." Classic thought is unconscious of self and objective. Eudaimonism is the ethical basis, that is, well-being in this life; and many found this well-being in sensual indulgence. As the pagan and Christian philosophies are thus opposed, the revived interest in the former brought with it profound modifications in the whole social structure of the latter, —the greater the interest the more profound the change. 1 The importance of the change is thus signalized by Karl Federn: Die Welt war ein Jammerthal, ein ides Gebiet des Elends und schwerer Prtifingen. Die Ausbil 6 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Discussions arose, doubts were born, and conventionalities were shattered in the conflict of these two antagonistic forces. Moved by the one, the Borgian orgies revived the lusts of imperial Rome; in reaction, Martin Luther started the Reformation; and between them, attracted by both and repelled by both, wavered Erasmus, in his own person summing up the unrest of the age. The first result was an immense increase in appreciation of physical beauty. The loveliness of line of a perfect column and the smooth ripple of muscle beneath the skin filled the men of the Renaissance with delight. As social conditions became more settled, the house was regarded as a home, rather than as a fortress, and was adorned with loving care. Graceful festoons draped the windows and the chimneys flowered in fantasy. The beautiful simplicity of the Doge's palace faces the decorous richness of Sansovino's Library. The grimness of Loche is exchanged for the lightness of Blois and the frostwork of Chambord. Ghiberti dreams his doors and Bramante his domes. The Bysantine rigidity of Cimabue and the statuesque grouping of Giotto develop into the richness of Titian, the tenderness of Raphael, the strength of Michelangelo, the subtilty of Leonardo and the interpretative skill of Holbein. And where before Art was the hand-maiden of the Church, now all life became her province and Giorgione paganizes in the mellow Fete Champetre.1 Thus they looked at the world with the creative eye and behold! it was very good. The same impulse found expression also in the trivialities of everyday life. Just as the temptation of the Renaissance artists was for multiplicity of detail and over-ornamentation, so in minor matters, in house-furnishing and table decoration, the fault lay in a lack of restraint. A gorgeous lavishness became characteristic of the period, although we catch only faint reflects of the splendid background in the literature. To be interpreted by the gray modern mind these writings must be read with the understanding that in the thought of both author and contemporary audience dung solcher Anschauungen musste durch den schrechlichen Zustand befordert werden: die Welt war in diesen Jahrhunderten wirklich ein Jammerthal; und sie verloren ihre Macht mit dem Augenblick, wo die Zustande sich besserten und die Menschen sich wieder des Lebens zu freuen anfiengen. Dante, 9-10. Like so many other pictures given to Giorgione, the attribution of this to him has been vehemently denied. THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE 7 there was this elaborate richness of daily life. Probably the extreme example is to be found in Cardinal Wolsey's country seat at Hampton Court. Moreover, since we have the inventory of the furnishings when the palace was given to the King and since Hampton Court itself is still not changed beyond all recognition, it is possible to reconstruct the mise en scene of the great Cardinal. Everything was on a large scale.1 There were two hundred and eight guest rooms, each with "a bason and a ewer of silver, some gilt and some parcel gilt, and some two great pots of silver in like manner, and one pot at the least with wine and beer, a bowl or goblet, and a silver pot to drink beer in; a silver candlestick or two, with both white lights and yellow lights of three sizes of wax; and a staff torch; a fine manchet, and a chet-loaf of bread." 2 The beds were hung with red, green, or russet velvet, or satin, or silk, or sarcenet, and elaborately carved "with fowls and beasts having banners about their neck with the arms of England and France," 3 or with the imagery of children playing in the water; two trussing beds were of alabaster. In the list, chair follows chair, carved and gilded, with cushions of embroideries and tapestry. There were forty-five pairs of brass or wrought iron andirons. The walls were hung with tapestries. To acquire a sufficient number agents ransacked the continent. In 1520, for example, Sir Thomas Gresham was ordered to take the measure for eighteen rooms, and yet in December, 1522, Wolsey bought twenty-one complete sets, consisting of one hundred and thirty-two pieces. Such ostentatious profusion at any time indicates the parvenu, but here, when the parvenu is a cardinal, it also indicates a change in Christian ideals. For this love of display there is another explanation beside that of personal gratification. In an age when comparatively few could read, the appeal had to be visual to bring home to the people the importance of any event. This is the logical reason for coronation processions, ambassadorial receptions, masques, etc. The extent to which any circumstance affected the nation was signified by the outward splendor accompanying it. The magnificence of 1 These details are taken principally from The History of Hampton Court, by Ernest Law, London, 1890. 2nd ed. 2 Calendars of State Papers, Venetian, vol. 1527-33, No. 205. From the Sanudo Diaries, vol. xlvi., p. 264. Quoted by Law, ibid., vol. i, 109-110. Ibid. 8 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Wolsey's establishment was a political measure. The crosses and pillars borne before him were the visible expression of power of a servant of the king. The forms and ceremonies attendant upon the arrival of the cardinal's hat expressed to the multitude the importance of the new dignity. The grandeur of Wolsey's state was not then merely a personal love of display, nor do the pages in Hall's Chronicle devoted to detailed description of festivities argue naive admiration on the part of the chronicler. In an age when there were no editorials and no inspired articles, the significant events were signalized by appeals to the inherent dramatic instinct. This may be illustrated by the long account of the celebration of the French alliance in 1527 as given by the Italian Secretary Spinelli. Politically, it was an event of major importance, the union of France and England against the conquering arms of Spain. At home, it meant the triumph of the party of Anne Boleyn, with all that that implies. The pictorial representation of this importance is as follows.' On the fourth instant all the ambassadors, with the exception of the Emperor's, were summoned to Greenwich; where, in the presence of the King and the chief personages of the Court, the French ambassador, the Bishop of Tarbes, delivered an oration, which was answered by the Bishop of London; who on the morrow, Cardinal Wolsey being unable to officiate from indisposition, sang mass with the usual ceremonies, after which at the high altar, where the missal was opened by the Cardinal, the French ambassadors swore in his hands to observe the perpetual peace now concluded with the King of England, he on his part swearing in like manner. Two of the ambassadors, namely, the prelate and the soldier, dined with the King, the others dining apart together. On rising from the table they went to the Queen's apartment, where the Princess danced with the French ambassador, the Viscount of Turenne, who considered her very handsome and admirable by reason of her great and uncommon mental endowments, but so thin, spare, and small as to render it impossible for her to be married for the next three years. Then yesterday there was a joust, the challengers at the tilt being four, the competitors being sixteen, each of whom ran six courses; a very delectable sight, by reason of the prowess of the knights. The joust ended with the day, not without rain, which rather impeded the jousting. The King and Queens, with some 200 damsels, then went to the apartments which I informed you in a former letter were being prepared on one side of the tilt yard at Greenwich for the reception of the French ambassadors, the rest of the company following them. The site adjoined the other chambers, from whence the King and the nobility view the jousts. There were but two halls, about thirty paces in length, and of proportional height and breadth. The centre of the ceiling 1 Brewer, History of the Reign of Henry VIII, 2, 151. THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE 9 of the first hall was entirely covered with brocatel, of no great value, but producing a good effect. The walls were hung with the most costly tapestry in England, representing the history of David; and there was a. row of torches closely set, illuminating the place very brilliantly, being ranged below the windows, which were at no great distance from the roof. The royal table was prepared in front of the hall, with a large canopy of tissue, beneath which was the King, with the Queens, his wife and sister, at the sides. Then came two long tables; at one end of which, on the right-hand side were seated the French ambassador and the Princess, each pairing with some great lady. At the other table, to the left, the Venetian ambassador and the one from Milan, placed themselves, with the rest of the lords and ladies. At no great distance from the two tables were two cupboards, reaching from the floor to the roof, forming a semicircle, on which was a large and varied assortment of vases, all of massive gold, the value of which it would be difficult to estimate; nor were any of them touched; silver-gilt dishes of another sort being used for the viands of meat and fish, which were in such variety and abundance that the banquet lasted a long while. The door of this hall was in the form of a very lofty triumphal arch, fashioned after the antique, beneath which were three vaulted entrances. Through one passed the dishes for the table; through the other they were removed; and on each side of the centre one, which was the largest, stood two enormous cupboards bearing wine to be served at table. Over the triumphal arch was a spacious balcony for the musicians, bearing the arms of the King and Queen, with sundry busts of Emperors, and the King's motto, "Dieu et mon droit," and other Greek words. Could never conceive anything so costly and well designed as what was witnessed that night at Greenwich. On rising from table all were marshalled, according to their rank, along a corridor of no great length, to the other hall, which was of rather less size than the first. The floor was covered with cloth of silk embroidered with gold lilies. The ceiling, which was well-night flat, was all painted, representing a map of the world, the names of the principal provinces being legible; there were also the signs of the zodiac and their properties, these paintings being supported by giants. Along the sides of the hall were three tiers of seats, each of which had a beam placed lengthwise for the spectators to lean on, nor did one tier interfere with the other. Above these tiers were in like manner three rows of torches, so well disposed and contrived as not to impede the view. Within the space for the spectators, on the right-hand side in the first tier, the ambassadors were placed; in the second, the Princes; in the third, those to whom admission was granted, they being few. On the opposite side, in the same order, were the ladies; whose various styles and apparel, enhanced by the brilliancy of the lights, caused me to think I was contemplating the choir of angels, they in like manner, being placed one above the other. Two-thirds of the distance down the hall an arch of a single span had been erected, its depth being five feet and a half (English measure), all gilt with fine gold, the inside of the arch being decorated with a number of beautiful figures in low relief. The magnificence of this arch was such that it was difficult to comprehend how so grand a structure could have been raised in so short a space of time. In the centre to the front stood the royal throne, on which the King sat, the two Queens being seated below at his feet. 10 EARLY TUDOR POETRY All the spectators being thus methodically placed, without the least noise or confusion, and precisely as pre-arranged, the entertainment commenced. One thing above all others surprised me most, never having witnessed the like anywhere, it being impossible to represent or credit with how much order, regularity, and silence such public entertainments proceed and are conducted in England. First of all, there entered the hall eight singers, forming two wings, and singing certain English songs; in their centre was a very handsome youth alone, clad in skyblue taffety, a number of eyes being scattered over his gown; and having presented themselves before the King, the singers then withdrew in the same order, there remaining by himself the youth, in the disguise of Mercury, sent to the King by Jupiter, delivered a learned Latin oration in praise of his Majesty; which panegyric being ended, he announced that Jupiter, having frequently listened to disputes between love and riches, concerning their relative authority, and being unable to decide the controversy, he appointed his Majesty as judge, and requested him to pronounce and pass sentence on both of them. Thereupon Mercury departed; and next came eight young choristers of the chapel, four on each side; those to the right were all clad in cloth of gold, much ornamented, and the first of them was Cupid; the others to the left were variously arrayed, and their chief was Plutus. In the centre walked one alone in the guise of Justice, who sang. In this order they presented themselves to the King, before whom Justice commenced narrating the dispute between the parties in English, and desired Cupid to begin with his defence; to which Plutus replied; each of the choristers on either side defending their leaders by reciting a number of verses. The altercation being ended, Cupid and Plutus determined that judgment should go by battle; and thus, having departed, three men-at-arms in white armour, with three naked swords in their hands, entered from the end of the hall, and having drawn up under the triumphal arch, an opening was made in its centre by some unseen means, and out of the arch fell down a bar, in front of which there appeared three well-armed knights. The combat then commenced valiantly, man to man, some of them dealing such blows that their swords broke. After they had fought some while a second bar was let down, which separated them, the first three having vanquished the others, fighting with great courage; and the duel being thus ended, the combatants quitted the hall in like manner as they had entered it. Thereupon there fell to the ground, at the extremity of the hall, a painted canvas (curtain) from an aperture, in which was seen a most verdant cave, approachable by four steps, each side being guarded by four of the chief gentleman of the Court, clad in tissue doublets and tall plumes, each of whom carried a torch. Well grouped within the cave were eight damsels, of such rare beauty as to be supposed goddesses rather than human beings. They were arrayed in cloth of gold, their hair gathered into a net, with a very richly jewelled garland, surmounted by a velvet cap, the hanging sleeves of their surcoats being so long that they well-nigh touched the ground, and so well and richly wrought as to be no slight ornament to their beauty. They descended gracefully from their seats to the sound of trumpets, the first of them being the Princess, hand in hand with the Marchioness of Exeter. Her beauty in this array produced such an effect on everybody that all the other marvellous sights previously witnessed were forgotten, and they gave themselves up solely to contemplation of so fair an angel. On her person were so many precious stones that her THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE 11 splendour and radiance dazzled the sight in such wise as to make one believe that she was decked with all the gems of the eighth sphere. Dancing thus, they presented themselves to the King, their dance being very delightful by reason of its variety, as they formed certain groups and figures most pleasing to the sight. Their dance being finished, they ranged with themselves on one side; and in like order the eight youths, leaving their torches, came down from the cave, and after performing their dance, each of them took by the hand one of those beautiful nymphs, and, having led a courant together for a while, returned to their places. Six masks then entered. To detail their costume would be but to repeat the words, "cloth of gold," "cloth of silver," etc. They chose such ladies as they pleased for their partners, and commenced various dances; which being ended, the King appeared. The French ambassador, the Marquiis of Turenne, was at his side, and behind him four couple of noblemen all masked, and all wearing black velvet slippers on their feet; this being done lest the King should be distinguished from the others; as, from a hurt which he lately received on his left foot when playing at tennis, he wears a black velvet slipper. They were all clad in tissue doublets, over which was a very long and ample gown of black satin, with hoods of the same material, and on their heads caps of tawny velvet. They then took by the hand an equal number of ladies, dancing with great glee, and at the end of the dance unmasked; whereupon the Princess with her companions again descended, and came to the King, who, in the presence of the French ambassadors, took off her cap, and, the net being displaced, a profusion, of silver tresses, as beautiful as ever were seen on human head, fell over her shoulders, forming a most agreable sight. The aforesaid ambassadors then took leave of her; and all departing from that beautiful place returned to the supper hall, where the tables were spread with every sort of confection and choice wines for all who chose to cheer themselves with them. The sun, I believe, greatly hastened his course, having, perhaps, had a hint from Mercury of so rare a sight. So showing himself already on the horizon, warning being thus given of his presence, everybody thought it time to quit the royal chambers, returning to their own with such sleepy eyes that the daylight could not keep them open. However stupid may seem to us the reading of such a description, the account deserves careful consideration from the fact that the shrewdest state in Europe required that it be so circumstantial. The reverend seniors of the Doge's council did not find these details trivial. It was an important state occasion as seen by impartial eyes. As it was written to be read only in Venice, the superlatives, unlike those used by Hall, cannot be laid to patriotic motives. The decorations alone, without including the expense of the entertainment, cost 8000~ in modern currency; Holbein was employed to paint part of the scenery; Rastell,"for writing of the dialogue and making (poetry) in rhyme, both in English and Latin", received 3s. 4d. (2~ in modern currency),-a curious 12 EARLY TUDOR POETRY comparative valuation of scenery and poetry. Inclination and political necessity then combined to make life splendid. With such gorgeous backgrounds and such spectacular productions they naturally dressed the part. The reason why our stage pictures seem unreal is because they are unreal. Our cottonbacked velvets and paste jewels create no illusion. We neither know how to wear the clothes nor do we possess them. The wardrobe lists of that time itemize gowns for both men and women of silk, of satin, and of velvet, and lined with foxskin and ermine. Henry, Earl of Stafford, according to the inventory of 1522, possessed thirteen gowns of cloth of tissue, white damask, cloth of gold, velvet, and satin; his wife sixteen gowns of the same materials, pearled and lined with velvet. As such costumes are obviously valuable, they may be said to have invested their capital in their clothes. This state of affairs was due principally to the fact that, since the statute of 1487 forbade "usury", surplus monies were expended on land and on articles of use. Property was a tangible asset. That explains Spinelli's enthusiasm for the King's display of plate," nor were any of them touched"; it was a gratifying exhibition of royal power. In accumulating treasure the King set the example to his subjects. An earlier Venetian traveller had remarked: 1 The most remarkable thing in London, is the wonderful quantity of wrought silver. I do not allude to that in private houses, though the landlord of the house in which the Milanese ambassador lived, had plate to the amount of 100 crowns, but to the shops of London. In one single street, named the Strand, leading to St. Paul's, there are fifty two goldsmith's shops, so rich and full of silver vessels, great and small, that in all the shops in Milan, Rome, Venice, and Florence put together, I do not think there would be found so many of the magnificence that are to be seen in London. This exaggeration was rendered plausible by the fact that, in defiance of modern economics, no gold or silver was allowed to be exported. Brought into England by her foreign commerce, they necessarily remained there. The will of Elizabeth Browne,2 preserved among the Paston documents, shows to what an extent property assumed such form. 1 Italian Relation, Camden Soc., 1847, 42. 2 Paston Letters, ed. Gairdner, 3, 463. THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE 13 Moreover I geve and biqueith to my doughter Mary... First, a standing cupp of silver gilt, chaced with plompes, weyeng with the cover, knoppe and devise xlij. unces et dimidium. Item, a standing cupp of silver and gilt, chaced with flowres, weying with the cover, the knopp, and devise, xxvij. unces et dimidium. A playn standing cupp of silver gilt, weing with the cover, the knopp and the devise, xxx unces. A standing cupp of silver and gilt, chaced with half plompes, weying with the cover, knopp and devise xx. unces and dimidium. A playn standing cupp of silver gilt weying with cover and the knoppe and the devyse xxvij. unces and an half. A standyng cuppe of silver and gilt,, weyng with the cover, the knoppe and the devyse xxvj. unces. A saltseler of sylver and gilite, weying with the cover, the knoppe and the devyse xxiij unces. A saltseler of sylver and gilt, without a cover, weying xxij. unces and an halfe. A litill saltseler or sylver and gilt, weying with the cover and the knoppe and the devyse xv. unces and an half. A litell saltseler or sylver and gilt, without the cover, weying viij. unces and an halfe. And vij. bolles of sylver, parcelles gilt, weying iiij.... xviij. unces. And ij. peces of silver with a cover weying xlviij. unces. A dozen and a half of silver sponys weying xxiij. unces, and iij. sponys of silver and gilt weying iij. unces and iij. quartrons, and a long spone of sylver and gilt for ginger, weying j. unce and iij. quar+ons. Item, a chafing disshe of sylver weying xxvj. unces. And ij. litell crewettes of sylver weying viij. unces. A chalese of sylver and gilt with the paten, weying xj. unces. An haly water stok of silver with the lid, handill, and spryngill, weying xij. unces. An Agnus with a baleys, iij. saphires, iij. perlys with an image of Saint Anthony apon it. And a tablet with the Salutacion of Our Lady, and the iij. Kingis of Collayn. A bee with a grete pearl. A dyamond, an emerawde, iij. grete perlys hanging apon the same. A nother bee with a grete perle with an emerawde and a saphire, weying ij. unces iij. quarters. A pece of the Holy Crosse, crossewise made, bordured with silver aboute; iij. brode girdilles,... etc. As Elizabeth Browne was not apparently a person of great wealth, this astonishing list must show the kind of possessions conventional in her state of life, and it illustrates the comment of the Italian.' And every one who makes a tour in the island will soon become aware of this great wealth, as will have been the case with your Magnificence, for there is no innkeeper, however poor and humble he may be, who does not serve his table with silver dishes and drinking cups; and no one, who has not in his house silver plate to the amount of at least 100~ sterling, which is equivalent to 500 golden crowns with us, is considered by the English to be a person of any consequence. But above all are their riches displayed in the church treasures. Whereupon he gives an account of the shrine of St. Thomas at Canterbury which reads like that of Aladdin's cave: but every thing is left far behind by a ruby, not larger than a man's thumb-nail, which is set to the right of the altar. The church is rather dark, and particularly 1 Italian Relation, ibid, 28. 14 EARLY TUDOR POETRY so where the shrine is placed, and when we went to see it the sun was nearly gone down, and the weather was cloudy; yet I saw that ruby as well as if I had it in my hand; they say that it was the gift of a king of France. To us this suggests such an exhibition as that at the shrine of San Carlo Borromeo at Milan, which may be regarded as a part of the conservatism of the Roman Church. But today such exhibitions are the exceptions, rather than the rule. Then the whole life, political as well as religious, private as well as public, was toned to that pitch of gorgeousness, and the modern reader must imaginatively supply such a background to the literature. Such display affected also every detail of the life. Each nobleman kept his state and had scores of retainers living at his expense. A condition, proper to feudal society, remained for Renaissance ostentation. For the entire court the King set free table (bowge). To quote again from the Italian Relation,1 he does not change any of the ancient usages of England at his Court, keeping a sumptuous table, as I had the opportunity of witnessing twice that your Magnificence dined there, when I judged that there might be from 600 to 700 persons at dinner. And his people say that his Majesty spends upon his table 14,000~ sterling annually, which is equal to 70,000 crowns. In this respect the King was but the first in the Kingdom. All the great nobles and ecclesiastics provided "sumptuous" fare for numbers that seem to us incredible. The manner of living of a great noble is given us in the household book of the Duke of Buckingham. For example, on Thursday, the sixth of January 1508, meals were prepared for four hundred and fifty-nine persons. To feed this number required 1137 loaves of bread, 66 quarts of wine, 1039 quarts of ale, 36 rounds of beef, 12 carcasses of mutton, 2 calves, 4 pigs, 1 dry ling, 2 salt cod, 2 hard fish, 1 salt sturgeon, 3 swans, 6 geese, 6 suckling pigs, 10 capons, 1 lamb, 2 peacocks, 2 herons, 22 rabbits, 18 chickens, 16 woodcock, 9 melards, 23 widgeons,18 teals, 20 snipes, 9 dozen of great birds, 6 dozen of little birds, 3 dozen larks, 9 quails from the store, half a fresh salmon, 1 fresh cod, 4 dog fish, 2 tench, 7 little bremes, half a fresh congre, 21 little roaches, 6 large fresh eels, 10 little whiting, 17 flounders, 100 lampreys, 3 sticks of little eel sowers, 3 plaice, 1 fresh...,4000 eggs, 24 dishes of butter, 2 flaggons of...,15 flaggons of milk, 3 flaggons 1 Ibid, 46. THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE 15 of cream, 2 flaggons of frumenty, 900 oysters, and herbs. Aside from the quantity and the variety, the list is remarkable also for the fact that, except for the last item "herbs", there are no vegetables. Englishmen were still in the carnivorous age. The manner of preparation may be illustrated from the well-known Life of Wolsey by Cavendish. Ye must understand that my lord was not there, nor yet come, but they being merry and pleasant with their fare, devising and wondering upon the subtleties. Before the second course, my Lord Cardinal came in.... Anon came up the second course, with so many dishes, subtleties, and curious devices, which were above a hundred in number, of so goodly proportion and costly, that I suppose the Frenchmen never saw the like. The wonder was no less than it was worthy indeed. There were castles with images in the same; Paul's church and steeple, in proportion for the quantity as well counterfeited as the painter should have painted it upon a cloth or wall. There were beasts, birds, fowls of divers kinds, and personages, most lively made and counterfeit in dishes; some fighting as it were, with swords, some with guns and crossbows, some vaulting and leaping; some dancing with ladies, some in complete harness, jousting with spears, and with many more devices than I am able with my wit (to) describe. Among all, one I noted: there was a chessboard subtilely made of spiced plate, with men to the same; and for the good proportion, because that Frenchmen be very expert in that play, my lord gave the same to a gentleman of France, commanding that a case should be made for the same in all haste, to preserve it from perishing in the conveyance thereof into his country.... Then went cups merrily about, that many of the Frenchmen were fain to be led to their beds... The last survival of such culinary art is to be found in the ornaments for wedding-cakes, the little bride and groom under the bell, which most of us have seen only through confectioners' windows. It belongs to a past age, an age when the appeal was made to the eye rather than to the palate, just as children are delighted with ice-cream in fancy moulds. In general, in all this emphasis upon externality during the Renaissance there is a child-like quality. Lack of restraint in the manner of life was symptomatic of the internal change in the philosophy of the period. In reaction against Semitic ideals taught by the Bible the moral code was relaxed. Intellectually, vertu lost the meaning of virtue to become synonymous with ability; emotionally, the bounds of decency were overstepped in a worship of beauty.l In the first direction, 1 "Diese wichtige Konsequenz besteht darin, as prinzipielle, also grundstUrzende UmwSilzungen im seitherigen Produkyionsmechanismus 4er Menschen unbedingt 16 EARLY TUDOR POETRY lying became a political accomplishment and assassination a legitimate weapon. One of the keenest books of any age, I1 Principe of Macchiavelli, has for hero the notorious Cesar Borgia whose masterpiece of diplomacy was the murder of two hundred of his opponents who were his guests at a banquet in Sinigaglia. But Macchiavellianism was not peculiar to Macchiavelli; it pervades the age. In the second direction, to gratify the lusts of the flesh was considered admirable and done in the name of Hellenism. For, while we have behind us centuries of criticism, they accepted the whole without discrimination. Nor is this to be wondered at. Ancient Greece and Rome presented a complex ordered civilization beyond the conception of feudalism. The descriptions of Athens at the time of Pericles, or Rome at the time of Augustus, with broad portico-lined streets, seemed of the very fabric of dreams to the 15th century dweller in muddy, unsanitary London, or Paris. To us with our stadiums seating seventy thousand people there is nothing colossal about the Coliseum; its interest is in its historical associations. To them it was the work of supermen, the memorial of an age when life was finer than any that they knew. Now there are certain features of classic life, however much we may tacitly ignore them, that unquestionably existed, for although Greek culture is represented by the tragedies of Aeschylus and Sophocles and by the statues of Phidias and Lysippus, the same culture in another phase is given in the erotic writers and the vase-paintings. Nor had the Renaissance sufficient perspective to differentiate. To them the Priapeia, equally with the Aeneid, was the work of Vergil and worthy of imitation,-perhaps even more worthy of imitation by persons of culture because it presented conceptions opposed to the conventional ideas taught by the Church and held by the common herd. Much of the Renaissance immorality is merely an artistic pose. In proportion to the progress of humanism there follows concomitantly a freedom of expression in literature and in art, and Italy, the center of humanistic culture, was also the center of pagan morality. There, a wide divergence from Christian ethics is exhibited in all classes of society. The unedifying auch zu einem vollig neuen geistigen Inhalt des Lebens, je nachdem sogar, wenn man, so sagen will, zu einer volligen Neugeburt der Idee fUhren miissen." Edward Fuchs, Sittengeschichte, Renaissance, 99. THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE 17 entries in Burckhardt's Diary show a state of affairs in the Vatican scarcely suggestive of St. Peter. The measure of the Italian prince is given by the lives of the Baglioni, the Sforzas, or the D'Estes, and the novelle give us that of the citizen. All testimony points to a general decline in the moral code. It is not that there were sporadic outbursts, such as followed the Restoration in England, or the Regency in France, or that there was any consciousness of wrong-doing, or any sense of shame. When a Duchess of Urbino allows herself to be painted nude, even by a Titian, it must mean a conception of decency very different from our own, or when Cardinal Bandello feels it fitting to introduce exceedingly free tales by short prayers, or when the author of the obscene Ragionamenti could expect to be made a prince of the Church, a state of morality is posited in which the modern distinctions between right and wrong do not exist. As humanism radiated from Italy to the northern nations, its progress was marked by an increased appreciation of the beautiful and a relaxation of morality. In France, the expedition of Charles VIII in 1494, when the French court en masse promenaded the length of Italy, introduced southern culture to the generality. Actually dates mean little when used in connection with a great movement. As early as 1478 the facetious tales in Latin of Poggio and Valla were published at Paris, and continuously Italian influence dribbled into France through Lyons. Yet, broadly speaking, owing to the strong personality of Clement Marot and the influence of his school, French literature does not become Italianate before the publication of the Defense et Illustration de la langue frangaise in 1549. On the other hand Francis First's patronage of Italian artists, such as Leonardo and Cellini for example, and his love for Italian architecture, as at Fontainebleau, are too well known to need comment. Almost equally well known through Brantome are the scandalous conditions at the Valois courts. In France the general proposition holds. In England the proposition does not hold for the first half of the sixteenth century. Not until Nash and Shakespeare and Marlowe do we find literature at all comparable in sensuousness with the Italian. And, unless English prudery has suppressed such work, it seems probable that then, as now, the Anglo-Saxon was repelled rather than attracted by the artistic excesses of the 18 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Latin nations. The movement was slow. Just as England had no painters to compare with the great Italians, on the other hand her literature had no analogies to the Italian capitoli or writers of the type of Aretino. Even at the end of the century Nash feels it necessary to excuse himself for his "lascivious rhymes," and Gascoigne apologizes for the looseness of his poems,-a looseness largely imaginary and defended by foreign precedent. Humanism in England for the first half of the century was on the side of morality. Ascham protests violently against the introduction of Italian culture and of "baudy" Italian books. An additional reason for this attitude may be found in the character of the protagonists of English humanism. To associate Sir Thomas More, Cheke, Lilly, or Linacre with dissolute living is impossible. The result is that humanism there became primarily intellectual in character; for the first half of the century at least its freedom was that of the mind only. In freeing English humanism from the responsibility of the introduction of refined vice, it must, however, be confessed that the effect was largely negative. The spiritual uplift of the age of faith had gone, and the contagion of European example produced a low moral tone. The grossness of the age is illustrated in the letters of Henry to Anne Boleyn. Skelton, a royal tutor, laureated by three universities, and ordained priest, allows himself to use words that today are to be found only in the slums and stews. Writers use the unadorned substantive whose place in the language of more polite peoples is taken by a suggestive paraphrase. They call a spade a spade, partly because they know no other expression, and partly because they see no objection to stating the fact. This coarseness caught the attention of the Venetian traveller.' And altho their dispositions are somewhat licentious, I have never noticed any one, either at court or amongst the lower orders, to be in love,... I say this of the men, for I understand it is quite the contrary with the women, who are very violent in their passions. Howbeit the English keep a very jealous guard over their wives, though any thing may be compensated in the end, by the power of money. The general effect of humanism upon the English morals in the sixteenth century was to make the age one of transition from a coarseness in expression, which is brutal and repelling, to a refinement, which, by concealing, is suggestive. Italian Relation, ibid, 24. THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE 19 One phase of this almost animal attitude on the part of the early Tudors deserves careful consideration by the student of literature, namely their ideas concerning the treatment of children and their attitude toward the marriage relation. These fundamental conceptions necessarily underlie all love poetry, such as the sonnet sequences of Wyatt and of Surrey. Our belief in the importance of the child and the sanctity of marriage causes us to read into their words meanings that are not there. We are sentimental over the presence of the child in the home; they were not. To illustrate from a familiar case, I think that it shocks the modern reader that Lorenzo in eloping with Jessica should allow her to rob Shylock; the elopement is excused by the power of love "on such a night", but what can excuse the theft of the jewels? To the sixteenth century mind both the elopement and the theft were on the same plane. If Lorenzo stole the daughter, why should he stickle at taking what was of less value? The relation between the parent and the child was sternly practical. Let the Italian continue.' The want of affection in the English is strongly manifested towards their children; for after having kept them at home till they arrive at the age of 7 or 9 years at the utmost, they put them out, both males and females, to hard service in the houses of other people, binding them generally for another 7 or 9 years. And these are called apprentices, and during that time they perform all the most menial offices; and few are born who are exempted from this fate, for every one, however rich he may be, sends away his children into the houses of others, whilst he, in return, receives those of strangers into his own. And on inquiring their reason for this severity, they answered that they did it in order that their children might learn better manners. But I, for my part, believe that they do it because they like to enjoy all their comforts themselves, and that they are better served by strangers than they would be by their own children. Besides which the English being great epicures, and very avaricious by nature, indulge in the most delicate fare themselves and give their household the coarsest bread, and beer, and cold meat baked on Sunday for the week, which, however, they allow them in great abundance. That if they had their own children at home, they would be obliged to give them the same food they made use of for themselves. That if the English sent their children away from home to learn virtue and good manners, and took them back again when their apprenticeship was over, they might, perhaps, be excused; but they never return, for the girls are settled by their patrons, and the boys make the best marriages they can, and, assisted by their patrons, not by their fathers, they also open a house and strive diligently by this means to make some fortune for themselves; whence it proceeds 1 Italian Relation, ibid, 24. On this whole subject compare The Age of Erasmus, P. S. Allen, Oxford, 1914. 20 EARLY TUDOR POETRY that, having no hope of their paternal inheritance, they all become so greedy of gain that they feel no shame in asking, almost "for the love of God," for the smallest sums of money; and to this it can be attributed, that there is no injury that can be committed against the lower orders of the English, that may not be atoned for by money. Such is the way the English "home" of the sixteenth century appeared to an intelligent Italian. Naturally the account must be taken with many grains of salt. Used to the communal family life of Italy, where all the generations and their families live under one roof, he is too ready to see the evils of another system and to assign wrong motives to those practicing it. Nevertheless the system existed and brought with it certain consequences. The relation between the parent and the child was necessarily formal. One of the best illustrations is given in Ascham's report of the conversation of Lady Jane Grey. As she was the niece of the King and a possible heir to the throne, the presumption is that she would be treated with special consideration. Ascham is here arguing that the teacher should use persuasion rather than force. The value of the following account is, therefore, that no criticism against the parents is implied; their attitude is assumed to be the normal one of the age.' One of the greatest benefits that ever God gave me, is, that he sent me so sharp and severe parents, and so gentle a schoolmaster. For when I am in presence either of father or mother; whether I speak, keep silence, sit, stand, or go, eat, drink, be merry, or sad, be sewing, playing, dancing, or doing anything else; I must do it, as it were, in such weight, measure, and number, even so perfectly, as God made the world; or else I am so sharply taunted, so cruelly threatened, yea presently sometimes with pinches, nips, bobs, and other ways (which I will not name for the honour I bear them) so without measure misordered, that I think myself in hell, till time come that I must go to Mr. Elmer.... The gentleness of the teacher obviously lies in favorable contrast with parental discipline. Opposed to this picture is that given us by Erasmus of the family life of Sir Thomas More, but the contemporary celebrity of the latter shows that the former was more nearly the rule. Children were regarded as property and, as property, negotiable. Marriages were bought and sold. Of this there is abundant testimony. The Paston Letters, of the latter half of 1 The Whole Works of Roger Ascham, Rev. Dr. Giles, iv, 118. THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE 21 the fifteenth century, have preserved Stephen Scrope's complaint of his guardian: 1 He bought me and sold me as a beast, against all right and law, to mine hurt more than 1000 marks. Yet the same man, with a changed point of view, tells his correspondent that 2 For very need I was fain to sell a little daughter I have for much less than I should have done by possibility. The same conditions prevailed in the sixteenth century. In this spirit the Duke of Norfolk wrote Wolsey: 3 I beseech Your Grace to be a gode Lord unto me concernyng the office of the late lord Mounteagle and to move the King's Grace that for my mony paying, as another wold, I myght have the young man to marry one of my doghters. I think his londe shal be little above mle marks a yere, with wich I wold be well contented, not myndyng to marry my doughters no hier. With marriage considered in this frankly commercial spirit, sentiment evaporates. The result, as was noted at the time, was not happy. In his Dialogue Starkey represents Pole as saying: 4 Among the wych, as I remembyr, was ther notyd the faute of bryngyng vp of the nobylyte, wych, for the most parte, are nuryschyd wyt (h) out cure, bothe of theyr parentys being alyfe, and much wers of them in whose ward commynly they dow fal aftur theyr deth; the wych care for nothyng but only to spoyle theyr pupyllys and wardys, or els to mary them aftur theyr plesure, wherby the true loue of matrymony was and ys vtturly taken away and destroyd; to the wych, as euery man knowyth, succede infynyte myserys and mysordurys of lyfe. The correctness of Cardinal Pole's deduction could be proved by citing a number of examples of unhappy marriages, among which would be listed that of his Grace of Norfolk himself. It is this attitude that makes Henry VIII's marital experiences comprehensible. Thomas, his apologist, explains simply:5 Now, as touching the King's so many wives, whom he chopped and changed at his pleasure (as you say), the truth is, that he hath had a great many wives, and with some of them hath had as ill-luck as any other poor man. 1 Paston Letters, ed. Gairdner, Intro. clxxv. 2 Ibid., Intro. clxxvi. 3 Norfolk to Wolsey, 15 April, 153..... Record Office, Scottish State Papers, ii, no. 7. 4Starkey's Dialogue between Lupset and Pole, ed. Brewer, 186. 6 The Pilgrim, by William Thomas, ed. Froude, 55. EARLY TUDOR POETRY In any case, the situation is only slightly more scandalous than his father's negotiations for a second wife. Marriage then was regarded, not from the point of view of the contracting parties, but from the standpoint of the family. When a man wished otherwise, the easy morality of the sixteenth century allowed unsanctified attachments, since from feudal times the Renaissance had inherited a difference in meaning between the words "lover" and "husband". As this condition was inherited from feudal times, it is illogical to posit it as a result of humanism. On the other hand, the spread of classic culture not only did not remedy the evil, it served to intensify it. In ancient Greece the wife is not the one celebrated in poetry and romance, and while republican Rome has her Cornelias, the luxury of the later city was the attraction for the men of the Renaissance. And a great gain to civilization by the introduction of Christianity, namely the recognition of the rights of the woman and the child, in the sixteenth century had been gravely impaired. To summarize, then, the total effect upon Renaissance England of the working of the classic spirit is difficult. In one respect, it increased the joy of living, but, in another, it did so at the expense of spiritual growth. Humanism, in the minds of such men as Ascham, certainly was associated with a sense of morality almost Puritanical, and yet the very works in which they advocate it are filled with denunciations of its logical results in Italy. These logical results, moreover, the freedom in thought and in life, acting in varying ways, produced the ancestors of the Puritans. Tyndale, Martin Marprelate, Cromwell,-there is a kinship between them, and humanism becomes a factor in the English Reformation. This revival of an interest in classic literatures by stimulating man's intellect stimulated also an interest in the natural world about him. A mind brought into contact with the guesses at truth by the ancient philosophers refused to be satisfied with dogmatic utterances, however authoritative. Modern science was born, and with it the struggle between inspirational and inferential teaching, which is still with us. The conflict between Galileo and the Church, between science and faith, precedes chronologically the debate between Huxley and Gladstone by centuries, but the principle involved is the same. Shall man accept the conclusions of his reason founded upon scientific data when such conclusions THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE are in opposition to the explanations of the same phenonoma given by religious doctrine? The particular question at issue in the sixteenth century was not the cosmogony of Genesis but the substitution of the Copernican for the Ptolemaic system of astronomy. Like other great ideas it advanced slowly. It appears in a rudimentary form in the speculations of the "Pythagoreans" at the end of the fifteenth century. Copernicus, returning from Italy, enunciated it in 1530, and Galileo and Kepler popularized it nearly a century later. During the period with which we deal it was a subtile, unsettling force, destructive rather than constructive, and its effect appears rather in the mental attitude assumed toward things in general. To understand why the abstruse question of the relation of the sun to the earth should have had such momentous consequences it must be remembered what the Ptolemaic system implied. According to the medieval interpretation of this, the earth was a flat plain covered by a series of transparent globes between'which the planets moved with the "music of the spheres". Looking down from above were God and the saints. In the mappamondo in the Campo Santo at Pisa, God is represented as a gigantic figure holding this mechanism. Two deductions followed this conception, each flattering to man's sense of his own importance. The first was the belief in the immediate nearness of the supernatural,-not the telepathic spiritual presence of the Divine, but a corporeal reality that in the Pisan Campo Santo, or in Orcagna's painting in Santa Maria Novella at Florence, or in Giotto's fresco in the Arena Chapel at Padua, is terrible in its grotesqueness. The life of man was a battle between the powers of light and the powers of darkness,-a battle in which the soul played a somewhat passive part. On one side actual tangible devils were awaiting their opportunity; on the other were ranged the Virgin and the saints. In any and all contingencies the repentant sinner could rely upon their aid. Miracles were of common occurrence and, according to report, upon them chiefly depended the repentant scallawag. Many a thief has been spared, many a peril averted, by timely prayers to the saints. In fact it was well known that each saint, and even each madonna, had peculiar prerogatives, and an acute perception of the difference of attributes rendered prayer more efficacious. And this point of view was universal; it was approved 94 EARLY TUDOR POETRY by the Church and recognized by the State; it was held by the monarch, the scholar, the merchant, the priest; it had been tested by thousands; it was so. To a world of such conceptions, imagine the mental upheaval caused by the Copernican theory where the earth is but a restless midge hurtling through space, man an atom in the scheme of things, and God withdrawn beyond the silent voids. No wonder that both Church and State opposed such a doctrine, that Copernicus' books were destroyed, that Galileo was forced to recant, and that Bruno was burned, or that a faint apprehension of its consequences should have brought the whole question of religion to the fore. It was all embracing in its scope and both the mystic and the atheist were equally affected. If the first deduction were important in changing man's conception of his relation to God, the second was no less so in changing his relation to nature. By a literal interpretation of the covenant with Noah, the Middle Ages believed man to be the most important factor in the universe. All things were created for his use, existed for him, and were to be studied in regard to him. As the earth had been given him for his habitation, the assumption was made that all natural phenomena were to be explained in terms of human benefit, and, if that benefit was not obvious, it was because his purblind eyes could not see God's hidden purpose. The meaning was there if only the book of nature could be read. When, for example, a comet appeared, the desire was not to investigate its nature and the law by which it is governed, but to determine its significance, and, as clearly so striking a phenomenon would not be employed upon trifles, its appearance portended battle, murder, or sudden death. If once the premises upon which they argued be accepted, their conclusions are logical; there is nothing absurd in astrology or alchemy. To us, with our knowledge based upon other hypotheses, the science of the Middle Ages seems ridiculous and we make the error of thinking of its professors as simple and child-like. We complacently laugh at an age that could accept such extravagant opinions, and the vast tomes of the schoolmen are read in search of the bizarre, the great acumen and acuteness displayed in the reasoning quite forgotten. But so long as the deductive method only was employed, not in spite of, but because of, the acuteness of the reasoning,-if a man starts in the wrong direction, the farther he goes the farther he goes astray-little THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE progress was possible in science. The pagan Arab it was that studied nature, while Christian Europe was lost in futile speculations. That nature obeys her own laws, quite independent of man's convenience, is a modern conception and one which influences to the last detail the daily life of each of us. Natural law moves on, crushing our protesting impotence, and we have learned that happiness lies in our adjusting ourselves to powers that we may direct but cannot control. The Middle Ages had not learned this. Their disdain of nature permitted habits of life and living conditions clearly unsanitary. Today the back scese of old Naples give a faint appreciation of the actuality of Tudor London. Through the middle of narrow unpaved streets,-one of More's Utopian dreams was of streets twenty feet in width-ran, or stagnated, the accumulated garbage, offal, and sewage of the inhabitants. The unhappy traveller fought for precedence with swine that acted as scavengers. Overhead hovered flocks of kites 1 "which are so tame, that they often take out of the hands of little children, the bread smeared with butter, in the Flemish fashion, given to them by their mothers." Within the halftimbered houses matters were no better.2 First of all, Englishmen never consider the aspect of their doors or windows;next, their chambers are built in such a way as to admit of no ventilation. Then a great part of the walls of the house is occupied with glass casements, which admit light, but exclude the air, and yet they let in the draft through holes and corners, which is often pestilential and stagnates there. The floors are in general laid with white clay, and are covered with rushes, occasionally removed, but so imperfectly that the bottom layer is left undisturbed, sometimes for twenty years, harbouring expectorations, vomitings, the leakage of dogs and men, ale-droppings, scraps of fish, and other abominations not fit to be mentioned. Whenever the weather changes, a vapour is exhaled, which I consider very detrimental to health.... More moderation in diet, and especially in the use of salt meats, might be of service; more particularly were public aediles appointed to see the streets cleaned from mud and urine, and the suburbs kept in better order. That under such sanitation as Erasmus has here described, the plague should be a frequent and terrible visitor is not surprising, 1 Italian Relation, ibid., 11. 2Erasmus to John (?) Francis, Wolsey's physician, translated by Brewer, Reign of Henry VIII, i, 239. 26 EARLY TUDOR POETRY but the particular epidemic which called forth his strictures was the sudor Anglicus, or Sweating Sickness. Dr. Caius, a Welsh physician, had studied it.l In the year of our Lord, 1485, shortly after the seventh day of August, at which time King Henry VII. arrived at Milford, in Wales, out of France, and in the first year of his reign, there chanced a disease among the people, lasting the rest of that month and all September, which for the sudden sharpness and unwonted cruelness passed the pestilence. For this commonly giveth in four, often seven, sometime nine, sometime eleven, and sometime fourteen days, respite to whom it vexeth. But that immediately killed some in opening their windows, some in playing with children in their street doors; some in one hour, many in two, it destroyed; and, at the longest, to them that merrily dined it gave a sorrowful supper. As it found them, so it took them: some in sleep, some in wake, some in mirth, some in care, some fasting and some full, some busy and some idle; and in one house sometime three, sometime five, sometime more, sometime all; of the which, if the half in every town escaped, it was thought great favour. This disease, because it most did stand in sweating from the beginning until the ending, was called The Sweating Sickness; and because it first began in England, it was named in other countries "The English Sweat." This pestilence appeared again in 1506, 1517, 1528(?) and 1551 and it has been calculated that over thirty thousand persons died of it during the five visitations. Precautions seemed uiiless. Du Bellay, the French Ambassador, writes: 2 This sweat, which has made its appearance within these four days, is a most perilous disease. One has a little pain in the head and heart, suddenly a sweat breaks out, and a doctor is useless; for whether you wrap yourself up much or little, in four hours, sometimes in two or three, you are dispatched without languishing, as in those troublesome fevers. However, only about two thousand have caught it in London. Yesterday going to swear the truce, we saw them as thick as flies rushing from the streets and shops into their houses to take the sweat, whenever they felt ill. I found the Ambassador of Milan leaving his lodgings in great haste because two or three had been suddenly attacked.... In London, I assure you, the priests have a better time of it than the doctors, except that the latter do not help to bury. If the thing goes on corn will soon be cheap. It is twelve years since there was such a visitation, when there died ten or twelve thousand persons in ten or twelve days, but it was not so bad as this has been. The Legate (Wolsey) had come for the term (to Westminster), but immediately bridled his horses again, and there will be no term. 1 Storiesfrom State Papers, A. C. Ewald, i, 140. 2 Reign of Henry VIII, ibid., ii, 271. THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE 27 A few days later he writes:1 The King keeps moving about for fear of the plague. Many of his people have died of it in three or four hours... Of 40,000 attacked in London only 2,000 are dead, but if a man only put his hand out of bed during twenty-four hours it becomes stiff as a pane of glass. The panic of both Cardinal and King was not due to unfounded fear, as the former himself had been attacked four separate times and among the immediate attendants of the latter, Bryan Tuke, his Secretary suffered, and Sir William Compton, a favorite courtier, and William Cary, the husband of Mary Boleyn, both died. Even Anne Boleyn herself was attacked. The King made his will and took the sacraments to be prepared for sudden death. The quickness of the disease and its fatality are illustrated in the case of Ammonius, the Latin Secretary and friend of Erasmus. He had arranged at dinner with a friend to ride to Merton the following day to escape the infection; early next morning a messenger arrived to tell the friend that Ammonius had died in eight hours. To combat the evil medical science had receipts of which the three following are typical. Take three large spoonfuls of water of dragons, and a quarter of a spoonful of the treacle of Gean, and half a nutshellfull of unicorn's horn scraped small, and a quarter of a spoonful of fine good powder of maces, and make all that same hot, and so let the patient drink it, and keep him well, neither over hot nor over cold, but whole in his arms and feet, and let him keep him by taking clothes off him by little and little, till he be dried up, and let him use wholesome meats, and by the grace of God he shall not perish. Probatum est of my Lord Darcy and 30 persons in his house all in peril. A proved medicine against the pestilence, called the philosopher's egg.-Take first an egg and break an hole in one end thereof, and do out the white from the yolk as clean as you can; then take whole saffron and fill the shell therewith by the yolk, then close it at both ends with two half egg shells; then rake it in the embers till it be so hard that you may stamp it to fine powder in a mortar, shell and all; then take as much white mustard seed as the weight of the egg and the saffron is and grind it as small as meal; then take the 4th part of an ox. of a dittony root, and as much of turmontell and of crownutes one dram; stamp this three sundry times very fine in a mortar, and then mix them three well together; after take as a thing most needful the root of angelica and pimpernel, of each one drachm, and make them to powder and mix with the rest; then compound herewith 4 or 5 grans a quantity of unicorn's horn if it be possible to be gotten, and take so much weight ' Reign of Henry VIII, Brewer, App. i. 28 EARLY TUDOR POETRY as all these powders come to of fine treacle, and stamp the same with the powders in a mortar, till they be all mixed and hang to the pestle, and then it is perfectly made; put this electuary in glass boxes, and you may keep it 20 or 30 years; the longer the better. Another very true medicine.-For to say every day at seven parts of your body, 7 paternosters, and 7 Ave Marias, with 1 credo at the last. Ye shal begyn at the ryght syde, under the ryght ere, saying the "paternoster qui es in coelis sanctificetur nomen tuum," with a cross made there with your thumb, and so say the paternoster full complete, and 1 Ave Maria, and then under the left ear, and then under the left armhole, and then under the left thigh (?) hole, and then the last at the heart, with 1 paternoster, Ave Maria, with 1 credo; and these thus said daily, with the grace of God is there no manner drede hym. Quod pro certo probatum est cotidie. With remedies like these, which seem about equally good, the terror inspired by the Sweating Sickness may well be imagined. And this was not the only terror; the Black Death 1 was a recurrent visitor in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, while fevers, which are today differentiated and fought individually, then as a single disease exacted their toll. Death was near. Whether the foreground in the literature be fantastic, gorgeous, or joyous, the modern reader must remember that the background was of somber black. Beneath the light vibrant laugh and the staccato tinkle of the lute, he must hear the dull tolling of the sepulchral bell. The effect of these general conditions was to vulgarize and to cheapen death. It was so common that it lost its punitive effect. The "plague" must not be confused with the epidemic of syphilis which raged during the closing years of the fifteenth century. The statement is often made that it was then introduced into Europe by the companions of Columbus. Although without question it was regarded by the physicians of that time as a new disease, the theory of the Columban origin must be received with great caution. The question is at present being hotly debated. Dr. Ivan Bloch of Vienna argues in favor of the theory on the ground that no pre-Columban bones have been found with lesions. The case for the negative is stated by Dr. J. K. Proksch (Geschichte de Geschlechtskrankheiten, Handbuch der Geschlechtskrankheiten, Wien und Leipzig, 1910, I Band, 48-49): "dagegen ist es aus sehr vielen, schon hundertmal dargelegten Grtinden wissenschaftlich absolut unmoglich, diesen drei viel zu spat gekommenen und sonst auch ganz unverlasslichen Zeugen dafiir die endgiiltige Entscheidung zu iiberlassen, dass die Syphilis vor der ersten RUckkehr des Kolumbus aus Amerika (1493) in Europa nicht existiert hat." When doctors disagree, it behooves the layman to be silent. I owe these references to the kindness of Dr. John E. Lane. THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE 29 Of what deterrent value was it merely to kill a man today when probably he would die tomorrow naturally? Thus arose the horrible features of the tortures, of the quarterings, and of the public executions. When capital punishment was the sentence for petty theft, the imagination was called upon for weird horrors when a real crime had been committed. According to Holinshed, twenty-two thousand persons were executed for theft during the reign of Henry VIII and it was the economic loss to the state by this practice that More lamented in the Utopia. Moreover as during the fifteenth century there had been a continual shifting of political parties, and as each party when successful uniformly condemned the defeated, Few families indeed escaped the sentence. At the accession of Henry VII many of the persons to compose parliament, including the King himself, were under sentence of outlawry, and the difficulty was resolved by the judges by the declaration that all under sentence should take seat only after the sentence had been revoked, except the King "by reason of the fact that he has taken upon him the supreme authority, and is king." 1 The fatality of the age may be shown by enumerating the tragedies of the brilliant company assembled for the christening of the future Queen Elizabeth. Henry Bourchier, Earl of Essex, who carried the bason, was killed by a fall from his horse; Henry Courtenay, Marquis of Exeter and Earl of Devonshire, who carried the wax, was beheaded; Henry Grey, Duke of Suffolk and third Marquis of Dorset, who carried the salt, was beheaded; the mother, Anne Boleyn, was beheaded; the godfather, Archbishop Cranmer, was burned at the stake; in the company were Baron Hussey and Lord Rocheford, who were both beheaded, Thomas Boleyn, Earl of Wiltshire, who lived to see both his son and his daughter beheaded, and Lord Darcy whose son-in-law was hanged. It was a grim age, the days of bluff King Hal! The first rift in this darkness is the Copernican doctrine, in that there was conceived the existence of law apart from supernatural agency or human interest. After the idea had been assimilated, the succeeding steps through the centuries seem inevitable. Scientific knowledge, based upon experiments, necessarily accumulated; whereas, so long as it was held that logical deduction 1 Year Book 1, Henry VII, fol 4b. 30 EARLY TUDOR POETRY from premises inspired directly by God was the only procedure, the energy of the Middle Ages had been misdirected. It is for this reason that the answer to an apparently abstruse question such as is that of the relation of the earth to the sun forms one of the mental cleavings between the medieval and the modern man. Contemporaneously with these two vast changes in the mental outlook, produced by the revived interest in classic life and thought and produced by the new scientific point of view, appeared the third great factor that was to revolutionize the world, namely the extension of geographic knowledge. The world of classic civilization, which the Middle Ages had inherited, centered around the Mediterranean Sea. To the north the Empire had extended to the North Sea and England; to the south it was bounded by the Sahara. Beyond these limits was a region of casual myth; there was little to stir even curiosity. To the west lay the Mare Tenebrosum, concerning the bounds of which it was futile to speculate; their attitude towards the ocean was similar to ours in regard to stellar space,-an inability to conceive either an end or an absence of end, and in the meantime an increased interest in matters that we can know. The result was that Europe was backed against the Atlantic and faced the east from whence came her perils. From the earliest times the history of Europe has consisted in resisting invasions from Asia. Greece had the Persian and Rome had the Parthian. With the fall of the Empire a succession of barbarian tribes overran Europe. To the Middle Ages the conflict between the Cross and the Crescent was still reality without romance. It was not until 1492 that the Moors were driven from Granada, and not until 1683 that the tide was finally turned by the victory of Jan Sobieski under the walls of Vienna. During the whole of the Renaissance the Great Turk was an ever-present menace. However delightful danger may be in retrospect, rarely is one sufficiently philosophic to enjoy the present peril, and Europe, "facing mornward still", had no leisure to enjoy the thrill. With the passing of the ages of faith, the unification given by that faith had gone, and a Renaissance picture is that of Pius II dying on the mole at Ancona after he had summoned all Christendom for a final crusade against the Turk,-and waited in vain! If Europe's interest in Asia was due partly to fear, it was also due partly to love of gain. There were three great trade routes THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE 31 from Europe to the far east; the northern, via the Caspian Sea, the Oxus, to the Indus; the middle, through Syria, down the Euphrates to the Persian Gulf; and the southern, via the Red Sea. By the rise of the Saracen Empire in the seventh and eighth centuries the southern and middle of these routes had passed into the control of the Arabs. The possession of the sole remaining route explains the commercial prosperity first of Constantinople, and later of Venice. The stately palaces on the Grand Canal rose from the profits of the trade, since from the thirteenth century Venice was the natural port of the products of the east. Venetian galleys carried indigo, incense, gumarabic, aloes, myrrh, lake, nutmegs, cloves, cardamums, and other spices, ginger, camphor, rice, muslins, silk stuffs, almonds, wax, cubebs, oil, malmsey, sugar, currants, honey, pigments, vitriol, rock alum, etc. etc. to all parts of western Europe. As there was no refrigeration, condiments were used in cooking to an amount unapproached in modern times and all spices came from the Orient. In 1453, however, the last route for this commerce was closed to Europe by the capture of Constantinople by the Turks, and Asia was apparently lost. Its glories as told by the occasional traveller, such as Marco Polo, or by the occasional missionary, such as Friar Odoric, took on the lustre of romance. The travels of "Sir John Mandeville" and the Epistle of Prester John were accepted at their face value. The grossly fictitious mingled with the actual because men had lost the ability to distinguish between fact and fiction, and the whole subject shone with the light that is the peculiar property of things that are lost. Even now Kubla Khan is a king in dreams! During the last half of the fifteenth century Europeans were bent upon recovering their lost inheritance. Although the eastern routes were closed to them, there yet remained the ocean at their back. Already Prince Henry of Portugal had been sending his ships farther and farther down the African coast. Cape Verde was passed in 1445; in 1471 the equator was crossed; the mouth of the Congo was found in 1484; and three years later the Cape of Good Hope received its name. At the close of the century, after having triumphantly circumnavigated Africa, Vasco da Gama returned with 1 "nutmegs and cloves, pepper and ginger, rubies and emeralds, damask robes with satin linings, bronze chairs with 1 Prince Henry the Navigator, Major, 398-401. 32 EARLY TUDOR POETRY cushions, trumpets of carved ivory, a sunshade of crimson satin, a sword in a silver scabbard, etc." Europe was again in contact with the East. While the Portuguese were hunting for the eastern passage around Africa, the possibility of reaching Asia by sailing directly west had also been suggested. Before 1474 Toscanelli, a Florentine astronomer, had sent Columbus a map showing this direct route. Later, in reply to Columbus, he adds: 1 I am very much pleased to see that I have been well understood, and that the voyage has become not only possible but certain, fraught with honour as it must be, and inestimable gain, and most lofty fame among all Christian people. You cannot take in all that it means except by actual experience, or without such copious and accurate information as I have had from eminent and learned men who have come from those places to the Roman Court, and from merchants who have traded a long time in those parts, persons whose word is to be believed (persone di grande autoritA). When that voyage shall be accomplished, it will be a voyage to powerful kingdoms, and to cities and provinces most wealthy and noble, abounding in all sorts of things most desired by us; I mean, with all kinds of spices and jewels in great abundance. It will also be advantageous for those kings and princes who are eager to have dealings and make alliances with the Christians of our countries, and to learn from the erudite men of these parts, as well in religion as in all other branches of knowledge. The interest in this well-known passage lies in the number of motives suggested for the undertaking. To discover the Indies would appeal equally to the merchant, to the scholar, and to the statesman. Although indicated rather than mentioned in the letter, there was another strong appeal, the desire to spread the Christian religion. Practically, then, the interest not only of all that wrote books but also of all that bought books was excited by this western experiment. In literature the new conception also made its appearance. In the Morgante Maggiore of Pulci, the demon Astarotte informs Rinaldo that beyond the Pillars of Hercules in the other hemisphere are cities, and castles, and government. As the passage was written in 1488, four years before the voyage of Columbus, at the Florentine court the possibility of making such a trip was a matter of common speculation. This does not, of course, detract from the splendor of Columbus' achievement; it merely shows that in his case, as in that of Copernicus, the conception did not spring MinTranslated by Fiske: Discovery of America, i, 361-362. THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE 33 erva-like from his single brain, but was the offspring of many minds. It must be remembered, however, in discussing the effect upon literature of the discovery of America, that it was a long time before it was realized that it was a new world that had been discovered. At first the belief was that it was the coast of Asia, and later that the American continent was only an island obstructing the route. The problem was how to pass around it. Accordingly, the interest in the discovery was at first little more than curiosity. In January, 1502, as we are told in the London Chronicle, three men were brought to England "oute of an Iland founde by merchaunts of Bristoll farre beyong Ireland, the which were clothed in Beeste skynnes and ate raw flessh, and were in their demeanour as Beests". In 1508 Barclay, adapting Locher's Latin version of Brandt's German poem, concludes that it is all folly.1 For nowe of late hath large londe and grounde Ben founde by maryners and crafty gouernours The whiche londes were neuer knowen nor founde Byfore our tyme by our predecessours And here after shall by our successours Parchaunce mo be founde, wherein mren dwell Of whome we neuer before this same harde tell Ferdynandus that late was kynge of spayne Of londe and people hath founde plenty and store Of whome the bydyifge to us was vncertayne No christen man of them harde tell before Thus is it foly to tende unto the lore And vnsure science of vayne geometry Syns none can knowe all the worlde perfytely. To many people living in 1500 the discovery of the American continent produced the same reaction as did the discovery of the North Pole to many people living in the twentieth century. There was the thrill of adventure and of achievement, coupled with the same doubts of utility. But as voyage followed voyage, as the coast line became more clearly marked and as colonies began to be settled, the wonder of the wideness of the world was brought home to them. Tales of Aztecs and Incas, marvellous in very truth and still more marvellous in the stories told by the 1 Ship of Fools, Jamieson, 1874, ii, 26. 34 EARLY TUDOR POETRY soldiers of Cortez and Pizarro, spread over Europe. The effect of these travellers' tales was to stimulate the imagination. The real and the fabulous became confused. To the excited sailor a manatee upright in the sea nursing its young seemed a mermaid; classic myth has nothing more monstrous than the giant octopus; and Prester John himself is no more improbable than Montezuma. Our geography is defined and exact, and illustrated with photographs; theirs had all the fascination of mystery, the intoxication of danger, and the lure of romance. Yet, owing to the fact that the significance of the discovery was not appreciated for a long time, the effect upon the imagination was of gradual growth, and for the first half of the sixteenth century it is rather a general than a specific cause of literary inspiration. Not until the generation of Spenser and Shakespeare and Raleigh is it possible to cite concrete illustrations of its working. To them all truth seemed unconfined and the human mind free to wander at will. The line dividing fact from fancy became almost obliterated. As Spenser playfully argues, Faeryland is no more unreal than America.1 Right well I wote most mighty Soueraine, That all this famous antique history, Of some th' abundance of an idle braine Will iudged be, and painted forgery, Rather then matter of iust memory, Sith none, that breatheth liuing aire, does know, Where is that happy land of Faery, Which I so much do vaunt, yet no where show, But vouch antiquities, which no body can know But let that man with better sence aduize, That of the world least part to vs is red: And dayly how through hardy enterprize, Many great Regions are discourered, Which to late age were neuer mentioned. Who euer heard of th' Indian Peru? Or who in venturous vessell measured The Amazons huge river now found trew? Or fruitfullest Virginia who did euer vew? Yet all these were, when no man did them know; Yet haue from wisest ages hidden beene: And later times things more unknowne shall show. The Foerie Queene, Spenser, Bk. ii, Prologue, Oxford, 1909. THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE 35 Why then should witlesse man so much misweene That nothing is, but that which he hath seene? What if within the Moones faire shining spheare? What if in euery other starre unseene Of other worldes he happily should heare? He wonder would much more: yet such to some appeare. As Spenser here implies, this stimulation was not limited to questions dealing only with material subjects; it passed over also into the spiritual realm. Hamlet's retort, There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy, is characteristic of the age. The old limits, grown hard and fixed through the centuries, were broken and the imagination grew with the wonders it fed on. Literature, which without this third factor might have been confined to close analysis such as is the Prince of Macchiavelli, became broad as life itself. And, as imagination bodies forth The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen Turns them to shape, and gives to airy nothing A local habitation and a name. At this critical moment in the development of Europe when these three great ideas were to change to the smallest detail the outlook on life, came the invention of printing by movable type. Previously the number of books had been few and the texts inaccurate. The catalogue of the library of Oriel College in 1375 lists only one hundred items, and yet this was a famous collection. Chaucer's scholar dreams of twenty! By this new method books became accessible to the many and the texts were based upon the collation of manuscripts. Still more, a new work could spread over Europe in a comparatively short time. The all-pervasiveness of the printed page today has obscured for most of us the importance of the press in our daily life; like the air we breathe we are conscious of it only when something goes wrong. Although the old proverb, Vita sine libris est morti: imago, would relegate the great mass of medieval life to the mortuary, yet our modern life is dependent to a very great degree upon our mental contact 36 EARLY TUDOR POETRY with our fellows. Progress is due not so much to the individual but to the united effort of all working in the same field, a condition which implies that the individual must himself be conscious of his fellow workmen. Such unity of thought as is here required is given by the press. Without its invention the other three factors would have operated, doubtless, and in time man's spirit would have been freed. But without question the time would have been incomparably longer. As it was, the invention of printing came at a time when man was full of utterance and by it his voice was carried everywhere. It was in vain that laws were passed against the influx of the Lutheran heresy; in vain that Calvin was condemned; Tyndall's Bible, printed in the Netherlands, found its way to all parts of England. The Devil had to be fought with fire, and the greater proportion of More's works are controversial and in English. Even the King himself was forced to enter the arena. By the invention of the press the nation was rendered sensitive to every fresh current of thought. Public opinion was created,-a fact that explains the position of Erasmus and the power of Aretino. And finally, by the reaction of mind on mind due to its agency, is evolved the modern man. Such is the Renaissance, the re-birth. Of course the term is a misnomer, in that life is necessarily continuous and these four factors operated through an extended period of time. Yet it makes the sixteenth century a period set apart. As Wordsworth says of the cataclysmic years of the French Revolution, Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive; But to be young was very heaven. O times In which the meager, stale, forbidding ways Of custom, law, and statute took at once The attraction of a country in romance. so here there was the same receptibility of impression. As in the life of an individual it is platitudinous to say that the clock does measure his life, so a nation or a race seems at some times to live more intensely than at others. The long, slow, fat years of peaceful sloth are followed by others of great intellectual activity and of strenuous intellectual endeavor. Such a time was the Renaissance. By the four great factors, which have just been outlined, all men were affected-but they were not affected equally by all factors, THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE 37 nor all by any one factor to an equal degree. One man might be interested in the humanistic revival, but might believe that scientific interests were negligible and that the Reformation was the work of unlettered barbarians; whereas another, equally sincere and equally of the age, might feel that the Rome of Leo was the Beast of Revelations and Leo himself the! incarnate Anti-Christ. The Renaissance seems to consist of a bewildering variety of brilliant individuals, with nothing in common except that the characteristics of each are described with a superlative. Great saints, Saint Theresa; great sinners, Cesar Borgia; great thinkers, Macchiavelli; great scientists, Copernicus; great scholars, Budeus; great artists, Leonardo; great poets, Ariosto; great knights, Bayard; great blaggards, Aretino. Names at hazard throng the mind, each a vivid personality and one which the world has not forgotten. The same paradoxical contrast may be found even within the limits of a single life. More, who has been beatified, argued for religious toleration, wore a haircloth shirt and prided himself on persecuting heretics. Henry, the Defender of the Faith, was the first Protestant king of England. There is no need to pile up instances. Forces that had been accumulating for centuries had broken loose, swirling in a mighty whirlpool and engulfing all. But the effect of the forces on any individual varied according to his temperament and according to the time. What is true of one man is not necessarily true of another; what is true of one man at a certain time is not necessarily true of the same man at another time. The total result is bewildering because each particle is in constant motion,-and therein lies the fascination of the study. Up to this point the general reasoning, with a change in dating, would be applicable to any of the European countries, and the illustrations might have been drawn from any one of them. When the reasoning is narrowed specifically to England, however, still another factor is introduced, the social conditions there, because literature like every other commodity obeys the laws of supply and demand. The buyer buys the book because he wishes to read it; he wishes to read it because he finds it interesting. The popularity of a book in any given section is, therefore, a direct indication of the state of mind of the people in that section. Conversely, since an author composes in the expectation that his work will be 38 EARLY TUDOR POETRY read, the kind of work done is conditioned by the public state of mind. However true this statement of the relationship between the author and his public is now, the same statement holds to a still greater degree in the Renaissance. Men of education, namely both the writers and the readers, tended automatically to collect around a court, and in each court there was a definite literary public and literary opinion. Each Italian state, for example, produced a local school, which differed in its output from the others. The Neapolitan differs from the Tuscan, the Tuscan from the Ferrarese, etc., and it is not until the Spanish domination, after 1530, that the writers lose their distinguishing characteristics in the bathos of Petrarchan imitation. In England also, so far as it is a question of formal literature, it was limited to court circles. London dominates. In the first place, the country was so scantily populated that it attracted the attention of the Italian Traveller.1 I rode, as your Magnificence knows, from Dover to London, and from London to Oxford, a distance of more than 200 Italian miles, and it seemed to me to be very thinly inhabited; but, lest the way I went with your Magnificence should have differed from the other parts of the country, I enquired of those who rode to the north of the kingdom, i. e. to the borders of Scotland, and was told that it was the same case there; nor was there any variety in the report of those who went to Bristol and into Cornwall. His observation is supported by modern researches. In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, York had declined "in inhabitants as well as in position and wealth." 2 By 1547 the number of people in Plymouth had fallen from the medieval count over fifty per cent.3 The great western and central cities, with the exception of Bristol, are relatively modern. Clearly war and the plague had done their work. In the second place, not only were the provinces less important, but, measured in time, they were more distant. For example, in 1515 the Venetian ambassador spent a day on the road between Dover and Canterbury. Travelling was not only incommodious, it was also dangerous.4 Small parties slowly pick1 Ibid., 31. 2 Jas. Raine, History of York, 202. 3 R. N. Worth, History of Plymouth, 26. 4R. Brown, Four Years at the Court of Henry VIII, I, 60. For the general condition, cf. the long note in Croft's edition of Elyot's Gouernour, ii, 81-84, where the legislative acts are given. THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE 39 ing their way over miry and rutty roads were liable to be set upon by thieves, so liable, in fact, that in 1506 Quirini in the suite of Philip preferred to await his master several months rather than brave the dangers of the road to London.' That this fear was only slightly exaggerated is shown by the comment of the Italian: 2 There is no country in the world where there are so many thieves and robbers as in England; insomuch, that few venture to go alone in the country, excepting in the middle of the day, and fewer still in the towns at night, and least of all in London. Geographically, culture, so far as it found expression in formal literature, was almost confined to the south of England. The expression "formal literature" has been used to differentiate the type of work which will be considered in the following chapters from the ballads with which we have no concern. The scarcity of population and the difficulty of communication give the explanation to the phenonenon that in the Renaissance two different literatures existed simultaneously and, as it were, in parallel planes. In the first, the authors are generally known; they are connected with the Court; the composition is pretentious, follows definite models, and is responsive to European influences: in the second, the authors are generally anonymous; the composition is simple, and follows the ballad form. The antithesis between these two may be carried indefinitely. Court poetry deals with European subject matter, often after European models; the ballads deal primarily with English subjects, usually in the conventional quatrain: nature in the first is seen through books; in the second it is studied from life; action in the first is slow and detailed; in the second it is rapid and suggested; the art of the first is studied and formal; in the second it is spontaneous and real. It is to be added that references in the first class to poems of the second class are apt to be supercilious,3 and lastly that, while the little skiffs of the second class have triumphantly floated down the centuries, the great galleons of the first have succumbed to wind and weather. Another feature to be considered for its effect upon the literature is the political situation. When, August twenty-second, 1 England under the Tudors, by Dr. Wilhelm Busch, 1895, i, 253. 2 Italian Relation, ibid., 34. I wryte no lest ne tale of Robyn hode. Barclay, Ship of Fools, Jamieson, ii, 331. 40 EARLY TUDOR POETRY 1485, the crown which had rolled from the head of Richard IV was picked from the hawthorne bush to be placed upon that of Henry, Duke of Richmond, the old order had passed. The long struggle between York and Lancaster, which history poetically calls the Wars of the Roses, had necessarily been unfavorable to authors. Scarcely a writer survives as a personality, with the exception of Lydgate and Occleve whose works are read only by specialists. With the exception of the ballads there are few pieces that have any interest beyond the philological. This condition is not surprising. England had suffered the throes of civil war for generations and war, although it may offer subject matter for literature, rarely grants the leisure necessary for composition. Yet too much emphasis must not be placed upon these wars in discussing the literary output, because their action was sporadic. It must be remembered that Caxton was apparently placidly issuing his books at Westminster when Edward IV was still upon the throne, while Richard III had usurped the power by the murder of his nephews, and during the battle of Bosworth Field. The reign of Edward IV of twenty-two years had given stability that, in spite of the episodic career of Richard III, was continued by Henry VII. To establish his dynasty upon a firm foundation was the first problem of the new monarch. Henry's claim to the throne was at best questionable. The direct Plantagenet line had ceased with the deposition of Richard II, the son of the Black Prince and grandson of Edward III. The Lancastrian branch claimed descent from John of Gaunt, the fourth son of Edward III, and the York branch from Edmund Langley, the fifth son. But Henry Tudor claimed descent only from an illegitimate connection of John of Gaunt with Katherine Swynford, a connection that had been legitimized by Richard II, but whose descendants had been excluded from the throne by Henry IV. Moreover, Henry Tudor derived his right through his mother, and if descent through the distaff side were accepted, all the Yorkist heirs had a prior claim. Even the choice of him to lead the insurrection was apparently due to Archbishop Morton, the patron of More. At the battle he had only five thousand soldiers and the victory was gained by the aid at the decisive moment of three thousand more under William Stanley. His right to the throne consisted in his being considered the most valuable man in his party and his pos THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE 41 session of it was due to troops over whom he had no control. Under such circumstances his seat was far from secure. Evidently with this in mind the Italian remarks: 1 This kingdom has been, for the last 600 years, governed by one king, who is not elected, but succeeds by hereditary right. Should there be no direct heir, and the succession be disputed, the question is often settled by the force of arms.... And, heretofore, it has always been an understood thing, that he who lost the day lost the kingdom. In relation to the attitude of the people toward their sovereign he says:2... but from what I understand few of them are very loyal. They generally hate their present and extol their dead sovereigns. Such was the condition confronting Henry Tudor. To meet the problem the first act of the new reign was the authorization of his title by Parliament. Then by marriage with Elizabeth, the heiress of the Yorkist faction, Henry united in his children the claims of the two parties. The necessity for such action is apparent in the light of the insurrection of Lambert Simnel, personating the Earl of Warwick., a possible Yorkist heir, and of Peter Warbeck, personating one of the princes murdered in the tower. Later, by means of the marriage of his son Arthur to the Infanta of Spain, he gained European recognition for his dynasty. Beyond this, his policy may be defined as avoidance of foreign complications, conciliatory measures at home, and an accumulation of treasure that would enablte him to be independent of Parliament. His success in the last of these aims may be estimated from the fact that in 1497 the Milanese ambassador valued his treasure at ~1,350,000,-a sum so vast, considering the purchasing power of money at that time, that it seems an incredible amount to have been amassed in twelve years. In discussing the social factors affecting the early years of Henry VIII, then, these two must be borne in mind; first, a sense of social inferiority with other sovereigns, a feeling none the less strong because it was never expressed, and second, the possession of this large amount of ready money. The first gave Henry the desire and the second I Italian Relation, ibid., 46. 2 Ibd. EARLY TUDOR POETRY the means for the somewhat vulgar love of display so characteristic of his Court. To this analysis of early Tudor society one more factor, and that the most important from the point of view of the type of literature produced at the Court, must be added, namely the personalities of the rulers. The modern reader must remember that, as there was no reading public, there was no such thing as the profession of letters. Authorship was merely incidental. For example, Hawes was Groom of the Chamber to Henry VII, Barclay a monk, Skelton first royal tutor and then Rector of Diss, More a lawyer, Heywood a courtier, Surrey and Wyatt nobles, etc. Writing books was a side issue, a polite accomplishment. And the literature of the Court has a personal, intimate, almost epistolary tone; while occasionally books were written addressed to all England, such as the Ship of Fools, they were usually composed with a definite circle of readers before the mind of the writer. Caxton's prefaces are really open letters. His allusion to Skelton, for example, in the dedication to his Eneydos would be understood because the majority of his readers knew Skelton personally. It was a small world. And in this world dominated naturally the personality of the king. He it was that could make, or mar, a writer's fortune, his approbation meant success, and his disapproval spelled failure. Of the two Tudor kings, Henry VII may be dismissed with few words. During his reign modern English literature is just beginning. His preference was for French, due to his early residence abroad, and a Frenchman Andr6 was his official historiographer. He was fond of music and encouraged songwriting, again especially in foreign languages. His account book shows various items paid for books, unfortunately omitting the titles. Once only does it state that Verard received six pounds for printing two volumes entitled the Gardyn of Helth. To the Conventual monastery at Greenwich he presented a "valuable" library. And he advanced Pynson ten pounds to enable him to print a book of the mass. These meager details show merely that he was not averse to learning. Probably the great problems of statecraft had absorbed his energies, leaving him slight inclination for literature. Henry VIII, on the contrary, is the protagonist of the Renaissance in England. Early in his lifetime the hope of the nation THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE 43 centered upon him. Hawes, in a poem dedicated to Henry VII, after celebrating the virtues of his father and mother, thus eulogizes the young prince in a burst of lyric exuberance.1 Thus God, by grace did well combine The Red Rose and the White in marriage. Being oned, right clear doth shine In all cleanness and virtuous courage; Of whose right and royal lineage, Prince Henry is sprung, our King to be, After his father, by right good equity. 0, noble Prince Henry! our second treasure, Surmounting in virtue and mirror of beauty! O. gem of gentleness and lantern of pleasure! 0, rubicund blossom and star of humility! 0, famous bud, full of benignity! I pray to God well for to increase Your high Estate in rest and peace! Shortly before this comes the celebrated account of Erasmus.2 I was staying at Lord Mountjoy's country house when Thomas More came to see me, and took me out with him for a walk as far as the next village, where all the King's children, except Prince Arthur, who was then the eldest son, were being educated. When we came into the hall, the attendants not only of the palace, but also of Mountjoy's household, were all assembled. In the midst stood Prince Henry, then nine years old, and having already something of royalty in his demeanour, in which there was a certain dignity combined with singular courtesy. On his right was Margaret, about eleven years of age, afterwards married to James, King of Scots; and on his left played Mary, a child of four. Edmund was an infant in arms. More, with his companion Arnold, after paying his respects to the boy Henry, the same that is now King of England, presented him with some writing. For my part, not having expected anything of the sort, I had nothing to offer, but promised that on another occasion I would in some way declare my duty towards him. Meantime I was angry with More for not having warned me, especially as the boy sent me a little note, while we were at dinner, to challenge something from my pen. I went home, and in the Muses' spite, from whom I had been so long divorced, finished the poem within three days. The popular conception of Henry as only a bestial corpulent tyrant must be revised if one is to understand the age. In every 1 Hawes, Example of Virtue, 295-296, Dunbar Anthology, ed. Arber, 294. 2 Epistles of Erasmus, F. M. Nichols, i, 201. 44 EARLY TUDOR POETRY way, physically, mentally, morally, he was the personified ideal. To the people at large he seemed the embodiment of the typical Englishman. His delight in archery, in wrestling, in joust and in tourney, his skill on the tennis court and his boldness at the hunt, thrilled men to whom mental attainment meant little. As Professor Pollard aptly remarks: "Suppose there ascended the throne today a young Prince, the hero of the athletic world, the finest oar, the best bat, the crack marksman of his day, it is easy to imagine the enthusiastic support he would receive from thousands of his people who care much for sport, and nothing at all for politics." But mentally he was equally fortunate in pleasing the scholar. His education had been unusually careful,-to such a degree that Lord Herbert of Cherbury, a century later, was led to assume that he had been destined for the Church. He knew Latin well, spoke French easily, understood Italian, and later acquired Spanish. His father's love of music he had inherited; he composed pieces, one of which, Pastime with good company, is occasionally heard now. He set the example to his Court in making verses, both in English and French. He was an enthusiastic humanist, defending the "Greeks" against the "Trojans" at Oxford, and attracted many men of learning to his Court. Finally in 1521 his book against Luther was finished,-a work that, however much revised by others, was yet his own,-and the Pope granted him the title Fidei Defensor. He was certainly distinguished for his excellences for the first half of his reign. The Venetian ambassador, representing the shrewdest court in Europe, would have no object in giving an account untrue because flattering, since his letter would be read only by his own rulers in Venice. His report would be marked by calm analysis, because its object was to enable the Venetian Council to estimate the character of the King as a leading piece in the game of European politics. The following report was, therefore, a statement of the facts as seen by the writer, and is free from the suspicion of self-interest that might be inferred in the case of an Englishman, or even of Erasmus.2 1 Henry VIII, A. F. Pollard, 41. 2 Calendar of State Papers and Manuscripts, Relating to English Affairs, Existing in the Archives and collections of Venice, and in other libraries of Northern Italy, ed. by Rawdon Brown, 1871, iv, 293. THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE 45 In this Eighth Henry, God combined such corporal and mental beauty, as not merely to surprise but to astound all men. Who could fail to be struck with admiration on perceiving the lofty position of so glorious a prince to be in such accordance with his stature, giving manifest proof of that intrinsic mental superiority which is inherent in him? His face is angelic rather than handsome; his head imperial (Cesarina) and bald, and he wears a beard, contrary to English custom. Who would not be amazed when contemplating such singular corporal beauty, coupled with such bold address, adapting itself with the greatest ease to every manly exercise. He sits his horse well, and manages him yet better; he jousts and wields his spear, throws the quoit, and draws the bow, admirably; plays at tennis most dexterously; and nature having endowed him in youth with such gifts, he was not slow to enhance, preserve and augment them with all industry and labour. It seeming to him monstrous for a prince not to cultivate moral and intellectual excellence, so from childhood he applied himself to grammatical studies, and then to philosophy and holy writ, thus obtaining the reputation of a lettered and excellent Prince. Besides the Latin and his native tongue, he learned Spanish, French, and Italian. He is kind and affable, full of graciousness and courtesy, an: liberal; particularly so to men of science (virtuosi), whom he is never weary of obliging. Such a characterization, however false it may appear to modern eyes, enables us to comprehend the exultation in England upon Henry's accession that is shown by Mountjoy in his letter to Erasmus.' What, my dear Erasmus, may you not look for from a prince, whose great qualities no one knows better than yourself, and who not only is no stranger to you, but esteems you so highly! He has written to you, as you will perceive, under his own hand, an honour which falls but to few. Could you but see how nobly he is bearing himself, how wise he is, his love for all that is good and right, and espcially his love for men of learning, you would need no wings to fly into the light of this new risen and salutary star. Oh, Erasmus, could you but witness the universal joy, could you but see how proud our people are of their new sovereign, you would weep for pleasure. Heaven smiles, earth triumphs, and flows with milk and honey and nectar. This king of ours is no seeker after gold, or gems, or mines of silver. He desires only the fame of virtue and eternal life. I was lately in his presence. He said that he regretted that he was still so ignorant; I told him that the nation did not want him to be himself learned, the nation wanted him only to encourage learning. He replied that without knowledge life would not be worth our having. With such a paragon on the throne no wonder men looked for a new Golden Age! Literature and Learning united to call him blessed and the Renaissance in England was incarnate in her King. In modern opinion this aspect of Henry's character is apt to be 1 Life and Letters of Erasmus, J. A. Froude, 90. 46 EARLY TUDOR POETRY obscured by the moral issue and that in turn to be discussed in terms of abstract morality. Of a king that married six wives, executed two and divorced two, that sent to the block More and Fisher, that, using men as his instruments, ruthlessly abandoned them when they no longer served his purpose, what good can be said? And it was under this king, also, that the Church of England separated from the Church of Rome,-a fact which has biassed many writers. Moral standards, however, vary from age to age. In accordance with the standards of his age, Henry's character stands as high certainly as those of his fellow sovereigns, higher in fact than that of the profligate Francis. And although it is true that during the lifetime of Katherine Henry had at least two illicit connections, it is equally true that it was not on that account that moral indignation was excited against him. The peculiarity of his case lies in the fact that he tried to legalize his amours in order to legitimize the possible heir to the throne. Even in his excesses he showed care for the State. That he was far from the sensual monstrosity of popular legend is also shown by the comparative purity of the literature.1 That the age was coarse and brutal is obvious; the astonishing feature is that, in comparison with either the Italian or the French, the English literature is so pure in intention. And if, as has been suggested, Court literature takes its color from the character of the king, this freedom from the erotic must be due, at least to some degree, to Henry himself. Henry's dominance of his age seems perplexing, His acts seem those of a tyrant, callously shedding the blood of the noblest and the best, and carelessly sacrificing any interest in opposition to his own. Professor Pollard's statement of the enigma is worth quoting.2 Henry's standing army consisted of a few gentlemen pensioners and yeomen of the guard; he had neither secret police nor organized bureaucracy. Even then Englishmen boasted that they were not slaves like the French, and foreigners pointed a finger of scorn at their turbulence. Had they not permanently or temporarily deprived of power nearly half their kings who had reigned since William the Conqueror? Yet Henry VIII not only left them their arms, but repeatedly urged them to keep those arms ready for use. He eschewed that air of mystery with which tyrants have usually sought to impose on the mind of the people. All his life he moved familiarly and almost unguarded in the midst of his subjects, and 1 English conditions are almost omitted in the renaissance chapter of Das Erotische Element in der Karikatur by Eduard Fuchs. 2 Henry VIII, ibid., 3. THE BACKGROUND TO THE LITERATURE 47 he died in his bed, full of years, with the spell of his power unbroken and the terror of his name unimpaired. The answer is that in Henry two antagonistic points of view found expression. The nation at large had learned from the bitter lesson of the late wars the value of stable government. To it Henry represented, just as his daughter Elizabeth did in the second half of the century, the personified State. His sudden death, or death without heirs, threatened anarchy. Therefore Parliament in any crisis was willing to legalize his action. By Parliament and by the nation any individual, even as reverend as Fisher or as saintly as More, would be sacrificed if his living endangered the common good, irrespective of abstract justice. There is, consequently, the anomaly that, if Henry be a criminal, the English nation was particeps criminis. Henry himself, on the other hand, was saved from the sense of this paralyzing responsibility, by the individualism characteristic of the whole Renaissance. So both parties accepted the sentiment of Louis XIV, L'etat c'est moi,-with this essential difference, however, that the nation stressed the subject of the sentence and the sovereign the predicate. This condition appears but once more in English history, in Henry's daughter Elizabeth. In both cases there is a despotic government, conducted along parliamentary lines, yet the sovereign, both by himself and the nation, is considered to represent the nation. The result in each case was a strong popular government, and, historically, the dominance of England. Through the turmoil of that age the nation led by her King passed in almost unbroken calm. The great question of the separation from the Papacy was settled in England without a French Saint Bartholomew, or a German civil strife; through almost continuous years of peace the martial prestige of England steadily grew; and a country which at his birth was rent by innumerable internal dissensions, at his death was strong and unified; the dynasty, started by his usurping father, was so well established by him that his daughter, Mary Tudor, had but to appear to have all England hail her as queen. Without an appreciation of the magnitude of his accomplishment, the literature of his reign seems merely a sporadic development, and without an appreciation of the literature of his reign, the great literature of the Elizabethan age, of Shakespeare and of Spenser, is an unrelated, inexplicable phenomenon. CHAPTER II THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION In history the Battle of Bosworth Field marks an epoch. It is the turning of the tide that comes to the full a century later. The disastrous French wars of Henry VI, followed by the still more disastrous civil strife between York and Lancaster, had almost removed England as a factor from European politics. After the accession of Henry VII, however, civil strife dwindled into a few insignificant insurrections, and foreign warfare was negligible. In literature for the same reason the Battle of Bosworth Field marks an epoch. The presence of literature implies not only leisure for the writer, but also leisure for the reader, and England had been at war spasmodically for half a century. Consequently after Lydgate there is no uniform literary development, each poem is casual, and the appearance of poetry seems sporadic. During this time there was no English writer who survived as a personality and no book of general interest with the exception of the prose Morte Darthur. When once again the country had returned to a state of equilibrium and again there was a demand for literary production, writers found themselves without definite literary models. Their effort to adapt medieval or foreign models, or to originate their own, is the subject of this book; their modification of the traditionary English treatment is the subject of this chapter. Before proceeding further, it may be well to lodge a caveat. There has been a tendency in recent writers to assume that the Renaissance in England was completely severed from the past. Actually this is not so. In spite of the irregularity and vagueness of the English tradition it is astonishingly strong, due to the vendetta-like nature of the conflict. Battles, on which the possession of the kingdom depended, were fought with comparatively small armies, and small sections of the country only were involved. Elsewhere men went about their business as usual. Naturally, as is shown by the Paston Letters, to each man his own affairs bulked large, and the chief interest in the bewildering political changes 48 THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 49 was how they would affect him personally. The life of the nation went on fairly normally. As Gairdner says: 1 "Education, nevertheless, was making undoubted progress,. both among high and low. Eton College and King's College, Cambridge, had been founded by Henry VI... (in 1479) he (William Paston) sends him (his brother John) also a specimen of his performances in Latin versification. It is not a very brilliant production, certainly, but the fact of his sending it to his elder brother shows that John Paston too had gone through a regular classical training on the system which has prevailed in all public schools down to the present day." And again: 2 "But these letters show that during the century before the Reformation the state of education was by no means so low, and its advantages by no means so exceptionally distributed, as we might otherwise imagine... No person of any rank or station in society above mere labouring men seems to have been wholly illiterate. All could write letters; most persons could express themselves in writing with ease and fluency. Not perhaps that the accomplishment was one in which it was considered an honour to excel. Hands that had been accustomed to grasp the sword were doubtless easily fatigued with the pen... Men of high rank generally sign their letters, but scarcely ever write them with their own hands. And well was it, in many cases, for their correspondents that they did not do it oftener. Whether, like Hamlet, they thought it a baseness to write fair, and left such 'yeoman's service' to those who had specially qualified themselves for it; or whether, absorbed by other pursuits, they neglected an art which they got others to practice for them, the nobility were generally the worst writers of the day." But a catalogue, unfortunately much injured, of probably John Paston the younger gives a list of representative books.3 "His library, or that of his brother John, contained 'the death of Arthur,' the story of Guy of Warwick, chronicles of the English kings from Coeur de Lion to Edward III., the legend of Guy and Colbrand, and various other chronicles and fictions suited to knightly culture; besides moral treatises, like Bishop Alcock's Abbey of the Holy Ghost, and poetical and imaginative books, such as the poems of Chaucer-at least 1 Paston Letters, Gairdner, Introduction, ccclxiv. 2 Ibid.., ccclxiii. 3 Ibid., ccclxviii. The original inventory, 869, is given Vol. iii, 800. 50 EARLY TUDOR POETRY his Troilus and Cressida, his Legend of Ladies (commonly called the Legend of Good Women), his Parliament of Birds, the Belle Dame sauns Mercie, and Lydgate's Temple of Glass." Although it is an inventory endorsed "off Englysshe Boks off John..." there are four books in Latin, principally Cicero. Exactly what the endorsement means, therefore, is doubtful. If this be a complete catalogue of all his books, the striking feature is the great predominance of English. La Belle Dame in all probability is Ros' English version because in the two cases where it appears on the list it is bound with works of Chaucer. The unavoidable inference is that even but a few years before the accession of Henry VII, English was scarcely influenced by either humanistic or foreign literatures. Naturally then, after the political condition had become settled, one would expect an increase in the number of poems following Chaucerian precedent. But there are two reasons why Chaucer was not a good literary model for the sixteenth century writer; first, because his medieval content was not adapted to the renaissance reader, and secondly, because during the fifteenth century the very language had undergone a striking change. The great peculiarity in Chaucerian versification noticed by the modern reader, is the pronunciation of the final e. In the following passage, the opening lines of the Prologue of the Canterbury Tales, this e is italicized. Whau that Aprille with his shoures soote The droghte of Marche hath perced to the rote, And bathed every veyne in swich licour, Of which vertu engendred is the flour; 5 Whan Zephirus eek with his swete breeth Inspired hath in every holt and heeth The tendre croppes, and the yonge sonne Hath in the Ram his halfe cours y-ronne, And smale fowles maken melodye, 10 That slepen al the night with open ye, So priketh hem nature in hir corages:Than longen folk to goon on pilgrimages... Read in a modern text, with the final e pronounced, as decasyllabic pentameter couplets, the passage is beautifully fluid. But the modern text represents years of scholarship. The text of the sixteenth century reader was in chaotic condition. And read with THE MEDIEVAL TRAIITION 51 out pronouncing the final e, the effect is justly described by Dryden, "There is the rude sweetness of a Scotch tune in it, which is natural and pleasing, though not perfect." 1 For example, the second couplet, with the ed sounded, is perfectly regular, but the first line of the passage must be given up as hopelessly impossible, whereas the seventh and the ninth are halting octosyllabics. A fervent imitator of Chaucer, under the impression that such roughness was intentional, would conscientiously write bad verse! This, according to Professor Pollard, has been done by the author of the Castell of Labour,-a poem which he attributes, mistakenly I think, to Barclay.2 Through the disuse of the pronunciation of e-final, and the general clipping of inflexions, the secret of Chaucer's verse within two generations of his death was entirely lost. If any one will turn to either of Caxton's editions of the Canterbury Tales he will find that many lines, as they are there printed, have entirely ceased to be decasyllabics; they can be read in no other way than as trotting verses of four accents apiece. Other lines, however, in which there were no inflexions to lose, or small words to drop out, remain distinctly decasyllabic, and cannot be compressed into verses of four accents except by a reader with an enormous power of swallow. It was a text like this which drew down on Chaucer the condescending allowance for his " rudeness" of a succession of critics, few of whom possessed a tithe of his music. It was also, I think, the existence of such a text of Chaucer that accounts for the metrical peculiarities which we find in the Castell of Labour. The modern reader who expects to find all the lines of a stanza of equal metrical length, or of different lengths arranged in a fixed order, may look askance at the suggestion that Barclay normally uses lines of four accents, but mixes with them (especially towards the beginning of his poem) others of a slower movement with five. Yet this is what Barclay found when he read Chaucer, as he must have done, in the editions of Caxton, Pynson, or Wynkyn de Worde, and I believe that he accepted these alternations as a beauty, and one which should be imitated. It must not be assumed, however, that this change was abrupt. It was a gradual transformation varying with the individual and the dialect, beginning not long after Chaucer's death. It is somewhat apparent in Lydgate, and is normal in Sir Richard Ros (circ. 1460). Hawes, (1506) rimes was-passe,3 Jupiter-farre,4 good-mode,5 etc; Barclay (1508), chylde-.defyled, made-decayed, 1 Preface to the Fables. 2 Castell of Labour, for the Roxburgh Club, xl-xli. 3 Pastime of Pleasure, Percy Society, p. 5, stanza 3. 4 Ibid., p. 8, stanza 3. Ibid., p. 48, stanza 2. EARLY TUDOR POETRY etc.;1 and by 1547 William Salesbury tells his Welsh compatriots,2 "Similarly E final in English words is melted away, for the most part, from the end of every word in pronunciation..." During the first half of the century, however, there seems to have been room for individual preference; certainly so, before the opening of the century. This is illustrated by the following couplet from Caxton's Book of Curtesye (1477-8); Your hondes wesshe / it is an holsum thinge Your naylis loke / they be not gety blacke. Here the e in hondes must be pronounced to scan the line, whereas the e in loke, coming before the caesura, probably was not. Words, with closed penultimate syllables, such as thinge, tended to retain the sound, but there seems no general rule. With the language thus steadily changing, the difference between the speech of 1500 and that of 1400 was strongly marked. Not only had the e-final been lost, but inflexions had disappeared and new words had been introduced. The resulting difficulty is best stated in the words of Caxton 3 (1490)....And whan I had aduysed me in this sayd boke, I delybered and concluded to translate it in-to englysshe. And forthwyth toke a penne & ynke, and wrote a leef or tweyne / whyche I ouersawe agayn to corecte it / And whan I sawe the fayr & straunge termes therin / I doubted that it sholde not please some gentylmen whiche late blamed me, sayeng that in my translacyons I had ouer curyous termes whiche coude not be understande of comyn people / and desired me to vs olde and homely termes in my translacyons. and fayn wolde I satysfye euery man / and so to doo, toke an olde boke and redde therein / and certaynly the englysshe was so rude and brood that I coude not wele vnderstande it. And also my lorde abbot of westmynster ded do shew to me late, certayn euydences wryton in olde englysshe, for to reduce it in-to our englysshe now vsid / And certaynly it was wreton in suche wyse that it was more lyke to dutche than englysshe; I coude not reduce me brynge it to be vnderstonden / And certaynly our langage now vsed varyeth ferre from that wiche was vsed and spoken whan I was borne / For we englysshe men / ben borne vnder the domynacyon of the mone, whiche is neuer stedfaste / but euer wauerynge / wexynge one season / and waneth & dyscreaseth another season / And that comyn englysshe that is spoken in one shyre varyeth from a nother. In so moche that in my dayes happened that certayn marchauntes were in a shippe in tamyse, for to haue sayled ouer the see into zelande / and for lacke of wynde, thei taryed atte 1 Ship of Fools, Jamieson, Vol. 1, p. 37, stanza 3; p. 38, stanza 4. 2 William Salesbury, Ellis, part III, Chapter VIII, 777. 3 Caxton's Eneydos, Early English Text Society, p. 1. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 53 forlond, and wente to lande for to refreshe them; And one of theym named sheffelde, a mercer, cam in-to an hows and axed for mete; and specyally he axed after eggys; and the goode wyf answerde, that she coude speke no frenshe. And the marchaunt was angry, for he also coude speke no frenshe, but wolde haue hadde egges / and she vnderstode hym not / And thenne at laste a nother sayd that he wolde haue eyren / then the good wyf sayd that she vnderstod hym wel / Loo, what sholde a man in thyse dayes now wryte, egges or eyren / certaynly it is harde to playse euery man / by cause of dyuersite & chaunge of langage. For in these dayes euery man that is in ony reputacyon in his countre, wyll vtter his commynycacyon and maters in suche maners & termes / that fewe men shall vnderstonde theym / And som honest and grete clerkes haue ben wyth me, and desired me to wryte the moste curyous termes that I coude fynde / And thus bytwene playn rude / & curyous, I stande abasshed, but in my Iudgemente / the comyn termes that be dayli vsed, ben lyghter to be vnderstonde than the olde and auncyent englysshe / And for as moche as this present booke is not for a rude vplondyssh man to laboure therein / ne rede it / but onely for a clerke & a noble gentylman that feleth and vnderstondeth in faytes of armes, in loue, & in noble chyualrye / Therfor in a meane bytwene bothe, I haue reduced & translated this sayd booke in to our englysshe, not ouer rude ne curyous, but in suche termes as shall be vnderstanden, by goddys grace, accordynge to my copye. But the same difficulty confronted every writer, as Skelton complains.1 I am but a yong mayd, And cannot in effect My style as yet direct With Englysh wordes elect; Our naturall tong is rude, And hard to be enneude With pullysshed termes lusty; Our language is so rusty, So cankered, and so full Of frowardes, and so dull,, That if I wolde apply To wryte ornatly, I wot not where to fynd Termes to serue my mynde. Gowers Englysh is olde, And of no value told; His mater is worth gold, And worthy to be enrold. In Chauser I am sped, His tales I haue red: His mater is delectable, Solacious, and commendable; 1 The Poetical Works of John Skelton, Dyce, 1843, i, 74. 54 EARLY TUDOR POETRY His Englysh well alowed, So as it is emprowed, For as it is enployed, There is no English voyd. At those dayes moch commended, And now men wold haue amended His Englysh, whereat they barke; And mar all they warke: Chaucer, that famus clerke, His termes were not darke, But pleasunt, easy, and playne; No worde he wrote in vayne. Also Johnn Lydgate Wryteth after an hyer rate; It is dyffuse to fynde The sentence of his mynde, Yet wryteth he in his kynd, No man that can amend Those maters that he hath pende; Yet some men fynde a faute, And say he wryteth to haute. There seems even then to have been a desire to modernize the older writers,-a tendency that has persisted even to this day,if we may make, with Warton,1 the not improbable assumption that in the following passage from Barclay the allusion is to Gower's Confessio Amantis. Right honorable Master ye me required late A Lovers confession abridging to amende, And from corrupte Englishe in better to translate... The conclusion is that during the storm and stress of the fifteenth century not only had the language changed, but the secret of the old versification had been lost. Therefore Middle English writers, of whom Chaucer is the great exemplar, are more intelligible to us with our variorum texts, annotated editions, and elaborate glossaries than they were to the subjects of Henry VIII. Through the imperfections of his texts and the change in the language even Chaucer was no longer available as a literary model. It must not be understood, however, that Chaucer was no longer read, The vitality of his reputation under such adverse 1 History of English Poetry, Thomas Warton, section xxix. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 55 circumstances is surprising. The precedent of eulogizing him, set by Occleve and confirmed by Lydgate, is followed by the Tudor authors. Caxton's fine apostrophe to him sounds the note of sixteenth century criticism.' 0 Fader and Founder of eternate eloquence, That eluminede all this oure britaigne; To sone we lost his lauriate presence, O lusty licoure of that fulsome fountaigne; Cursed deth, why hast thou this poete slayne, I mene Fadir chaucers, mastir Galfride? Alias! the while, that euer he from vs diede. Redith his bokys fulle of all plesaunce, Clere in sentence, in longage excellent, Brefly to wryte suche was his suffesaunce, What-euer to sey he toke in his entent, His longage was so feyre and pertinent, That seemed vnto mennys heryng, Not only the worde, but verrely the thing. Redith, my child, redith his warkys all, Refuseth non, they ben expedient; Sentence or langage, or both, fynde ye shall Full delectable, for that fader ment Of all his purpos and his hole intent Howe to plese in euery audience And in oure toung was well of eloquence. Hawes, on the other hand, feels it necessary to give a list of the works,-perhaps as a proof that he has read them.2 The boke of fame, which is sentencyous, He drewe hym selfe on hys own invencyon; And than the tragidyes so pytous Of the xix. ladyes, was his translacyon; And upon hys ymaginacyon He made also the tales of Caunterbury; Some vertuous, and some glad and mery. And of Troylus the pytous dolour For his lady Cresyde, full of doublenes, He did bewayle ful well the langoure, Of all hys love and grete unhappines. t Caxton's Book of Curtesye. Early English Text Society. Extra Series, No. III, p. 34. 2 Pastime of Pleasure, Cap. xiv. 56 EARLY TUDOR POETRY And many other bokes doubtles He dyd compyle, whose godly name In printed bokes doth remayne in fame. Eulogy of these two types continues through the sixteenth century, until it culminates in Spenser, with his famous phrase, reminiscent of Caxton's a century earlier, "well of English undefyled." But as Chaucer is a master of verse technique, naturally more than others he suffered by the change in the language. When the music of his verse had gone, his works were read principally for their matter. Thus, as in the passage of Hawes just quoted, the important works were apparently the House of Fame and the Legend of Good Women. The Canterbury Tales, although glad and merry, were not profitable to the same degree as moral allegory. Consequently there was a complete failure to distinguish the literary superiority of Chaucer over authors like Gower and Lydgate. And, literature aside, judged purely from a question of morality, his work cannot bear comparison with the unending tedious commonplace of Lydgate. He it is that furnishes the real inspiration and evokes the genuine enthusiasm of the early writers. Compare the vagueness of Caxton's tribute to Chaucer, just quoted, with the fervor of his devotion to Lydgate: Loketh Also vppon dan Iohn lidgate, My mastire, whilome clepid monke of bury, Worthy to be renownede laureate, I pray to gode, in blis his soule be mery, Synging "Rex Splendens," the heuenly "kery," Among the muses ix celestiall, Afore the hieghest Iubiter of all. I not why deth my mastire dide envie, But for he shulde chaunge his habite; Pety hit is that suche a man shulde die! But nowe I trist he be a carmylite; His amyse blacke is chaunged into white, Among the muses ix celestial, Afore the hieghest Iubiter of all;" Passing the muses all of elicone, Where is ynympariable of Armonye, Thedir I trist my mastir-is soule is gone, 1Caxton's Book of Curtesye. Op. cit., pp. 36-40. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 57 The sterrede palays aboue dapplede skye, Ther to syng "sanctus" incessantly Among the muses ix celestiall, Affore the highest Iubiter of all. Redith is volumes that ben so large and wyde, Souereynly sitte in sadnesse of sentence, Elumynede wyth colouris fresshe on euery syde, Hit passith my wytte, I haue no eloquence To yeue hym lawde aftir his excellence, For I dare say he lefte hym not on lyue, That coude his cunnying suffisantly discreue. But his werkes his laude moste nede conquere, He may neuer oute of remembrance die, His werkys shall his name conuey and bere Aboute the world all-most eternallie; Lette his owne werkys prayse hym and magnifie; I dare not preyse, for fere that I offende, My lewde langage shuld rather appeyre than amende. Hawes also, after showing that he knows Chaucer, is emphatic in stating his preference.' And, after him, my mayster Lydgate, The monke of Bury, dyd hym wel apply Both to contryve and eke to translate; And of vertue ever in especyally For he dyd compyle than full nyally Of our blessed lady the conversacion, Saint Edmunde's life martred with treson. Of the fall of prynces, ryght wofully He did endyte in all piteous wyse, Folowynge his auctoure Bocas rufully; A ryght greate boke he did truly compryse, A good ensample for us to dispyse This worlde, so ful of mutabilyte, In whiche no man can have a certente. And thre reasons ryght greatly profytable Under coloure he cloked craftely; And of the chorle he made the fable That shutte the byrde in a cage so closely, The pamflete sheweth it expressely; He fayned also the courte of Sapyence, And translated wyth al his dylygence. 1 Pastime of Pleasure, Cap. XIV. 58 EARLY TUDOR POETRY The grete boke of the last destruccyon Of the cyte of Troye, whylome so famous, How for woman was the confusion; And betwene vertue and the lyfe vycyous Of goddes and goddes, a boke solacyous He did compyle, and the tyme to passe, Of love he made the bryght temple of glasse. Were not these thre gretly to commende, Whyche them applyed such bokes to contryve, Whose famous draughtes no man can amende? The synne of slouth they dyd from them dryve, After theyr death for to abyde on lyve In worthy fame by many a nacyon, Their bokes theyr actes do make relacyon. O mayster Lydgate, the most dulcet sprynge Of famous rethoryke, wyth balade ryall, The chefe orygynal of my lernyng, What vayleth it on you for to call Me for to ayde, now in especiall; Sythen your body is now wrapte in chest, I pray God to gyve your soule good rest. O what losse is it of suche a one! It is to grete truely me for to tell; Sythen the tyme that his lyfe was gone, In al this realme his pere did not dwell; Above al other he did so excell, None sith his time in arte wolde succede, After their death to have fame for their mede. But many a one is ryght well experte In this connyng, but upon auctoryte, They fayne no fables pleasaunt and covert, But spende theyr time in vaynful vanyte, Makynge balades of fervent amyte. As gestes and tryfles wythout frutefulnes; Thus al in vayne they spende their besynes. I, lytell or nought expert in poetry, Of my mayster Lydgate wyll folowe the trace, As evermore so his name to magnyfy Wyth suche lytle bokes, by Goddes grace, If in this worlde I may have the space; The lytell connyng that his grace me sente In tyme amonge in suche wyse shall be spente. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 59 And yet nothinge upon presumpcyon My mayster Lydgate I wyll not envy, But onely is mine entencyon With suche labour my selfe to occupy; As whyte by blacke doth shyne more clerely, So shal theyr matters appeare more pleasaunt Besyde my draughtes rude and ignoraunt. The first comment to be made upon this passage is that at least we know its exact date. The inscription in the first edition, "This boke, called the Pastime of Pleasure, was made and compyled by Stephen Hawes, one of the gromes of the most honorable chambre of our soverayne lorde Kynge Henry the Seventh, the xxi. yere of his most noble reyne...," shows it to have been written by 1506. Here then is a statement of the condition of the literature at the opening of the century by one of those surrounding the King, and even more reliable than Skelton's indications because the personal equation is not so great. There were two distinct literary tendencies: first, the desire to continue the long allegorical type of Lydgate, the form stamped with critical approval and confirmed by literary precedent; and second, a reaction against this, "balades of fervent amyte," short occasional poems. This distinction is of primary importance as a guide through the confusion of the work of the Renaissance. The second, obviously an omnibus class, will develop in many directions, into the court poetry of Surrey for example and into the very different, almost doggerel poetry of Skelton; the first persists as formal literature, producing what Lowell1 wittily calls "the saurians in English poetry, interminable poems, book after book and canto after canto, like far-stretching vertebrae, that at first sight would seem to have rendered earth unfit for the habitation of ran. " Both of these classes are easily accessible in the Chaucerian apocrypha,-a mass of literature collected through the desire of each succeeding editor of Chaucer to present not only all his works, but also, more or less consciously, to include analogous poetry. In this way was preserved a body of fifteenth and even sixteenth century literature. Consequently in the eight editions of Chaucer from 1532 to 1721 there is an anthology of early verse to which some twenty authors involuntarily contributed,-in all amounting J. R. Lowell, Spenser. 60 EARLY TUDOR POETRY to about 17,000 lines. Naturally the greater proportion of this material is nearer the time of Chaucer, approximately before 1450. This is not true, however, of some of the pieces. They are not by Chaucer, in Chaucer's time, nor imitations of Chaucer. Thus these editions form a veritable "ingathering" of pre-Renaissance literature. The difficulty in discussing this literature is that, since originally the poems appeared under Chaucer's name, the personality of Chaucer is apt to obscure the main issue, so that the discussion tends to show, not what they are, but what they are not. And, as the date of publication is naturally no clue to the date of composition, criticism of the poems is apt to be involved in linguistic dissertations. Nor is it correct to label them all 'imitations of Chaucer' merely because a later editor added them to his genuine works. Of many of them the chief connection with Chaucer is the accident of publication and the fact that they allude to him in company with Gower and Lydgate. It seems more logical, therefore, in this work, to separate them, and to discuss them, together with other contemporaneous work, in connection with the various tendencies of the coming literature. The first group of poems to be discussed, then, belongs to the formal literary tradition. The form used is the rime-royal stanza consisting of seven pentameter lines in the order ababbcc. It was introduced into English by Chaucer and used by him in two of his important single works, The Parlement of Foules, and the Troilus. Later, the Kingis Quair is written in this stanza form. Then Lydgate gives it his critical sanction by using it in his Secrees and the Temple of Glas. During the second half of the fifteenth century it became curiously popular,-even appearing in verse letters.l It seems to have supplanted the heroic couplet as a narrative medium for serious poetic effort. There are three other characteristics common to the type; the use of the dream structure, the use of allegory, and the use of personifications. All these are due to the French poem, Le Roman de la Rose which had a somewhat inexplicable fascination for the whole of the later middle ages. Inaugurated by Chaucer in his translation of La Roman de la Rose and confirmed by him in the Parlement of Foules, this type of poem continues through the middle of the sixteenth century. Pas!on Letters, ed. Gairdner, Letter No. 794. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 61 Its vitality is remarkable, and still more remarkable is the sameness of the literary convention. The author is usually reading when he anticipates the reader by falling asleep, the ensuing dream constituting the body of the work. In a dream, he passes through a series of adventures that have an allegorical significance, and he meets with various characters that are personified virtues and vices. The conclusion is that he awakes and writes down his dream. The objection to this scheme is the fundamental one that led Washington to lay down his rule that he would never tell dreams, the sequence of events is not logical; the law of causation does not exist. The waking mind, therefore, in telling the dream, almost invariably injects causation,-whereby it ceases to be a dream, without attaining the conviction of reality. It thus falls between two stools. When the case is complicated by the introduction of characters that are not characters but abstractions, interest in the narrative has been doubly weakened. There remains, then, only the sweetness of description and an intellectual pleasure in identifying the allegory, akin to that in guessing a riddle. There is also an annoying mannerism to be mentioned, the affectation of self-depreciation. This, although the literal interpretation of it gives the modern critic the pleasure of being witty, is only a convention, comparable to that of Elizabethan poetry, whereby the author promises immortality to the subject of his verse. All these characteristics, however they may have been derived, were passed on to the younger generation by Lydgate. This seems as appropriate a place as any to introduce Ritson's characterization of him, "voluminous, prosaic, and drivelling monk,"-a phrase without which no article dealing with Lydgate would be admitted to our best encyclopedias. That the first adjective in the indictment be true no one can question. MacCracken has ruthlessly reduced Ritson's list of titles from 951 to 160,1 yet even this is a far from contemptible showing. The other two adjectives, however, represent a purely personal opinion. The point to emphasize here is that the subjects of the early Tudor kings found him the reverse of either prosaic or drivelling. And whatever may be the present critical estimate of the aesthetic value of his poems, the fact remains that he is a force to be considered, and that his style is worth comment. 1 The Minor Poems of John Lydgate, H. N. MacCracken, xi-xxxi. EARLY TUDOR POETRY Naturally, as one would expect in an author so "voluminous," his style is both prolix and careless.l Written currente calamo, his sentences are accretions of afterthoughts, illustration piled on illustration and epithet on epithet until the thought is exhausted. In the same way he runs to catalogue. It gives the effect of having been composed impromptu. This is increased by the manner in which, to fill up his verse, he interjects stock phrases, and unnecessary words. In like manner, his scansion is entirely by ear. His accent shifts without much regard for the number of syllables in the line. A peculiar trick is to treat the caesural pause as equivalent to a weak syllable, thus bringing two accented syllables together. As he is also apt to omit the first weak syllable in the line, the effect is one of two short lines. "Mirrour of wit, ground of governaunce." 2 The result of this peculiarity of scansion, in combination with the uncertainty of the language, caused some of his imitators to write little more than rimed prose. Following the example of Lydgate writers produced numerous poems with the characteristics mentioned above. "Courts of.. "Castles of... "Temples of..." Their genealogy is given by the name. Nor do they deserve individual comment in a work such as this. It is sufficient if the reader recognizes the type and the convention. This is not true, however, of several of these poems that are more widely known than their fellows. Each of these presents its own set of perplexing problems. As they are anonymous, the question of authorship is open to debate; as they are undated, the question of language is unsettled. Consequently in the long controversy they have been attributed to various writers, beginning with Chaucer, and have been dated at any part of the fifteenth century, occasionally spilling over into the sixteenth. Since to me they all show Lydgate's influence, I place them after 1450 and before the end of the first quarter of the sixteenth century. The first of these, The Flower and the Leaf, has the enviable record of having inspired two poets of dissimilar tastes. It was 1 The best analysis of Lydgate's peculiarities is in the preface of The Temple of Glas, by J. Schick. E. E. T. S. 2 Temple of Glas, ibid., line 754. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 63 selected by Dryden for translation, under the impression that it was by Chaucer, and Keats has left the following well-known account of his reading it. This pleasant tale is like a little copse: The honied lines so freshly interlace To keep the reader in so sweet a place, So that he here and there full-hearted stops; And oftentimes he feels the dewy drops Come cool and suddenly against his face, And, by the wandering melody, may trace Which way the tender-legged linnet hops. Oh! what a power has white simplicity! What mighty power has this gentle story! I, that do ever feel a thirst for glory, Could at this moment be content to lie Meekly upon the grass, as those whose sobbings Were heard of none beside the mournful robins. The story of the poem that thus affected Keats is briefly as follows: the author being unable to sleep, arises at dawn to seek rest in an arbour; first a musical duel takes place there between a nightingale and a goldfinch; then a company of ladies, clad in white, appear, to be followed shortly by a company of white knights; after a joust by the latter, the entire number seek refuge under a tree which they first greet; their place upon the lawn, however, is soon occupied by an equal number of knights and ladies dressed in green; the festivities of this latter group are interrupted first by the heat, then a wind storm, followed by hail; in piteous plight, they are succoured by members of the first party that have been sheltered by the tree. Whereupon the nightingale joins the first party and the goldfinch the second; upon inquiry the author is told that the party of the Leaf represents those that shun delights and live laborious days, while that of the fragile Flower enjoys the moment. The allegory is delicate, and the atmosphere charming. So much so in fact that after being added to Chaucer's works by Speght in 1598, it was generally accepted. Even Tyrwhitt hesitated, and it appears in all the early nineteenth century editions. Actually, of course, the language 1 is not Chaucerian. The use 1 This has been elaborately discussed by the late Professor Skeat in the seventh, the supplementary, volume of his Chaucer. 64 EARLY TUDOR POETRY of the final e is erratic and grammatical forms have been lost. Still more, it seems a palpable imitation of Lydgate's manner. The stanzas overflow even in the midst of a subordinate clause. The last line of the twenty-third stanza reads, Chapelets fresh; but there were many tho, and the following stanza continues the sentence. That daunced and eek song ful soberly. You find examples of Lydgate's line, such as, Causing the ground, fele tymes and oft And Lydgate's peculiarity of closing with a deprecatory apostrophe to his "little" book,-it must be an affectionate diminutive since the number of lines (and the Fall qf Princes 2 has over thirty-six thousand lines) has nothing to do with it,-is faithfully followed. 0 litel book, thou art so unconning, How darst thou put thy-self in prees for drede? It is wonder that thou wexest not rede, Sith that thou wost ful lyte who shal behold Thy rude langage, ful boistously unfold. While none of these characteristics, nor others like them, is convincing singly, the total effect seems conclusive that the poem was written after 1450. On the other hand, that it is not by Lydgate himself is taken for granted, because it is assumed that the author is a woman. That the ego is a woman is shown in the line in which she is addressed as "My doughter"; but that the author was a woman does not necessarily follow, since there are any number of possible dramatic reasons why a man should write in that character.3 Not much more convincing is the argument of Skeat drawn from the detailed description of the dresses. In an age when so large a proportion of the individual's property was invested in clothes and 'Line 5. 2 " Miscalled by him and others Falls," MacCracken, p. xvi. 3 Professor Saintsbury, Cambridge History of Literature, suggests that the poem is part of a larger whole. It does not give me that impression. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 65 distinction in rank was indicated by the garments worn, detailed interest in dress was not peculiar to women.1 Yet there is a charm and softness about the poem that suggests feminine authorship, and likewise explains Keats' enthusiasm. That he thought it simple, merely argues that he was unfamiliar with the type. Actually it is written in full knowledge of the literary conventions of the day. Discussion of the Flower and the Leaf is inextricably bound up with its fellow poem, The Assembly of Ladies, owing to the fact that Skeat hypothesizes the same authorship. This was added to the Chaucerian canon by Thynne in 1532, but was decisively rejected by Tyrwhitt,-with the result that it has not figured so largely in English literature. Nor is it so attractive, largely because it is more conventional. It is the story of a dream told by a lady to a knight. In the dream she goes to the castle of Pleasant Regard where Loyalty is queen. The officers of the court are Perseverance, Diligence, Countenance, Discretion, Acquaintance, Largesse, Belchere, Remembrance, Avysienesse, and Attemperance. Once there, various women present bills of complaint; whereupon Loyalty promises to consider them, and dismisses the audience. And the poem ends, as it began, with the conversation between the lady and the knight. The great point of similarity with the Flower and the Leaf is the feminism displayed.2 Not only is the ego a woman, but, aside from the first knight, all the characters are women and all the incidents concern women. Also there is the same detailed description of dress. In both poems the characters wear garments with embroidered French mottoes,-a type of costume also to be found in Lydgate.3 And still more there are a number of verbal similarities.4 On the other hand the language of the Assembly of Ladies is certainly later than that of The Flower 1 There is nothing in the poem more detailed than William Makegyrr's account of the costumes worn at the meeting of Henry VII and Philip of Castile, Paston Letters, No. 953. 2 " (with the sole exception of the Nutbrown Maid) no English poems exist, as far as I remember, written previously to 1500, and purporting to be written by a woman." Skeat, Supplementary, Vol. LXIII. But verses, endorsed "By a Lady," in the reign of Edward IV are in the Paston Letters, No. 870. They are also in rime-royal. 3 Temple of Glas, 1.309-10. 4This has been carefully pointed out by Skeat, ibid., lxiii. 66 EARLY TUDOR POETRY and the Leaf. Consequently one may choose between the hypotheses; either the two poems were written by the same person at different periods, or they were written by two people, one in imitation of the other. As no one has been able to name a probable author of either, the question is rather academic. In any case, whether written by the same woman or different women, or men in the name of women, the significant inference to be made is the same. They point to a condition of society when woman was to be considered. The Wars of the Roses had given place to settled life and the court had resumed its social function. Consequently, as in Ariosto, the poet of the Renaissance sings, not only the knights and their feats, but also ladies and loves.1 Le donne, i cavalieri, I'arme, gli amori Le cortesie, l'audaci impresse io canto. This point of view seems to be borne out by the incidental references in the Assembly of Ladies. It opens in a garden with five ladies, attended by "knightes and squyers many one," walking in the cross-alleys. One thinks of the English love of gardens stressed in the Utopia. The knight is warned, when he begs for the tale, that it is no "litel thing",-which seems like a hit at the Lydgate mannerism. The setting proper of the dream is attractive. A whole party had tried to penetrate a maze, exactly as you see it today at Hampton Court, and some, exactly as you see them today, had lost both their way and their temper. For very wrath, they did step over the rayle. The first recorded maze that I can find is that at Hampton Court,2 which is too late for our poem. As Chaucer uses the word, they must have been somewhat common. This maze, in any case, had a fountain, set round with margarettes, forget-me-nots, remembermes and pansies; certainly it was a "delectable place". Here it is, that while the rest of the party are finding the center, the heroine has her dream. In this, the architecture of the palace of PlesauntRegard suggests strongly what we call Tudor, one of the best examples of which is the Henry VIII wing of Hampton Court.3 1 The opening of the Orlando Furioso. 2 Archeologia, VII, 124, 126-127. 3 Assembly of Ladies, 158-168. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 67 Fairer is noon, though it were for a king Devysed wel, and that in every thing. The toures hy ful plesaunt shul ye find, With fanes fressh, turning with every wind. The chambers and parlours both of oo sort, With bay-windowes, goodly as may be thought, As for daunsing and other wyse disport; The galeryes right wonder wel y-wrought, That I wel wot, if ye were thider brought,1 And took good hede thereof in every wyse, Ye wold it thinke a very paradyse. Thus in the account of the building of Hampton Court there are items for the gilding and painting of vanes,-a decorative feature lost in the present building. And one feels that Anthony Trollope would have liked Plesaunt Regard with its Tudor bays, because he feels that "no sort or description of window is capable of imparting half so much happiness to mankind." And the mention of galleries also suggests the Tudor love of pageantry. In the same vague way the gorgeousness of the costuming brings to mind Tudor splendor.2 And furthermore, to speke of her aray, I shal you tel the maner of her gown; Of clothe of gold ful riche, it is no nay; The colour blew, of a right good fasoun; In tabard-wyse the sieves hanging coun; And what purfyl there was, and in what wyse, So as I can, I shal it you devyse. After a sort the coller and the vent, Lyk as ermyne is mad in purfeling; With grete perles, ful fyne and orient, They were couched, al after oon worching, With dyamonds in stede of powdering; The sieves and purfilles of assyse; They were (y-) mad (ful) lyke, in every wyse. Aboute her nekke a sort of fair rubyes, In whyte floures of right fyne enamayl; Upon her heed, set in the freshest wyse, A cercle with great balays of entayl; 11I have changed Skeat's period, here, to a comma. 2 Assembly of Ladies, ibid., 519-539. 68 EARLY TUDOR POETRY That, in ernest to speke, withouten fayl, For yonge and olde, and every maner age, It was a world to loke on her visage. To date these poems accurately is manifestly impossible. During the latter half of the fifteenth century the language is too fluctuating to give definite indications, and the handwriting of the manuscript at Cambridge is not a safe guide. But we shall not be far wrong if we assume them to have been written during the reign of Henry VII. Another poem of the same type is the much discussed Court of Love. This differs from the previous examples in that, while the language they employ is natural, the language here is consciously archaic.1 The truth of this important fact has been established by Professor Lounsbury. He has shown that the grammatical errors are due to the author and to his desire to imitate the language of a previous age. These are the errors of a man striving to do what he has not the special knowledge to accomplish. So large a number of impossible forms-and not all have been given-cannot be attributed to gross oversight on the part of even the most stupid of scribes. On the other hand, they could not have been changes made intentionally. Such changes are introduced to conform to the language of a later timeto put something which the copyist understands in the place of what he does not understand. He would be little likely to replace grammatical endings that were unknown to himself by other endings that had never been known to anybody. It is this condition of literary forgery that makes the dating of the Court of Love so perplexing. The only extant MS. is in the Library of Trinity College, Cambridge, and it is from this MS. that the poem was taken by Stowe for his Chaucerian apocrypha. But this rejection of the printed copy merely throws us back into the morass of dating by handwriting. According to Professor Skeat, "I suppose most of the pieces are in a handwriting of a later date, not far from 1500;" 2 and again, "the handwriting is later than 1500".3 Later, in his Supplementary Volume,4 he goes very much farther in the supposition, "that we have here the work of one of the heralds of the Elizabethan poetry, of the class to Studies in Chaucer, T. R. Lounsbury, i, 497-503. 2 Skeat, Chaucer, Vol. I, p. 56. 3 Ibid., 42. 4 Supplement to the Works of Chaucer, lxxvi. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 69 which belonged Nicholas Grimoald, Thomas Sackville, Lord Surrey, Lord Vaux, and Sir Francis Bryan." Probably it is safer to agree with Professor Neilson,1 when, after discussing Skeat's arguments he concludes; "Allowing an interval to account for the loss of some of Hawes' inflections, we shall probably be not far astray in fixing the date about the end of the first quarter of the sixteenth century." On turning to the context of the poem we find an example of the familiar type of erotic allegory. After a brief apologetic prologue the author in the first person, summoned by Mercury, makes a pilgrimage to the Court of Love on Mount Cithaeron. There, guided by a friend, Philobone, he is censured by Love and swears to the twenty statutes of Love. Then he is conducted by Philobone to the presence of the heroine Rosiall, who is finally favorable to his suit. A second tour of the court follows, this time with a number of personifications described. It ends with a parody on a religious service, sung by the birds. The MS. is in poor condition and even with Neilson's suggested emendation of inserting the twelve stanzas (w. 1093-1176) after verse 266, there are bad breaks. From this brief analysis it is obvious that the poem falls into four parts; the prologue, the allegory proper, the statutes, and the Matins and Lauds sung by the birds. As might be supposed, the author whom he especially imitates is Lydgate. The poem opens with the stock apologetic explanation. With timerous hert and trembling hand of drede, Of cunning naked, bare of eloquence, Unto the flour of port in womanhede I write, as he that non intelligence Of metres hath, ne floures of sentence:... In the main body of the poem, Dr. Schick 2 has shown so large a number of similarities between it and Lydgate's Temple of Glas as to prove that the author knew that poem. Particularly is this true with the Statutes of Love,3 "which recur in a diluted form in the Temple of Glas, mostly in the exhortations given by Venus 1 The Origin and Sources of the Court of Love, by William Allan Neilson, 1899, p. 2. This is the most careful study of the poem yet made. 2 Lydgate's Temple of Glas, J. Schick, E. E. T. S., 1891. 3 Ibid., cxxxi. 70 EARLY TUDOR POETRY to the Knight." Thus the first, second, third, fifth, sixth, seventh, ninth, tenth, twelfth, fourteenth and eighteenth statutes are suggested by passages in the earlier poem. Curiously enough the versification, however, does not suggest Lydgate. His peculiar broken-backed line, such as A crowne of g6ld, rich for any king 1 is rarely used. It was partly this perfection of the metre that led Tyrwhitt on internal evidence not to reject the poem as by Chaucer. At least the author has used as models Chaucer's Legend of Good Women, Parlement of Foules, Hous of Fame, and Compleynt to Pity, and 2 "the total result gives the impression of a very devoted disciple." And, as Neilson shows, there is a fair probability that he knew La Messe des Oisiaus of Jean de Conde and the Kingis Quair of James I of Scotland. This very enumeration differentiates the Court of Love from the previous poems of the type. Whereas there the authors were writing normally, here the impression is that of a conscious literary artist deliberately reviving a past form. Even the details have precedents. Philobone "caught me by the lap" before the first tour of the Court; so likewise Pandarus starts to leave Criseyde "Til she agayn him by the lappe caughte"... 3 It is the accumulation of imitative touches that argues against its being the work of an early writer. Any one feature, such as the Statutes of Love, or the Matins of the Birds, may be found in a medieval poem,-the peculiarity here is that they are all united. Like so much of modern architecture, it is the excess of the peculiarities of the style that disproves its genuineness. That the poem is a Renaissance imitation of a past medieval form is also suggested by occasional details, no one of which taken alone would be conclusive. The architecture, for example, has the Tudor bay 4 and great expanse of windows.5 The composition of the names, Philobone and Philogenet, as Skeat remarks and Neilson questions, seems to point to a period of the early Greek revival. That the names are badly formed is unquestionable; the remarkable feature is the presence at all of the Greek. Still more remarkable is the impression of what may be termed vaguely the men 1 Flower and Leaf, 1.172. 41.1058. 2 Neilson, ibid., 239. 3 Troilus, Bk.., 1.448. 5 1.229. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 71 tal attitude. The eighteenth statute, for example, inculcates cleanliness and courtesy. The original of this is the detailed catalogue in the Ars Amatoria, i, 513 ff., that the toga, should be in good condition, the teeth brushed, skin, hair, beard, and nails clean, etc. These eight lines from Ovid are expanded into thirty in the Romaunt of the Rose, where they are elaborately adapted to medieval conditions. Lydgate, on the other hand, omits the physical details to stress courtesy in two lines only. In the Court of Love all either Roman or medieval details have vanished, the Lydgate scarcely stressed, and the whole told with a touch of humor. The eighteenth statut, hoolly to commend, To plese thy lady, is, That thou eschewe With sluttishness thy-self for to offend; Be jolif, fresh, and fete, with thinges newe, Courtly with maner, this is all thy due, Gentill of port, and loving clenlinesse; This is the thing that lyketh thy maistresse. And not to wander lich a dulled ass, Ragged and torn, disgysed in array, Ribaud in speche, or out of mesure pass, Thy bound exceding; think on this alway: For women been of tender hertes ay, And lightly set their plesire in a place; Whan they misthink, they lightly let it passe. The second stanza certainly was not written seriously. Still more so is the case with the very objectionable sixteenth statute,-a statute that has not been found in any previous author. When he pleads to Rosiall that this must be modified, she grants his request. And softly than her colour gan appeare, As rose so rede, through-out her visage all, Wherefore me think it is according here, That she of right be cleped Rosiall. That she should blush is not surprising! Such open discussion of the physical in a poem marked by delicate poetic feeling is only comprehensible if one remembers the antagonism to the Christian ideal brought in by the revival of humanism. Much the same is true of the religious attitude in the poem. Thus in the Temple of Glas the only monks and nuns who lament are those forced into 72 EARLY TUDOR POETRY monastic vows in childhood, a legitimate medieval condition. In the Court of Love there is but slight stress on such a limitation. There the religious vow is of no force.... for truly, there is non Excepcion mad, ne never was ne may. Their regrets are stated with Renaissance frankness. 0 why be som so sorry and so sad, Complaining thus in blak and whyte and gray? Freres they ben, and monkes, in good fay: Alas, for rewth; greet dole it is to seen, To see thaim thus bewaile and sory been. See how they cry and wring their handes whyte, For they so sone went to religion! And eke the nonnes, with vaile and wimple plight, There thought that they ben in confusion: "Alas," thay seyn, 'we fayn perfeccion, In clothes wide, and lak our liberte; But all the sin mote on our frendes be. For, Venus wot, we wold as fayn as ye, That ben attired here and wel besene, Desiren man, and love in our degree, Ferme and feithfull, right as wold the quene: Our frendes wikke, in tender youth and grene, Ayenst our will made us religious; That is the cause we morne and wailen thus." Than seid the monks and freres in the tyde, " Wel may we curse our abbeys and our place, Our statuts sharp, to sing in copes wyde, Chastly to kepe us out of loves grace, And never to fele comfort ne solace; Yet suffre we the hete of loves fire, And after than other haply we desire. O Fortune cursed, why now and wherefore Hast thow," they seid, "beraft us liberte, Sith nature yave us instrument in store, And appetyt to love and lovers be? Why mot we suffer suche adversite, Diane to serve, and Venus to refuse? Ful often sith this matier doth us muse. We serve and honour, sore ayenst our will, Of chastite the goddes and the quene; THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 73 Us leffer were with Venus byden still, And have reward for love, and soget been Unto this women courtly, fressh, and shene. Fortune, we curse thy whele of variaunce! There we were wele, thou revest our plesaunce." The same impression of slight religious feeling and a cynical attitude toward it is given by the parody on the religious service at the end of the poem. This seems detached from the preceding and complete in itself. While it is true that in Jean de Conde one finds much the same conception, the presumably immediate source is Lydgate's Devotion of the Fowles. This is reverential. It is merely an expansion of the verse from the Benedicite, englished in the Book of Common Prayer, as "0 all ye fowles of the air, bless ye the Lord: praise him and magnify him forever." On the contrary here the deity addressed is not the Creator of the World,-it is the God of Love, and the terms used are identical. "Dominus regnavit," seid the pecok there, "The Lord of Love, that mighty prince, y-wis, He hath received here and every-where: Now Jubilate sing:"-"What meneth this?" Seid than the linet; "welcome, Lord of blisse!" Out-stert the owl with "Benedicite, What meneth al this mery fare?" quod he. "Laudate," sang the lark with voice full shrill; And eke the kite, "0 admirabile! This quere will throgh myne eris pers and thrill; But what? welcom this May seson," quod he; "And honour to the Lord of Love mot be, That hath this feest so solemn and so high:" "Amen," seid all; and so seid eke the pye. The protestant reader must remember that these Latin phrases are the opening words of the Psalms, that they were familiarly employed as titles to the various Psalms, and that as such they were always associated with religion. The irreverent wit consists in using sacred words in a profane sense. This lack of religious feeling, expressed by the author and expected by the readers, is another argument for a late date of composition. If the Court of Love were written much later than 1500, a sur 74 EARLY TUDOR POETRY prising literary condition must be deduced. The author of it is without much question one of the ablest poets between Chaucer and Wyatt. It has much of Chaucer's wit and lightness of touch. Whoever "Philogenet, of Cambridge clerk" may have been, he created a poem that on aesthetic grounds alone may well have been attributed to the master. As an imitator he is more successful than Spenser. But the question arises, why did he attempt this tour de force? The answer is, I think, that without the originality of Skelton, he saw around him no literary models except those of the past. So he tried to turn back the hands of the clock, and was of course foredoomed to failure. The old formal erotic allegory was out of touch with the ideas of the new age, ideas waiting for the proper expression. Consequently the Court of Love is preserved in a single manuscript, and remained unprinted until Stowe in 1561 included it in his edition of Chaucer. Its day was past. Contemporaneous with the erotic allegory, there is a second variant, the moral allegory. While the first aims primarily to > amuse, the second aims primarily to instruct. Otherwise there.4 ) ' are the same general characteristics, namely the dream-structure, the use of personifications, the allegorical framework, and the rime-royal as verse form. And, again like the first, the master is Lydgate. At the opening of the sixteenth century the great exponent of this form is Stephen Hawes, "one of the gromes of the most honorable chamber of our souerayne Iorde Kynge Henry the Seventh." Aside from this statement (whatever that may mean!), which was evidently considered of paramount importance since it appears on the frontispiece of almost all of his works, our knowledge of him is pitiably meagre. The date of his birth, usually given as 1475, seems very doubtful.1 Nor are the incidental facts It is based upon the identification of the poet with the hero in the Pastime of Pleasure. In the Percy Society reprint the passage reads I thought me past al chyldly ygnoraunce, The XXXI. yere of my yonge flourynge aege; Cap. xxvii. Unhappily the first edition has "xxi!" I owe this fact to the kindness of Professor A. K. Potter of Brown University, who has collected material for a definitive edition of Hawes. With a generosity as scholarly as it is rare he has allowed me to steal his thunder; the very least that I can do is to acknowledge the voice of Jove. Aside from this doubtful reading, the hero of the Example of Virtue (1504) announces that he is sixty. Dunbar Anthology, 285. Southey's reprint British poets, 1831, however, gives the correct reading of the first edition of The Pastime. THE MEDIEVAL TRA)ITION 75 discovered by modern research much more reliable since the names Stephen and Hawes, or Hawys, are not unusual and the scattered references need not refer to the poet. Aside from certain items in the expense account of the king in regard to court ceremonials, the most interesting are that in 1506 a "Hawse" received "10 s. for a ballet," 1 and in 15121 "Mr. Hawse for his play VI~ XIIIs.IIIId." 2 1505-1506 would be the twenty-first year of Henry VII's reign, the time stated in the colophon of the composition of the Pastime of Pleasure, which is elaborately dedicated to the King. Yet to desrib this as a "ballad" is possible only on the not improbable assumption that the accountant had never read it, and ten shillings is certainly not an extravagant reward for a poem that extends through forty-five chapters. It was perhaps this experience that made him write, Our late souerayne his fader excellent I knowe ryghte well some holde oppynyon That to auaryce he had entenddment Gadrynge grete rychesse of this his regyon... a condition for which he apologizes on the ground that Henry might have been accumulating riches in order to make war on the Turks. What the play was, there is no means of guessing. In 1523 there is a will of a Stephen Hawes proved. This probably refers to the poet as in the Controversy between a Lover and a Jay, undated but probably before 1530, he is alluded to in the past tense. The earliest life, that by Bale,4 consists in pleasant epitaph-like generalizations. The statement, however, that he studied in England, Scotland, and France, when Henry's French predilections are remembered, explains his being the groom of the chamber much more than that he was called to it by the "sole commendation of virtue." Anthony Wood 5 adds that he studied at Oxford, but without taking a degree. He also is the authority for the horrifying statement that "he could repeat by Heart most of our English Poets; especially Jo. Lydgate a Monk of Bury, whom he made 1 Dictionary of National Biography. 2 Quoted by Dr. Burkart, Stephen Hawes' Pastime qf Pleasure, London, 1899. A Joyfull Medytacyon, edited for the Abbotsford Club, by David Laing, 1865. 4 Scriptorum Illustrium Maioris Brytanniae, 1559-L. 632. 6 Athenoe Oxoniensis. 76 EARLY TUDOR POETRY equal in some Respects with Geff. Chaucer." But we know little more of him than that he was "somtyme grome of ye chambre of our late souerayne lorde kynge Henry ye seuepth." 1 Without discussing the apocryphal works mentioned by Bale, Hawes is represented in English literature by five poems. As it is his habit to state upon the title page the date of the composition according to the number of years of the reign, it is simple to arrange them in chronological sequence..._ 1. The Example of Virtue, 1504.2 2. The Pastime of Pleasure, 1506. 3. The Conuercyon of Swerers, printed 1509. 4. A Joyfull medytacyon to all Englonde of the coronacyon of our moost naturaU souerayne lorde kynge Henry the eyght, undated (1509?). 5. The Comfort of louers (1512).3 As the fifth is inaccessible, and the third and fourth are comparatively short poems, his poetic reputation rests upon the first and second. That in his own age it was great is shown by the surprising number of editions. The Example was reprinted in 1530; the Conuercyon, in 1551, and again undated; and the Pastime again in 1517, 1554, and twice in 1555.4 Thus whatever may be the modern critical opinion of Hawes as a poet, it must be recognized that he satisfied certain demands of his time. His theory of poetry, like that of Lydgate, may be traced to _occaccio. The De Genealogia Deorum gives, as the name imports, the genealogies of the pagan pantheon. As many of the relationships among the gods are abominable from a moral point of view, in the fourteenth and fifteenth books, "the first defense of poesy in honor of his own art by a poet of the modern world ", Boccaccio is forced to accept the medieval position of an allegorical inter1 Wynkyn de Worde's colophon to the Joyfull Medytacyon. 2 The anonymous contributor of the article in the Dictionary of National Biography, owing to the mutilation of the copy in the Pepysian Library, Cambridge, conjectures the date, 1512. The title, however, reads "the nineteenth year of his (Henry VII) most noble reign." Consequently 1503-1504 is at least the date of composition. 8 The Comfort of Lovers, never reprinted, exists in an unique copy at Ham House. My transcription is due to the generosity of Professor Potter to whom Lord Dysart gave permission to photograph the volume. 4 These dates are taken from Burkart. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 77 pretation. As summarized by Professor Spingarn 1 the theory is as follows:"'he reality of poetry is deendent on its allegorical foiundations; its moral teachings are to be sought in the hidden meanings discoverable beneath the literal expression; pagan poetry is defended for Christianity on the ground that the references to Greek and Roman gods and rituals are to be regarded only as symbolic truths. The poet's function, for Boccaccio, as for Dante and Petrarch, was to hide and obscure the actual truth behind a veil of beautiful fictions-veritatem rerum pulchris velaminibus adornare." This theory was adopted by Hawes and carried to its logical conclusion. The aim of poetry is By the laboure of inventyfe busynes, Touchynge the trouthe by covert lykenes To dysnull vyce and the vycious to blame; 2 the method is so to write that there is both a literal and a symbolic meaning.3 It was the guyse in old antiquyte, Of famous poets ryght ymaginatife, Fables to fayne by good auctorite; They were so wyse and so inventife, Theyr obscure reason, fayre and sugratife, Pronounced trouthe under cloudy figures, By the inventyon of theyr fatall scriptures. And the author played a stimulating game of catch-as-catch-can with his reader. Not to understand him was to confess your own inefficiency.4 But rude people, opprest with blyncdnes, Agaynst your fables wyll often solisgyse, Syche is theyr mynde, such is theyr folyschnes; For they beleve in no maner of wyse That under a colour a trouth may aryse. For folysh people, blynded in a matter, Will often erre what they of it do clatter. This whole point of view has been so lost that it is necessary to explain it. Our ideas of allegory are formed from the clarity of the 1 A History of Literary Criticism in the Renaissance, J. E. Spingarn, 1899, p. 9. 2 P. of P., Cap. VIII. 3 bid. 4Ibid., Cap. IX. 78 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Pilgrim's Progress. With this as the norm, we turn back to the earlier work. By doing this we are unfair. Much of modern criticism of the Faerie Queene, for example, would have been regarded by Spenser as irrelevant. As the pleasure consisted in guessing the significance,l Specyally poetes under cloudy fygures Couered the trouthe of all theyr scryptures. there was no obligation on the part of the poet to be intelligible. It is for the reader to disperse the clouds. The poems of Hawes in whole and in part illustrate this poetic theory. The first, the Example of Virtue, has all the characteristics of the form; the body of the poem is a dream, in which the hero, Youth, conducted by Discretion, after having been instructed by Nature, Hardiness (courage), Fortune, and Wisdom, all personified as women, passes the bridge of Purity, resists Sensuality and Pride, and, defended by the armor of St. Paul, defeats the dragon, whose three heads are the World, the Flesh and the Devil; he then marries Cleanliness at a wedding attended by all the apostles, saints, and martyrs. After a brief tour of Hell, they both die, and the poem ends with an apostrophe to the King and the usual apology. This is clearly the glorified life of the Christian knight. The author is also careful to explain his personifications. First follows a description, for example, of the King of Love (who must have been worth seeing!) and then the "moralization." It is worth quoting as an illustration of his method.2 He sat in a Chair right clear and excellent, At the upper end of the Hall above. He sat still, and did not remove, Gird(ed) with willows; and might not see No manner of thing in his degree. He had two wings right large and great, And his body also was naked; And a dart in his right hand was set, And a torch in his left hand brenned. 1The Conuercyon, Prologue. ' From the Dunbar Anthology, stanzas 182-188. In fact, the frontispiece of the first edition illustrates this figure; in the second, the 1530 edition, the illustration shows the debate. THE MEDIEVAL TRA)ITION 79 A bottle about his neck was hanged; His one leg armed, and naked the other. Him for to see, it was a wonder. Sapience bade me marvel nothing For she would shew me the signification Why he so sat, by short reckoning, According to a moralization. Now, of the first to make relation, Love should be gird(ed) fast with stability, Without which love can have no surety. This has all the charm found in the exposition of a mathematical problem. For this type of work all that is needed is a little ingenuity and plenty of time. It is quite comprehensible that a man with leisure might amuse himself in constructing such allegorical puzzles, and it is very possible that this poem, like the Conversion of Swearers, "was made to eschewe ydlenesse." That something like this was his attitude is shown by the title of his second work, The Pastime of Pleasure. As this is commonly regarded as his masterpiece, I quote Morley's epitome of it completely.1 Graund Amoure passed through the fair meadow ofi Youth. and then came to the choice between two highways of life, the way of Contemplation-that was life in a religious order-and the way of Active Life. He took the way of Active Life, met Fame with her two greyhounds, Grace and Governaunce, who told him of La Bel Pucell, in whom Hawes represented the true aim of life, only attainable through many labours. Then he first visited the Tower of Doctrine, and was introduced to her seven daughters. These were the seven sciences, arranged of old into three, Grammar, Logic, Rhetoric, forming what was called the "Trivium;" and four, Arithmetic, Music, Geometry, Astronomy, which formed the "Quadrivium." When, in his introduction to these seven daughters of Doctrine, Graund Amoure had advanced to Music, he found her playing on an organ in her tower, and it was then that he first saw his ideal, La Bel Pucell. He told his love to her, and danced with her to sweet harmony. This means that the youth who has advanced far enough in the pursuit of knowledge to have ears for the grand harmonies of life, is for a time brought face to face with the bright ideal to be sought through years of forward battle. La Bel Pucell went to her distant home; and Graund Amoure, after receiving counsel from Geometry and Astronomy, proceeded to the Castle of Chivalry, prayed in the Temple of Mars, within which was Fortune at her wheel, and on his way to the Temple of Venus met Godfrey Gobilive, who spoke ill of women. This 1 Morley's English Writers, 7.73. I prefer this to my own since it will as far as possible eliminate the personal equation from the discussion. 80 EARLY TUDOR POETRY part is in couplets. They went to the Temple of Venus; but Godfrey was overtaken by a lady named Correction, with a knotted whip, who said that he was False Report, escaped in disguise from his prison in the Tower of Chastity. To that Tower the Lady Correction introduced Graund Amoure. As the adventurer proceeded on his way he fought a giant with three heads, named Falsehood, Imagination, Perjury, and cut his heads off with the sword of Claraprudence. Then he proceeded through other adventures, which carried on the allegory of steadfast endeavour till Graund Amoure saw the stately palace of La Bel Pucell upon an island beyond a stormy ocean. After the water has been crossed, there was still to be quelled a monster against which Graund Amoure could only defend himself by annointing his sword with the ointment of Pallas. The last victory achieved, Graund Amoure was received into the palace by Peace, Mercy, Justice, Reason, Grace, and Memory; and he was married next morning to La Bel Pucell by Lex Ecclesise (Law of the Church). After his happy years with her, Old Age came one day into Graund Amoure's chamber, and struck him on the breast; Policy and Avarice came next. Graund Amoure became eager to heap up riches. Death warned him that these must be left. After the warning, Contrition and Conscience came to him before he died. Mercy and Charity then buried him. Fame wrote his epitaph. Time and Eternity pronounced the final exhortation of the poem. And the poem ends with an apology. By a comparison of these analyses the striking similarity between the two poems is at once apparent. In each the young hero is educated by personified abstractions, falls in love with the heroine by report, is allowed to see her, is separated from her by water, is armed with the armour of Saint Paul, undergoes trials, slays a dragon or dragons, is married, and finally dies of old age. Both seem equally examples of virtue.1 Naturally as the second has seven hundred and fifty-five stanzas, with several pages of heroic couplet, in addition to the three hundred of the first, there is a good deal more material. Even then the poverty of his invention is shown by the fact that he duplicates the adventures. In The Example the hero kills one dragon, and in The Pastime two. This is clearly illustrated by a comparison of the two passages describing the armor. This is the armour for the soul, That, in his Epistle, wrote Saint Paul. Good-Hope thy Leg-harness shall be, The Habergeon of Righteousness gird(ed) with Chastity, 1 Professor Murison (Cambridge History of English Literature, 2,259) distinguishes them as follows: "In his two long poems, he has the same didactic aim-to portray a man's struggles to attain his ideal; moral purity in the Example of Virtue, worldly glory in the Passetyme of Pleasure..." I fail to see this distinction. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 81 The Placard of Business, with branches of Alms-deed, The Shield of Belief, and Meekness for the head. Thy Sword shall be, thee to defend, The Word of God, the Devil to blend! The Example of Virtue, stanza 196 For fyrst, good hope his legge harneys sholde be; His habergion of perfyte ryghtwysenes; Gyrde faste wyth the gyrdle of chastite, His riche placarde should be good besines, Brandred with almes so full of larges:; The helmet mekenes, and the shelde good fayth; His swerde Goddes worde, as saynt Poule sayth. The Pastime of Pleasure, Cap. XXVII. This does not mean that The Pastime is merely an enlarged edition of The Example. The inference is that after he had finished the first poem, he amused himself by constructing the second on much the same lines. The fundamental difference between the two poems lies in the treatment of the educational sections. Nearly one half of The Example, one hundred and twenty-seven stanzas, is filled by the debate between Nature, Fortune, Hardiness, and Wisdom as to which of them is most important to mankind; roughly the same proportion of space is used in The Pastime to personify the studies of the formal medieval curriculum. The explanation of this difference is little flattering to Hawes' inventiveness.1 His intense admiration for Lydgate has already been mentioned. In the list of Lydgate's works there enumerated it is stated that He fayned also the courte of Sapyence This, the earliest attribution of the Court of Sapience to Lydgate, has been denied on internal evidence by MacCracken.2 Presumably Hawes' admiration for the poem led him to ascribe it to his master. The hero of this walks through a beautiful meadow, watered by the clear river Quiete. There he meets a beautiful lady, accompanied by her two sisters, from whom he craves 1 Ten Brink, English Literature, 2,997, is extreme in his statement; "Hawes is very far from being able to compete with Lydgate in poetic productivity, yet he excels him, perhaps, in the art of invention and in working out allegorical motives." 2Minor Poems of Lydgate, xxxv. 82 EARLY TUDOR POETRY instruction. The first book is a disputation between the four daughters of a king (God) named Mercy, Peace, Truth, and Righteousness, on behalf of a criminal servant (Adam) who is to suffer death. The second book then conducts him to the Court of Sapience where he is instructed in the utility of the seven liberal arts.1 Hawe's method of procedure is now obvious. Using as a model the work he admired, in The Example, he copied the scheme of the dream structure and debate of the first book; in The Pastime, the scheme of the Court of Sapience of the second book. Yet as the age did not recognize property rights in ideas, it is somewhat difficult to run down the immediate source of any given detail. Certain conceptions were common to all. Thus, although there is some similarity between the Cuer d'amours epris of King Ren6 of Anjou and the Theuerdank of Emperor Maximilian and The Pastime, it is a similarity in genre. Still more is this true when arises the question concerning the origin of any particular part, such as the Tower of Doctrine and the seven personified arts. The main motive for this Courthope finds in Martianus Capella,2 and Dr. Hans Natter suggests that the "tower" may come from the woodcut in the Margarita Philisophica of Reisch of Freiburg.3 While either of these hypotheses is a possibility, it is yet a far cry from the medieval or the renaissance German. The most probable source, so far as there may be any conceivable importance attached to it, is as Professor Potter suggests, Caxton's version of the Image du Monde,4 although Dr. Natter insists that the French original is the "hauptquelle." Against Dr. Natter may be urged certain verbal resemblances and the fact that, as Caxton, the court printer, published two editions, 1 The Court of Sapience was announced in preparation for the E. E. T. S. by Dr. Borsdorf, but withdrawn. This outline is condensed from Burkart. 2 History of English Poetry, i, 382. 3 Untersuchung der Quellen von Stephen Hawes' allegorischen Gedichte "Pastime of Pleasure." von Dr. Hans Natter, Passau, 1911. 4 In order that the reader, if he wishes, may compare the two, the passages describing geometry are subjoined. The fythe is called geometrye, the whiche more auaylleth to Astronomye than ony of the vii other; ffor by her is compassed and mesured Astronomye. Thus is by geometrye mesured alle thingis where the is mesure. By geometrye may be knowen ye cours of the sterres whiche alleway go and meue, and the gretenes of the firmament, of the sonne, of the mone and of the erthe. By geometrye may be knowen alle thynges, and also the quantyte; they may not be fo farre, yf they may be seen or espyed with eye, but it may be knowen, Who wel vnderstode geometric, THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 83 1481 (?) and 1490, Hawes almost certainly was familiar with his translation. In any case he elaborates and expands his material, levying contributions from Lydgate and from other authors.1 Occasional lines suggest vague reminiscenses of Chaucer. Thus the critic is forced to praise his memory at the expense of his originality. Another feature that differentiates The Pastime from The Example is the introduction in the former of the Godfrey Gobilive episode. It there serves as comic relief. The tone is one of very broad comedy of the type of the fabliaux; the language is exceedingly coarse. The stories told are of the senile Aristotle and of the enchanter Vergil. Although these are in the Temple of Glas, both were so diffused throughout medieval literature that Hawes may have gotten them almost anywhere. Yet on the weary he myght mesure in alle maistryes; ffor by mesure was the world made, and alle thinges hye, lowe and deep. Caxton's Mirrour of the World, ed., O. H. Prior for the E. E. T. S., p. 38. My science, she sayd, it is moost profitable Unto Astronomy, for I do it mesure In every thing as it is probable; For I my selfe can ryght well discure Of every sterre, which is sene in ure, The mervaylous gretnes by my mesuring; For God made all at the begynnyng. By good mesuryng both the heyght and the depnes Of every thing, as I understand, The length and brede with all the greatnes, Of the firmament so compassing the land; And who my cunning list to take in hand, In his emyspery of hye or low degre Nothing there is but it may measure be. Though that it be from us hye and farre, If ony thing fall we may it truely sem, As the sonne or moone or any other sterre, We may thereof know well the quantite. Who of this science dooth know the certaynte, All maysteries might measure perfytely; For geometry doth shew it openly. Pastime of Pleasure, Percy Society, p. 100. 1For example, Lydgate's Temple of Glas. 84 EARLY TUDOR POETRY reader the dominant effect of the passage is that of surprise, surprise that it should be there at all, and, after the monotonous rime-royal, the use of the heroic couplet is rather a relief. So, up to this point in the investigation, Hawes may be considered merely as a continuator of the medieval tradition. He is dull, incoherent, verbose. Dr. Schick quotes Scott as saying that Hawes is "a bad imitator of Lydgate, ten times more tedious than the original," with the grim addendum that it "means not a little!" This opinion is comprehensible since the first parts of both poems have almost no action and consist of interminable disquisitions full of poorly phrased commonplace. But this criticism does not apply to the second halves of the same poems. Here the action is rapid, varied and romantic. The reader is hurried from adventure to adventure, each more marvellous than the last. And the break between these two divisions is marked by scarcely any transition. In The Example, for instance, after the interminable debate, which has no particular relation with what is to follow, Dame Sapience begins the new part with the unexpected remark that the hero had better get married. And the lack of sequence is still further shown by the fact that only a little later in the poem the hero, again meeting Sapience, has apparently never seen her before. Although in The Pastime the transition is better managed, in neither poem consequently is there any unity. Apparently he composed them as he went along, without much regarding what had preceded and without foreseeing what was to follow except vaguely.1 Naturally then it is useless to discuss the proportionate space given to the separate episodes, or the relation between them. And as their sequence is chronological, the composition is of the type familiar to the modern reader in the Morte d'Arthur or The Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye, where the charm lies in the quaintness of the language and of the particular incident. Unhappily it cannot be said that the episodes here, taken separately, are very attractive. The love passage in the garden between Amoure and Pucel has a certain formal quaintness, but in general Hawes' descriptions consist merely in catalogues of events or of characteristics of persons. Thus night after night he solemnly 1 In The Pastime, Cap. iv, the hero is shown an arras picturing his future adventures; these, however, do not exactly correspond with the presentment. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 85 puts the hero to bed. Or, when he wishes to impress the reader with the beauty of the heroine, he resorts to an inventory.1 Her shining here so properly she dresses Alofe her forehed with fayre golden tresses. Her forehead stepe, with fayre browes ybent, Her eyen gray, her nose streyght and fayre, In her whyte chekes the fayre bloud it went As among the whyte the rede to repayre: Her mouth right small, her breth swete of ayre, Her lyppes softe and ruddy as a rose, No hert on lyve but it wold him appose. Wyth a lyttle pytte in her well-favored chynne; Her necke... etc. The list goes from top to bottom, until he reaches Her fete proper, she gartered well her hose. He lacks the saving sense of humor so that when his dragons should be terrible, they are merely ridiculous.2 I sawe the dragon... I behelde his head with his great body, Which was mishaped ful right wonderly; Of gold so shene was both his head and face; Ful lyke a mayden; it was a mervalyous cacel His necke silver, and thicke as a bull; His brests stele, and like an olyphant; His forelegges latyn, and of fethers full; Ryght lyke a grype was every tallaunt; And as of strength he nothing did want, His backe afore, lyke brystles of a swyne, Of the fine copper did moost clerely shyne. His hinder legges was like to a catte, All of tynne, and like a scorpion; He had a tayle wyth a head thereat, All of leade, of plyaunt facion; His herte stele, without menission. Toward me he came, roring like the thonder, Spyttyng out fyre, for to se greate wonder. 1 P. of P, Cap. xxx. 2 P. of P., Cap. XXxvff. 86 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Now this is bad art! Surely with The marvellous Dragon so greatly stinkirng bearing down upon him, the knight would have neither time nor inclination to obsPrve all these details. Nor is the date of composition any excuse, because Chaucer, writing a century earlier, could have taught him to omit the non-essential. The reason why he fails to make his creations vital, is primarily because they were not vital to him. For examplehedesaenot see a real knight fighting_._ral Aragon, b4-the-~a -rk in tapestry. This is curiously obvious from the fact that from the heads of the dragon curl stanza-long statements in Greek lettering. Standing at ease before the imaginary tapestry, the author deciphers the inscription for the benefit of the reader. But as the effect is that of a description of a picture, compared with the vividness oTuny an, these figures are still and lifeless. The third poem, The Comfort of Lovers, to be bracketed with the two just discussed, is yet chronologically the last of the series, since the title tells us it was "made and compyled"... "in the seconde yere of the reygne of our most naturall souerayne lorde kynge Henry the eight." Perhaps, since this unique copy is practically inaccessible, it will be better to give an abstract of the poem. It opens with an introduction of four stanzas in the rimeroyal, stating Hawes' familiar positions, that poets cloak truth "under cloudy figures," that he himself is "lytell or nought experte in this scyence," doing it merely "to devoyde ydlenes;" and ending with the eulogy on Gower, Chaucer, and Lydgate, the stress being laid upon the last. In the poem proper the poet is walking in a fair meadow, meditating upon the ways of Providence, when he falls asleep. In his dream he seems to be in the garden of a Tudor palace. There he is met by a lady of goodly age who greets him in a stanza characteristic of the author at his worst. To me she sayd / me thynke ye are not well Ye haue caught colde / and do lyue in care Tell me your mynde / now shortly euerydele To layne the trouthe / I charge you to beware... 1 The Example, stanza 222. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 87 Moved by this poetic appeal, the hero confesses that divers years ago he had secretly loved a beautiful lady. I durst not speke unto her of my loue Yet under coloure I dyuers bokes dyde make Notwithstanding (or on account of?) this, misfortune had come upon him. Thretened with sorowe. of many paynes grete Thre yeres ago my ryght hande I dyde bynde Fro my browes for fere / the dropes doune dyde sweet God knoweth all it was nothynge my mynde Unto no persone / I durst my her to untwynde Yet the trouthe knowynge / the good gretest P May me releace / of all my / p / p / p / thre After this cryptic complaint, the lady comforts him with commonplace proverbs. But to these he rejoins Alas madame / unto her then sayd I Aboue XX. woulues / dyde me touse and rent Not longe agone / delynge moost shamefully That by theyr tuggunge / my lyfe here was spent I dyde perceyue / somewhat of theyr entente As the trouthe is knowen / unto god aboue My ladyes fader they dyde lytell loue. Apparently to escape these discomforts, he dispraised where he loved best, and turned his thoughts toward God. But he complains Som a had wened for to haue made an ende Of my bokes / before he hadde begynnynge But all vayne they dyde so comprehende Whan they of them lacke understandynge Vaynfull was & is theyr myssecontryuynge Who lyst the trouthe of them for to ensue For the reed and whyte they wryte full true Assuring him of her appreciation that his books have been written for the high pleasure of the red and white, she conducts him to a resplendent tower. Upon the walls within are three magic crystals, each with its appropriate emblem. In the first he sees his past; 88 EARLY TUDOR POETRY in the second he sees the plots of his enemies, and he takes the,,U~ emblem, the flower of virtue; in the third the Holy Ghost appears as aove, and he takes the emblem, the sword of prudence and the shield of perception. On again regarding the third crystal, it now shows the heavens with an effulgent star, which he interprets to mean that he will be successful in his quest. In any event he is so, as shortly after his lady appears, with Dame Diligence bearing her train. Then follows a dialogue of twenty-five stanzas, in which Pucel at last refers the case to Venus and Fortune. The poem ends with an apology addressed to ladies. This abstract has been purposely made full in order that the modern reader may have the pleasure, intended by Hawes for his contemporaries, of guessing the interpretation. And the modern reader, I think, will feel that Hawes underestimates his power of using "couert termes" and "cloudy figures." Herein lies its chief significance. In this, his last poem, he has rejected the appeals to the interest of his reader by introducing either morality or adventure, nor does he, as in the other two poems, vouchsafe any explanation. With any such meretricious weakness rejected, it is thus an example of this theory of art carried to its reductio ad absurdum. As such it was never reprinted. The age had lost its interest in these forms of intellectual ingenuity, which became degraded into charades and conundrums. Yet by the poet himself it was probably regarded as his masterpiece. At least, it is the most personal of his poems. And it forms a curious nexus between the other two. The heroine, Pucel, is taken from The Pastime; her father, who is unmentioned in The Pastime, is taken from The Example. Thus in a certain sense The Comfort of Lovers may be regarded as the completion and final summation of the art of Hawes. The remaining two poems may be passed almost without comment. The Conuercyon of Swerers reached the dignity of a third edition probably before fifty years had passed. Its appeal must have been based on the unimpeachable nature of its sentiments, since it consists advowedly in quotations from the early fathers against swearing, indefinitely diluted. And A Joyfull medytacyon to all Enqlonde of the coronacyon of our moost naturall souerayne lorde kynge Henry the eyght is chiefly interesting from the complete reversal of one of his prophecies. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 89 Holy chirche reioyse / with all your lybertees Withouten domage / the kynge wyll ye encreace And be your shelde from all adversytees No wrong shall be but he wyll it soone seace Knyttynge the knotte of fayth loue and peace Bytwene you and hym without dysturbaunce So for to endure by longe contynuance. Perhaps it was fortunate that Hawes did not live long enough to see what were the relations between Henry and the Church. These two poems are interesting for another reason, from the fact, namely, that being published in facsimile they are the only ones which give the American reader any appreciation of the actual condition of the text. Professor Arber has ruthlessly modernized The Example, and Wright's edition of The Pastime, reprinted from one of the latest editions of the sixteenth century, seems hopelessly inaccurate. The fact that he considers it as one of the "monuments of the bad taste of a bad age," is no justification for beginning a chapter in the middle of a sentence.1 Thus one is never sure whether the blunder is that of the printer or of the poet.2 Occasionally there is a lilt to the stanza faintly suggestive of Spenser, and usually the lines may be made to scan by an agile reader. Of course, being an admirer of Lydgate, he employs frequently the broken-backed line. And one must be prepared to call in the assistance of the final e. A very favorable example of his verse is given by the following stanza.3 O mortall folke! you may beholde and see Howe I lye here, sometime a myghty knyght; The end of joye and all prosperite Is deth at last, through his course and myght; After the day there cometh the derke night; For though the day be never so longe, At last the belles ringeth to evensonge. The last two lines include all that Hawes ever directly contributed to English literature, and even here the expression may not be The P. of P., Caps. xxxiii, xxxiv. Southey here gives the same reading. 2 Burkart gives a number of illustrations. Such conditions are necessarily unfair to the author. Sympathetic criticism and a complete understanding must be deferred until the appearance of Professor Potter's edition. 3 The P. of P., Cap. xlii. 90 EARLY TUDOR POETRY his as it figures in Heywood's Proverbs. On the other hand, that Hawes was interested in the technical side of his art is shown by the curious verse experiment in the Conuercyon. See Ye (kynde Be Agayne My payne (in mynde Reteyne My swete bloode On the roode (my broder Dyde the good My face ryght red Myn armes spred (thynke none oder My woundes bled Beholde thou my syde Wounded so ryght wyde (all for thyn owne sake Bledynge sore that tyde Thus for the I smerted Why arte thou harde herted (I thy swerynge as lake Be by me conuerted Tere me nowe no more My woundes are sore (and come to my grace Leue swerynge therefore I am redy To graunte mercy (for thy trespace To the truely Come nowe nere My frende dere (before me And appere I so In wo se se Dyde go I Crye (the Hy This attempt at so artificial a form makes one question whether in some of his impossible lines we have the poet's own text.' In spite of all that can be said in the way of unfavorable criticism the fact yet remains that his greatest work went through five editions before the reign of Elizabeth. Although the explanation lThe peculiarity of Hawes diction is discussed in Chapter 3. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 91 may be, as has been unkindly suggested, that the age had few books, the probable reason is that, owing to the very composite nature of the book, it appealed to a wide reading public. The long moral disquisitions attracted some; others found humor in the coarsely realistic episode of Godfrey Gobilive; and still others enjoyed the romantic adventures. To the literary historian Hawes' chief significance lies in the fact that to te allegorijed the romance. The age of Henry VII seemed prosaic; the good old times had passed, the knights and paladins had become extinct, and, as Hawes himself says, the flower of Chivalry had been long decayed.l But (especially under Henry VIII), the forms and ceremonies were all the more valued. Thus, while Henry and Francis were mutually trying to out-lie and out-trick each other, their professions were worthy of a Roland and of an Oliver. Jousts and tourneys and gilded armor were the fashion. It was Hawes' good fortune, rather than his literary instinct, that led him to unite the Prioresse and Sir Thopas. Both types of poems had existed separately; it was the union that was the novelty. If Hawes wrote the didactic element to please himself, the romantic part was presumably introduced to please Henry VII. His Welsh blood and predisposition toward French literature would account for the presence of the marvels and the combats. Jack the Giant Killer is a Welsh hero. Yet Hawes himself is not in sympathy with the static ideal of medieval Christianity. When his hero is offered the choice between a life of contemplation and one of activity, and of worldly dignity, it is the latter that is chosen, for Hawes is on the threshold of the Renaissance. With modern cnitics- te temptation s tto consider Hawes, not in regard to what he is, but in regard to what the type will produce. Thus feE phrase, "the Speuer.hefor e Spenser" continually appears. The point to remember is that, if this be true, it is also that he is Spenser with Spenser left out.2 There has been a tendency to exalhTnin, to read into him beauties, and' to excuse deficiencies. Mrs. Browning, who is enthusiastic, regards The Pastime of Pleasure, together with Piers Ploughman, the House of Fame, and the Temple of Glas, as the "four columnar marbles... on whose foundation is exalted into light the great allegorical poem of the 1 The P. of P., Cap. xxvi. 2 His effect upon Spenser is reserved for a later study. EARLY TUDOR POETRY world, Spenser's Faerie Queene." 1 As Schick points out, the pedigree is more probably Martianus Capella-Anticlaudianus-Court of Sapience-Pastime of Pleasure-Faerie Queene. At least this gives the significance to Hawes' work. He is known, if known at all, for the better work of other men. And yet it was his fortune to combine the two strongly marked-medievaLtendencies into one single form. Without a tithe of the poetie-4aacutty-o-the author of the Court of Love, in literary historyhe is much more important. lie is. the gateway between medievalism and the Renaissance. Up to this point in the discussion, there has been one characteristic common to all work, namely the lack of definite expression of the personality of the author. In spite of the Comfort of Lovers, Hawes remains a visionary figure. This condition is almost necessitated from the fact that each author wrote according to lines laid down by tradition. But such a state belongs rather to the Middle Ages than to the Renaissance. Then, if anything at all was stressed, it was individuality. What seems to the modern reader to be arrant boasting, to the man of that time appeared only the proper recognition of his own ego. In literature the time was at hand when a writer would employ the old formulae, but employ them as a medium for self-expression. Practically such a condition is to be found in a poem of John Skelton. Of his life, beyond what may be legitimately, or illegitimately, deduced from his works, we know curiously little. Since the name Skelton, Schelton, Shelton, or Scheklton, is quite common, at once appears a prolific source of misinformation. In particular a contemporary John Skelton, afterwards knighted, adds to the confusion. Thus his life, a fascinating structure of inference and conjecture, is built around only a few definite dates.2 We know neither when nor where he was born, nor who were his parents, nor where he received his education.3 The first notice 1 Book of the Poets, 123. 2 The Life prefixed to the Dyce edition of 1843 is still in great measure the source of all subsequent statements. This may be corrected by the masterly study of Friedrich Brie, Skelton-studien, Engliache Studien, 37 abnd, 1-86. As I shall have occasion to differ from certain positions taken by Dr. Brie, I wish here to express my hearty admiration for the skill with which he has brought order out of chaos. 3 One Scheklton, according to Cole's Collections, as quoted by Dyce, received the M. A. at Cambridge in 1484. That this is the poet is questioned in Vol. III of the Athene Cantabrigiensis. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 9S shows him already with an established reputation. In 1490 Caxton in his preface to the Eneydos, after explaining his difficulties with the English language, unexpectedly addresses Skelton.' But I praye mayster Iohn Skelton, late created pcete laureate in the vnyuersite of oxenforde, to ouersee and correcte this sayd booke, And taddresse and expowne where as shalle be founde faulte to theym that shall requyre it. For hym, I knowe for suffycyent to expowne and englysshe euery dyffyculte that is therin / For he hath late translated the epystlys of Tulle / and the boke of dyodorus syculus, and diuerse other werkes oute of latyn in-to englysshe, not in rude and olde langage, but in polysshed and ornate termes craftely, as he that hath redde vyrgyle / ouyde, tullye, and all the other noble poetes and oratours / to me vnknowen: And also he hath redde the ix. muses, and vnderstande theyr musicalle scyences, and to whom of theym eche scyence is appropred. I suppose he hath dronken of Elycons well. This casual remark of Caxton gives the two influences that affect Skelton's work, namely his Latinity and his desire for expression in English. For his Latin we have also other evidence. The first Grace Book of the University of Cambridge gives the entry in 1493,2 Conceditur Johanni Skelton poete in partibus transmarinis atque oxonie laurea ornato ut aput nos eadem decoraretur." According to this entry, then, he had been honored with the academic degree of poet laureate, by Oxford, Cambridge, and a foreign university, probably Louvain.3 Warton, followed by all subsequent writers, adds another entry, 1504-5.4 "Conceditur Johi Skelton Poete Laureat, quod possit stare eodem gradu hic quo stetit Oxoniis, et quod possit uti habitu sibi concesso a Principe." 5 What the "same degree here that he held at Oxford" was I do not know.6 The assumption that it was again the degree of poet laureate seems improbable since that had already been given him at each uni1E. E. T. S., Caxton's Eneydos, p. 3. 9 Athenoa Cantabrigiensis, Vol. III. 1 Given by title of verses of Whittington, Dyce 1, XVI. 4History English Poetry, 1873, iii, 127, note. This was verified for Dyce, i, xiii, note. On the other hand no such entry is given in the Athenve Cant. nor is there any mention of it by Mullinger. 6 For Dyce the Rev. Dr. Bliss searched the archives at Oxford with no result. "No records remain between 1463 and 1498 that will give a correct list of degrees." After 1500 Wood gives no notice of such a degree otnferred upon Skelton. The habit is presumably the one alluded to. Dyce, Vol. I, 124 and 197. Arno Thilmmel, Studien liber John Skelton (Leipzig, 1905), pp. 48-50, appreciates the difficulty but offers no solution. 94 EARLY TUDOR POETRY versity. It may have been the D. D. as Bale suggests. However that may be, it is the poet laureateship in which Skelton delights. In his curious (and unpleasant) series of mocking attacks upon Garnesche he plumes himself upon this particular degree.1 Lytyll wyt in your scrybys nolle That scrybblyd your fonde scrolle, Vpon hym for to take, Agennst me for to make Lyke a doctor dawpate, A lauryate poyete for to rate. Yower termys ar to grose, To far from the porpoes, To contaminate And to violate The dygnyte lauryate.2 And again: What eylythe the, rebawde, on me to raue? A kyng to me myn habyte gaue: At Oxforth, the vniversyte, Auaunsid I was to that degre; By hole consent of theyr senate, I was made poete lawreate. To cal me lorell ye ar to lewde: Lythe and lystyn, all bechrewdel Of the Musys nyne, Calliope Hath pointyd me to rayle on th6. It semyth nat thy pylld pate Agenst a poyet lawreat To take vpon thE for to scryue... It ys for no bawdy knaue The dignite lawreat for to haue.' In the postils to two poems Skelton is signed as "Orator regius," whatever that may mean. But that he had no definite connection with the court as our modern term implies is proved by the fact that his name does not figure on the rolls. It was an academic degree conferred for proficiency in the composition of Latin verse. The fact that he was so honored in three universities, even with 1 Of course this has no connection with the moder office of poet laureate. 2 Dyce, i, 122l. Dyce, i, 128-1iB. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 95 out considering the mysterious second degree, shows that according to the educational standards of the time he was regarded as a man of great scholarly attainments. Given a man with such scholastic antecedents, it was almost inevitable that he should experiment with a type of poem authorized by literary tradition; given a man with the renaissance craving for individualistic expression, and it was inevitable that the conventional form would be modified, even unconsciously, by his treatment. On the one side there will be careful adherence to the peculiarities of the form; on the other a complete breaking away from the typical mental attitude. So, whereas Hawes in his combination of the chivalric and erotic elements was a conscious innovator, mechanically creating a new type by a recombination of old forms, here there will be an unconscious adaptation of the old tradition to form a medium of expression for the new age. Such is the peculiarity of Skelton's poem, The Bowge of Court. The poem is divided into the three conventional sections, the introduction, the poem proper, and the apologetic conclusion. In the first five stanzas, with the typical astronomical opening, the poet in the first person tells us that he wishes to write,... callynge to mynde the greate auctoryte Of poetes olde, whyche full craf ely, Under as couerte termes as coude be, Can touche a trouth and cloke it subtylly Wyth fresshe vtteraunce full sentencyously. With becoming hesitation, however, he feels a lack of confidence in his ability to be sufficiently obscure. In this mood of doubt he falls asleep, and in his dream At Harwyche Porte slumbrynge as I laye, In myne hostes house, called Powers Keye, he sees a ship well freighted, called the Bowge of Courte. The aim of the voyagers is to obtain the jewel favor of the owner, dame Sauncepere. Shielded by silk she sits upon a throne over which is the motto Garder e fortune, que est mauelz et bone. Her chief gentlewoman, Danger, repulses him, but another, Desire, urges him on, and advises him to make friends with fortune, who controls the ship. 96 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Whome she loueth, of all plesyre is ryche, Whyles she laugheth and hath luste for to playe; Whome she hateth, she casteth in the dyche, For whan she frouneth, she thynketh to make a fray; She cheryssheth him, and hym she casseth awaye. With the rest, the poet, whose name is Drede, makes his suit to Fortune. Here the prologue ends. The poem proper is an account of the voyage. On board there are seven "full subtyll" characters, Favell (Duplicity), Suspecte (Suspicion), Harvy Hafter (a cheat), Dysdayne, Ryotte, Dyssymuler, and Subtylte. Each in turn is characterized, and has an interview with Drede. There is some dramatic action suggested. After the last, fearing for his life, he leaps overboard, and awakes. The "lytyll boke" ends with an apology,... it is only a dream, but sometimes in dreams truths appear. Such is in bare outline the plan of the poem. At once merely by the outline it is apparent that we have here a composition of the type of the medieval tradition. It has all the earmarks, the dream structure, the allegory, the personifications and the rimeroyal. Still more, it has the peculiarities of the Lydgate school. The formal astronomical opening, the belief in the necessity of "couert termes," the suggestion of the apostrophe to the "lytyll boke" at the end, and the inevitable apology. You even find an occasional broken-backed Lydgatian line. That i ne wiste what to d6 was b6ste Up to this point it is a perfect example of the school so worthily represented by Hawes. The interesting feature about the poem is, not its similarity to the type, but its unconscious divergence from it. Skelton's personality is too powerful to be confined in any common mould. Seeing life with his own eyes, and not through literary tradition, he becomes concrete. The vague medieval meadow is a definite place, Harwich Port, and a definite inn, Powers' Quai. This becomes strongly marked when he deals with the personifications. Instead of Hawes' pictured figures, here the characters are strongly individualized. The description of Harvy Hafter may serve as an example: THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 97 Vpon his breste he bare a versynge boxe; (dicing) His throte was clere, and lustely coude fayne; Me thoughte, his gowne was all furred wyth foxe; And euer he sange, Sythe I am no thyng playne. To kepe him frome pykynge it was a grete payne; He gased on me with his gotyshe berde; Whan I loked on hym, my purse was half aferde. The last line is a triumph of suggestiveness. And the same brilliant characterization is shown in the speeches. For the sake of continuity Harvy is again chosen for illustration: Syr, God you saue! why loke ye so sadde? What thynge is that I maye do for you? A wonder thynge that ye waxe not madde! For, and I studye sholde as ye doo nowe, My wytte wolde waste, I make God auowe. Tell me your mynde: me thynke, ye make a verse; I coude it skan, and ye wolde it reherse. But to the poynte shortely to procede, Where hathe your dwellynge ben, er ye cam here? For, as I trowe, I haue sene you indede Er this, whan that ye made me royall chere. Holde vp the helme, loke vp, and lete God stere: I wolde be mery, what wynde that euer blowe, "Heue and how rombelow, row the bote, Norman rowe!" "Prynces of yougthe" can ye synge by rote? Or shall I sayle wyth you a felashyp assaye; For on the booke I can not synge a note. Wolde to God, it wolde please you some daye A balade boke before me for to laye, And lerne me to synge, Re, my, fa, sol! And, whan I fayle, bobbe me on the noll. Loo, what is to you a pleasure grete, To haue that connyng and wayes that ye haue! By Goddis soule, I wonder how ye gete Soo grete pleasyre, or who to you it gaue: Syr, pardon me, I am an homely knaue, To be with you thus perte and thus bolde; But ye be welcome to our housholde. And, I dare saye, there is no man here lane But wolde be glad of your company: 98 EARLY TUDOR POETRY I wyste neuer man that so soone coude wynne The fauoure that ye haue with my lady; I praye to God that it maye neuer dy: It is your fortune for to haue that grace; As I be saued, it is a wonder case. For, as for me, I serued here many a daye, And yet vnneth I can haue my lyuynge; But I requyre you no worde that I saye; For, and I knowe ony erthly thynge That is agayne you, ye shall haue wetynge: And ye be welcome, syr, so God me saue: I hope here after a frende of you to haue. Here we are miles away from the stock epithet of the Lydgate school. Harvy is musical, and sings "Row the boat, Norman, row" 1 and "Princes of youth." But unhappily he sings by ear only. He is a homely knave and seeks to flatter by stressing the superior attainments of Drede. Yet he is completely insincere, and at another's suggestion is quite willing to throw Drede over board in a picked quarrel. The line, Holde up the helme, loke up, and lete God stere, is rather shocking coming from the mouth of such a character. Yet is it not natural for this type of rascal to throw thus the responsibility upon God? Harvy Hafter's easy-going philosophy is here suggestive, and it is worth comment that Skelton recognized that such a shifting of responsibility denotes weakness of character rather than strength. Thus each trait is carefully etched in. The result is that for the first time since Chaucer vivid characterization is placed in a framework of definitely conceived dramatic action. With such treatment as this, naturally there is no ambiguity in the interpretation of the allegory. Bouge, from the French bouche, is merely the technical term for the table set by the king for the court.2 As such it had been used half a century before Skelton. Here it is used to typify life at the Court. The conditions there were so unlike the present that it requires an effort of the imagina1 This is an actual song, the music of which is preserved in Chappell's Popular Music of the Olden Time, II, 482. 2 The reader is refered to Chapter I of the present work. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 99 tion to realize them. In the sixteenth century court a large number of individuals were brought together without any regard to congeniality and without very much to do. The duties were trivial. Yet however trivial they might seem abstractly, concretely upon them depended both one's reputation and one's income. The main object of a man's life was to acquire the favor of the monarch. If for any reason good or bad, important or trivial, noble or vile, you attracted the favorable notice of the king, you were successful. Thus all things were reduced to one level; whether you were a skillful statesman, or player on the lute, or a cunning deviser of royal debauch, it was immaterial. On the other hand, failure to obtain this, in the fullest sense of the word, spelled ruin. As the Duke of Norfolk said to More, "by God's body! Mr. More, indignatio principis mors est," and More proved the truth of the statement on Tower Hill. As there was no real dignity back of the life, and as there was no independence of thought, Skelton thinks that to gain this all-important favor of the King is only a matter of chance. And equally, he that possesses it is both flattered and hated by all the rest. The Court is peopled by liars and cheats, by suspicion and disdain. Success there is worse than failure and the honest man jumps over board! If this be the interpretation, only by form does the poem belong to the type represented by the medieval tradition. If on that side it be compared to Hawes, its content recalls Barclay in both his Eclogues and in his Ship of Fools. First there is no question that there was some relation between them. Even granting that Bale's mention of a work by Barclay Contra Skeltonum be mythical, that Barclay did not approve of Skelton is shown in the final stanzas 1 of the Ship of Fools. There he plumes himself upon his virtuous writings, priding himself that It longeth nat to my scyence nor cunnynge For Phylyp the Sparowe the (Dirige) to sing. To assume, however, that Skelton's verses good-humoredly advising those that disliked Philip Sparrow to do better themselves,2 are a reply to Barclay, is to assume that Barclay was the only critic. Likewise to construe the passage in the Fourth Eclogue 1 Jamieson, op. cit., ii, 331. 2 Dyce, 1, 412. 100 EARLY TUDOR POETRY against poet laureates as an attack particularly aimed at Skelton is to state a tempting hypothesis. Of course it may be true, but equally of course it may seem true only because of our lack of data. It is fair, however, to feel that the traditional enmity between the two poets must have had some foundation. But if there be any truth in this tradition it is somewhat surprising to find Skelton enlisted by modern scholarship as a follower of Barclay.' This is almost certainly an error, due to the inclusion among Skelton's work of the Boke of Three Fooles. As this has been shown by Brie 2 to be merely a part of Watson's translation of the Narrenschiffs, all connection of Skelton with Barclay's Ship of Fools is reduced to the fact that they each use the allegory of a boat. But even in English this metaphor is not uncommon.3 Nor is the employment of it the same. In Barclay the figure of the boat is a mechanism in which to put his innumerable fools; in Skelton the boat itself represents the court. If it be necessary to find an original for the ship of state, the ode of Horace comes at once to mind.4 Thus, while it may be possible that Locker's version of the Narrenschiffs (1497) suggested the idea, Skelton's employment of it is much more artistic. Much the same may be said of the assumed influence of Barclay's Eclogues, which also attack court life. Barclay's criticisms are after all criticisms of superficial detail; Skelton sensed the fundamental wrong. And this superiority of Skelton is due, in the last analysis, to his deeper perception. Barclay is merely an adapter of other men's work, a humanist by courtesy. Skelton, on the other hand, brought from his wide reading a point of view that made him a sharp and original critic of English conditions. The importance of this argument lies in the fact that the dating of the poem is based on internal evidence. If it shows the influence of the Ship of Fools unless Skelton saw the manuscript it must have been written after 1509; if it shows the influence of the 1 Herford, Literary Relations, pp. 354-355; Rey, Skelton's Satirical Poems, p. 51; Koelbing, Zur Charakteristik John Skelton's, p. 69; in the Chapter on Barclay and Skelton in the Cambridge Hist. of Lit., p. 83, written after Brie's Studien had appeared, Koelbing recedes from this position, substitutes Brandt for Barclay, and tends to date the poem early. 2 Brie, op. cit., p. 18. ' Koelbing op. cit., p. 76, gives a long list of predecessors. 4 The Fourteenth Ode of the First Book. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 101 Eclogues, it must have been composed about 1514.1 But as it does not in any way show the influence of these works, there is no necessity for so late a date. In fact the cumbrous form, the careful following of the medieval tradition, point rather to very early work. Brie here makes a suggestion, entirely without any foundation, but fascinating in connection with my interpretation of the poem. We know that Skelton had been connected with the Court as tutor to Prince Henry. We know also that in 1498 he was ordained successively subdeacon, deacon, and priest.2 But in 1504 he was Rector at Diss in Norfolk.3 It is a not unnatural assumption that he received the rectorship of Diss as a regard for his tutorial services. On the other hand there has never been a reason assigned why a man sufficiently influential to be chosen as tutor to his Prince, and with the reputation of one of the leading scholars of his country, should be willing to bury himself in an obscure country town. Norfolk today is but ninety-five miles from London, but ninety-five miles over sixteenth century roads was a long journey fraught with discomfort and danger.4 Skelton's own answer perhaps is to be found in the Bowge of Court. From a court in which there was not to be found one good man, where rTetches plotted against him, he indignantly sought refuge in exile.' This is mere hypothesis, but it does cover all the few facts of the case. This hypothesis also explains the acidity of the poem. The allegory of the Romaunt of the Rose and of Lydgate has been turned into satire! This medieval form, clear and definite, has already been twice modified by the literary necessities of the Renaissance; by Hawes, who combines with it a didactic chivalric romance, and again by Skelton, who forces it into the service of satire. Still another at1 See Chapter IV, p. 167. The latest date with the curious reason is given by Rey, op. cit. 51: "And what is still more concluding for the posteriority of the 'Bowge of Court' is the circumstance that it was even written after the 'Garland' which dates, as the title-page indicates, from 1523; as the 'Bowge' does not form part of the list of Skelton's works in the 'Garland,' the assumption of the posteriority of the 'Bowge of Court' seems quite ascertained." As Dr. Rey states that he has used the three volume American reprint of the Dyce, I refer him to Vol. 2, p. 222 of that edition where in the Garland of Laurel he will find the line, "Item Bowche of Court where Drede was begyled".. 2 Dyce, 1, XX. 4 Ante, pp. 48-49. s Dyce, 1, XXVI. 6 Brie, op. cit., p. 41. 102 EARLY TUDOR POETRY tempt to use the old formula was made just after the middle of the sixteenth century by John Heywood. John Heywood (1497?-1560?) has at least left behind him the tradition of a fairly definite personality, probably due, however, to the fact that he lived well into the reign of Elizabeth. His work belongs to the earlier period, because he remained faithful to his religion, even to the extent of becoming an exile. That he was possessed of tact is shown by his continued existence without changing his religious beliefs, although he was forced once to a public recantation. His marriage with the daughter of Rastell the printer, the brother-in-law of Sir Thomas More, strengthened him at the Court, which he had entered in the capacity of "singer." In any case he figures in the Court Expenses of three reigns. Although Wood rates him as an Oxford man, traditionally he was valued "for the myrth and quickness of his conceits more than for any good learning." 1 Probably he was concerned with the many masques and entertainments at Court, an occupation in which his wit and humor had full play. That that was his reputation is shown by his description of himself.2 "Of Heywood." "Art thou Heywood, with the mad merry wit?" "Yea, forsooth, master! that same is even hit." "Art thou Heywood that applieth mirth more than thrift?" "Yea, sir! I take merry mirth a golden gift!" "Art thou Heywood that hath made many mad plays?" "Yea, many plays; few good works in all my days." "Art thou Heywood that hath made men merry long?" "Yea, and will, if I be made merry among." "Art thou Heywood that would be made merry now?" "Yea, sir! help me to it now I beseech yow." It is unfair to take a man's description of himself too seriously, but he had the reputation of being a mad merry wit. Even in Puttenham's time, anecdotes were current showing his quickness of repartee. This is particularly shown in his plays. It is by them that Heywood maintains his hold upon the attention of the modern reader. Following the French models in substituting characters drawn from real life for the tedious abstractions of the morality 1 Puttenham, Art of English Poesy, Lib. I, cap. xxxi. 2 100 of Heywood; The Fifth Hundred of Epigrams. Ed. J. S. Farmer. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 103 plays, Heywood took a long step forward in the direction of comedy. Hence, in any history of the development of the drama form, Heywood occupies a conspicuous position.1 But whatever French influence may be shown in his dramatic works, there is none in his poems. His Epigrams,2 though founded upon humanistic models, are characterized by their idiomatic English. Still more so is this true of his " Proverbs," a disquisition on marriage in eleven chapters of dialogue. The peculiarity of the poem, however, is that the narrative avowedly serves but as a frame for "our common plain pithy proverbs old." Although both of these are experiments, they both show Heywood as conservative rather than as innovator. The work of Heywood, however, that concerns us here, is his curious allegory The Spider and the Fly. Not the least curious feature about it is the way it has been tacitly ignored. In bulk it occupies one third of his collected writings. It is perhaps on account of this very bulk that it is so seldom read. It belongs in the category of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, a book that we never find just the leisure to complete. Consequently if Ward's objection that only those critics that have read the poem discuss the poem holds, I fear that the name would appear even less often in print. But the main reason for this neglect is to be found, not in the size, but in the obscurity of the poem. It is as Heywood says a "parable." In form it belongs to the type now so familiar. In a morning, the description of which is reminiscent of the Prologue to the Canterbury Tales, the author sees a fly entangled in the web of a spider. The body of the poem, then, is taken up with these characters, —a method of introduction very similar to that of The Pastime of Pleasure, except that the author remains always the spectator. When it is added that the story is an allegory, that there are personifications, and that it is written in the rime-royal, it belongs obviously to the group. The interest to us lies, however, not in its similarity but in its differences from the type. First and foremost, the characters are not abstractions, such as Danger, Venus, et. al.; they are animals. 1 As the drama has been the subject of so many and such detailed studies, it is simpler here to refer the reader to Professor Brooke's "The Tudor Drama," where this side of Heywood's work is discussed. 2 These are discussed in Chapter III following. 104 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Thus on one side it is akin to the Second Nun Priest's Tale or Reynard the Fox. Apparently the story breaks into two quite distinct parts. The first twenty-seven chapters consist in the elaborate legal arguments presented by the fly, who has blundered into a spider's web, and the spider's rejoinders. Then arbitrators, an ant and a butterfly, are called. After twenty-two more chapters in which the original issue gets befogged by the introduction of irrelevant issues, the arbitrators leave the case exactly where they found it. Whereupon the spiders retire to their castle in which they are besieged by the flies with the ant as their prisoner. After various fluctuations of the fortunes of war, to save the ant, the spider grants peace but on the condition that the original fly shall die. As this is about to take place, the maid of the house destroys the web with her broom, kills the chief spider, and redresses grievances. This poem has been unfortunate in receiving almost universal condemnation. Only twenty-one years after it had been first printed, William Harrison 1 confessed that Heywood "dealeth so profoundlie, and beyond all measure of skill, that neither himselfe that made it, neither anie one that readeth it, can reach vnto the meaning therof." This opinion is endorsed by Warton with the comment "sensible." He adds that in his judgment "perhaps there never was so dull, so tedious and trifling an apologue; without fancy, meaning, or moral... Our author seems to have intended a fable on the burlesque construction; but we know not, when he would be serious and when witty." 2 Modern criticism quietly but firmly ignores it altogether.3 This opinion is scarcely to be wondered at as the meaning of the poem is undoubtedly obscure. That there is a meaning intended is so stated by the author himself in the Preface.4 A Parable: is properilie one thing, That of an other doth conceiuing bring. Yea: (oftentims) as parables are scand, One score of things: by one, be vnderstand. 1 Description of England, prefixed to Holinshed's Chronicle. Quoted by Warton. 2 History of English Poetry,-1871 —4, p. 85. 3 There seems to be no reference to it in Ten Brink, in Courthope, or in The Cambridge History. 4 The Preface, p. 3. Farmer's ed. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 105 Eche one of all: scanned and vsed well, Maie teache the scanner good: to take & tel. Contrarilie: scanned and vsed ill, Like il likewise, the fruite a mounteth untill. Wherfore, before entrance to scanning here: In present parable here to appere, First to induct (for to conduct) the waie: How readers and scanners: redilie male: Right scanning (in right reading) here purchase. He goes on to illustrate his position by an anecdote of three women dressing before a mirror. Each could see the errors of the other two while remaining ignorant of her own, and the reader is enjoined to meditate carefully upon the mirror of our actions presented in the picture. The only help to the interpretation is found in the conclusion. The maid is stated to be Queen Mary, the master of the house, Christ, and the mistress the Holy Catholic Church. The matter is scarcely clarified, however, by his statements at the beginning of the poem.' I haue, (good readers) this parable here pende: (After olde beginning) newly brought to ends. The thing, yeres mo then twentie since it begoon. To the thing: yeres mo then ninetene, nothing doon. The frewet was grene: I durst not gather it than, For feare of rotting: before riping began. The losse (it on the frewterers hande lying:) Had (in that mistery) mard his occupying. This worke (among my poore workes) thus hath it past: Begon with the first, and ended with the last. The poem was printed in 1556. The last part was written not earlier than '55 because there are allusions to the marriage of Mary with Philip of Spain.2 "Yeres mo then twentie," subtracted from '56 would practically make it antedate the Pilgrimage of Grace. Consequently, this rules out Professor Ward's interpretation. The presumption is that the first twenty-seven chapters deal with the legal difficulties when Wolsey was Lord Chancellor. There are some, perhaps casual, allusions which seem to support Haber's 1 Conclusion-The Spider and the Fly, p. 450. 2 In the interpretation of the poem I follow Dr. Jakob Haber-Litterarhiatorische Forschungen, 1900. 106 EARLY TUDOR POETRY contention that Wolsey is the chief spider; the fly then in this part represents the commons. This view becomes more plausible when Heywood's intimacy with Sir Thomas More is considered. But, after Wolsey's death in '30 this satiric fable in a measure lost its point. Or, even before Wolsey's death Heywood's connection with the court may have made it seem to him inadvisable to publish it. In any case, he allowed it to rest, according to his own statement, for nineteen years. Nineteen plus thirty gives us the year '49, when the Duke of Northumberland, who now becomes the chief spider, marches against the discontented yeomen, who now become the flies. Consequently, in the same poem, with no mark whatever of transition, there is a dual personalty for the spiders and a dual class for the flies. Moreover, as the "new men" during the minority of Edward VI belonged to the reforming party, whereas the yeoman were still largely Roman Catholics, there is a measure of truth in the old theory that the spiders are the protestants and the flies the catholics whom Mary supported by the death of the chief spider. Is it any wonder, then, that, when the memory of these events had passed away, a poem so inconsistent with itself should be regarded as unintelligible? From our point of view, however, the poem has been unjustly neglected because Heywood's method is very significant. On one side, as has been said, the poem is a specimen of a perfectly familiar type, with all the characteristics of that type. On the other, we find the old form changed with an entirely new content. What differentiates it sharply from medieval work is that it is political. Instead of personified abstractions, we find here concrete persons figuring under a thin disguise, and actual contemporary events told as an allegory. As such, it is the progenitor of a number of English works that can scarcely be ignored in the history of the literature. Exactly the same method is used by Spenser in his Mother Hubberd's Tale. And as moreover Heywood's inconsistency between the beginning and the end of his poem has been followed by Spenser, there is exactly the same difficulty in making it intelligible. And Mother Hubberd's Tale is the avowed precedent for Dryden's Hind and the Panther. It is a curious (and unfruitful) speculation whether among the books in Temple's library Swift may not have found a copy of the Heywood, to suggest to him his most famous episode in the Battle of the Books. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 107 If so, he probably did nothing but look at the cuts, in which the fly is the size of a very large bee. Be this as it may, in any case the possible influence of Heywood's poem is an interesting speculation. The severe condemnation of the critics is not quite justified on the ground of literary treatment. To the general reader the poem is undoubtedly dull, but that is because he is ignorant of the interpretation. At the time when all England was vocal with the injustice of the law-courts, when More won his great popularity through remedying the abuses, it would not have been called dull. Heywood's relationship to the great Chancellor seems to imply that he knows his subject. Even today the presentation is not without humor. Not only is it very colloquial, but he aims at an intentionally comic effect by attributing human gesture to his characters. Thus the fly wrings his hands and feet. The young spider begs his father, "for some part of that flesh fly's brain." Whereat the fond mother 1 How say ye to this babe (quoth the mother) Will ye here this vrchin of eyght weekes olde, It is a babling brat aloue all other. Human nature is much the same now as in the sixteenth century. When the fly has first blundered into the web, the spider is terrified.2 Is it the diuell? or is it our dame? Or is it the page? or is it the groome? Or is it our maide with hir birchin broome? Betwene the diuel, and all these, last and furst, The diuel take me, if I can choose the wurst. But ill, woorse, and woorst, diuel, and all togither Do me assaute as it (to me) doth seeme, Hath fortune wrought my foes at this tyme hither, And not so much as warnde me to misdeeme, Now fie on fickle fortune thus extreeme, And I defie the garde of suche a guider, Alas (this day) I am but a dead spider. I Page 43. ' Page 37. 108 EARLY TUDOR POETRY These woordes thus spoken, downe anone he sanke. Kneling a while, deuoutlie on his knee, And then rounde on a heape, to grounde he shranke Like an vrchin vnder an aple tree. This is of course the trick used by all fabulists in all times in all languages. It is the main source of humor in the Nonne Prestes' Tale, the one tale that Dryden's modernization renders successfully. At least then, let Heywood be given the credit for his employment of it. There is one more differentiating characteristic of the poem,and one that can be illustrated only by a long quotation. The passage chosen is the speech of the mediating ant.1 My masters flies here all in generall: And eehe one perticulerlie: I humblie praie, What things I shall touch, generall or speciall: To take to the best. And first that I made: As remembrauncer of your remembraunce, ley One speciall meane forth here: remembred to be, Drawing herers in all things to equite. And equite, in all things: to giue or to take: (Among other vertues) is a vertew pewre. Inequite, for wrong, no waie can make. Where equite, is set and setled sewre, For equite in no wise may endure; Balance, to anie one side, cast or dreuine. Equite, equallie; kepth the balance euine. Which meane: for which equite to be obteynde, Is: that herers: in hereing this mi case Se: that diffinitiue iudgement be refreynd, In anie part thereof: to take anie place, Tyll the whole be hard. Which hering to purchase, Is my great sewt. Beseching all to susspende: Iudgement in euerie part: till all parts take ende. First for me: next for you and me: last for you: I sew to be hard. And first for me, marke all. From all offence by me done; to you here now, Syns I cam, in this case that doth here fall, I am clearde. By one vnsuspect for parshall, I meane that worshipfull maister butterflie: Who trieth me: to haue delt here indiffrentlie. Pp. 235-244. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 109 He cleerth me sins I cam. And before I cam, Yf any flie (Iustlie) to my charge can lay; In anie thing waying the weyght of a cram, By worde, or decde: either open or priuey; That euer I hurt flie: anie maner way, Then let my ponishment here: be so ample, That all ants may therby take an example. But being clere sins I cam: and more tauow; Being clere till I cam: from woorde and deede ill, Alas: why will ye kill me, who hurth not yow. Nor neuer did hurt you, nor neuer will. Nor neuer can: though will wold ill fulfill. This: for my slefe leyde (as for my selfe proued, I hope my selfe sure: from harme by you moued Secondly: for you and me both, this meane I. Yf ye draw the blood of me: (thus innosent), As the los is small, so naught wyn ye therby. But (as is saide) infamie of endles extent, Which paino fro me: and shame from you to preuent, The safe salue for both sides: is this to decre, Saue you my life, and that saueth your honesto. Third: and last poynt: nought for me, all for you: Prouying me, not only: you no whit to hate, But much to leue: a tale Ile tell and a vow, Which: you hering and folowing: in stedie state, Shall stedilie stey you, from harme in debate: That hangth ouer your beds: much more than ye se, Wherin for you and not for me (I say), here me. Among many presepts philosoficall: Geuon to all persons: to take profet by, For tyme: place: and case present, aboue all. One serueth in sentence most singulerly. The woordes short: the matter long: the reason hy. Which woordes and matter, on these woordes do depende. Ere thou ought begin, haye an eie to the ende. This pure presept: as all oft in woordes sey it: If all did do it, in effectuall deede, So that our deeds did it: as our woords wei it, Oh; what commoditee therby shuld proceede. Our full felicitee; shuld thervpon breede. As contrarily breedth: in contrary show,, Infelicitee; as we feelingly know. 110 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Who wold begin a fray: and his fo therin kill? If he lookt to thend, that shuld hang him therefore. I wene all the world, shuld be kept from all ill; Kept we this lesson well, in practised lore: To thend of beginning; to looke euermore; Before we begin, for when we haue begoon, The leauing of lightly, is not lightly woon. Small things begun; without looking to their end, Cum oft to ill end: great lesse, and ieoperdee. Great things: begoon than: none Iie on thend tatend At (or ere) their beginning; we must agree; To be our much more discommoditee. As things: greatter and smaller: differ in sise, So diffreth here: discommoditee likewise. And of all our great thyngs: no one of more weyght, Nor therby more meets; thend therin to wey; At beginning, then is that better beyght; Of wrechid war. The very locke and key, That lacheth and lookth vs all, from quiet stey. Who that (in rashe roofe) beginneth to contende, He repenth beginning, ere he cum to ende. It is a thing: right far be yond an ants reche: To blase the plat of peyson; generaly; Set a broche by war, but short sum to feche: Warres harme: and good, stand bothe vnspeakably. Both are (I say) vnspeakable for why, War hath, done more harme; then tale of toung can holde, War hath done no good, and nought can not be tolde. War hath wrought such wo: that all flies comunly, And spyders eke. Of which two sortes I speake: Hauing in all times had experiensy, Of rashs beginning of war: the peace to breake, They feeling (in their war) their winning weake, Wolde loose half the good they had: to peace to fall: Rather than ieberd in war: goods life and all. And of both sortes in this case, weried in war, Flies haye had euer cause; to mislike war moste. When spiders and flies; haue falne at this lyke iar, For quarels: wherin flies, might most their ryght boste; Who suer had the right, the flies the feeld lost. To one score spyders sleyne, flies slayne, twentyscore, And much of their ofspring, lost for euermore. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 111 Which showth as spiders calte, that no dedicion; Can haue good sucses. In flies inferior: By stoburne war, but by humbyll peticion: For thing interior, or exterior. Flies must sew: to the spider superior. They take this as a full hold: not to be remist, Well framid flies, wyll suffre and not resist. Flies wreks in wars: in time past: yf flies reuolue, How spiders copwebs: flies sepultures haue beene, Your wise quiet retire, shall this war disolue. But yf smart of time past: be forgotten cleene, Cast Iye to parell, at Iyre presentlie seene. Vew yonder copweb castell: with endifrent iye: And marke whether ye be macht endifrentyle. Behold: the batilments in euerie loope: How thordinance lieth: fliers fer and nere to fach. Behold; how euerie peece: that lith there in groope: Hath a spider gonner: with redy firtd mach. Behold on the wals: spiders waking ware wach, The wach spider: in the towre a larum to strike, At a proch of any nomber, showing war like. Se then prenabill fort: in euery border. How euerie spider: with his weapon doth stand. So thorowlie harnest: in so good order: The capitall spider: with weapon in hand. For that sort of sowdiers: so manfully mand. With copwebs: like casting netts: all flies to quell, My hart shaketh at the sight: be hold: it is hell. Against whose strength there, your weakles here behold, Sum haue harnes: most haue none: all oft of rey. Capitaynes: practised: politike and bold, Few or none haue ye: this armie to conuey. But eche in others neck: as sheepe start a strey. Ordinance meete for the ship, ye bring to the feelde But force without order: winth victorie seelde. And put case: that of you fortie thousand flise: Thirtie thousand: shall scape, and his window win. Yet if ech one of you: in him selfe surmise: That he shalbe one: that shall die entring in, What one flie (of all flies) wil thassaute begin? No one, but that one that from home now come, Shall thinke him selfe wisest, that sonest goth home. 112 EARLY TUDOR POETRY But to die all: and in this window nought geynel Of that: sayde practise of time past: assewrth ye. To venter life, and suffer deth, are thinges tweyne. Ventring of life, tobteyne right, oft as we. But to venter life: where deth hath certente, For these kinds of right: to die: while ye may liue, No wise flie will: but right rather ouer give. But if your harms of time past: be forgoten, Warning of present harms: at present time take. Of which two measures: if none may be moten, Time past, nor time present (of which two I spake), Let the third: time to cum: be meane, thend to make. Weying that in time to cum. The end must cum: To one end of foure, which folow here in sum. After this war begoon, either both parts shall: Take ende with condision: as both parts can gre, Or continew in war, time perpetuall: Or the flies (by the spiders) conquered shalbe, Or the spiders conquered by the flies. Now se: How: in eche one end of these fowre: shall a rise, Paynfull perelus penuries, to all flies. First: if ye after a time had in conflickt: Take ende with the spider: by composicion, Beside the flies: that to death shalbe addickt: The suruiuers: shall receyue such condicion: At the spiders hand: as the distribution: Shall make flies at end: bid fle on their winning, And after that end: repent their beginning. Second: this war: continuing continualy, Euery yere, moneth, weeke, day, howre, euery minute: Many flies shall die, and all may feare to dy: What flie can besure: one howres life texecute: At poyntes of all weapons, euer had in pursute. In vndoughted death: and doughtfull deadly life, This ende sheweth small difrens, where reason is rife: Thirdly: yf the spider do conquere you flise, What so euer flie then: him selfe best he haues: The best and the worste: all in one rate shall rise. Now frank free franklin flies, then all vile bonde slaues, Now flie in light windowse, then sit in darke caues. Flies beginning war: ending thus, they shall clere, Their hell or purgatory, begin euine here. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 113 The fourth: yf you flies shall the spider conqueare, Then shall all spiders go to wracke first: no doubt. And after shall the flies folow: eueri wheare. When flies baud kild spiders: that stey the rewde rout, Then flie against flie: comun cuthrote moste stout. Foure endes: in this one war: show (thone and thother, The last being worste), ech end wors then other. In time past: time present: and in time to come: Sins ye haue woon: do win: nor shall win here ought, Beter wende your ship a loose: and take sea roome: Then roon here on rockes, and to shipwrak be brought: It is to fer fet: and ferder to dere bought: To fet: and bye thinges: with no les los in striues: But with los: both of all your liuinges and liues. Here haue I sayde my minde: vnder principles few. First: desiring you to here me thorowly. Ere ye iudge any part, or what I should shew. And then to iudge me, by equite equaly. Whervnto: for hereing in this case sewde I, First for me, next for you and me, last for you. Of which proses a brigde, brefe pith aprochth now. For me: the flies and butterflies tales: I weyde: To my discharge. Sins I cam: of all offence. And before I cam, my discharge my selfe leyde. Wherin: my case being giltles inosence, For you and me, both in reson and consiens. To saue both sides vpright, this counsell I gaue. You to saue my life, your honestie to saue. Foryou and not me: in your present quarell, On this principle, my hole talke did depende. Ere we ought begin: namelie thing of parell, Wisdom wilth vs, to haue an Iye to the ende. In parelus quarelus case: to contende: Chieflie this: in time past: present: and to cum, How ye sped: and be like to spede, I shoud the sum. But to end at beginning: you casting Iye, At this poore counsell: of poore Antonie ant, Of shap and good wit small: of good will great and hye, I shall reioyse. Hoping here shall be no want: Of equite: in my discharge this instant. Which I humbly pray: and so to end to fall, I say no more: but the great God saue you all. 114 EARLY TUDOR POETRY This done: a noyse began of such a huzzing, Ech one flie blowing in an other flies ears, As if ten milions of flies had ben buzzing. And all: by this tale so astonide in feare, That most of them: their weapons could scantly beard. Thants perswasions: in drede of deth: strake them so, That hundreds cride oute, home agayne let vs go. With this mounser graund captayne the great bragger: Was much a mased, and vengeably vext. To se these flies now: so vnstedily stagger, So late so redie: to bring their foose perplext. This time (thought he) should giue warning to the next. Yf he scaped this at all times to be ware, With faint fond flies, to fiske agayne a warfare. At once upon reading this speech, the intellectual quality becomes apparent. It may be thus briefly digested. The ant is not partial, or he would not be there. He himself has never hurt a fly, and, since he is of small account, they would gain nothing by killing him. After this introduction he argues that the flies should cease the conflict because (1) it will be they who suffer most by the war; (2) the spiders are fortified; (3) they are well armed; (4) an end must come. This will be either (1) perpetual war,-a condition which is hopeless; or, (2) the flies will be conquered,-and defeat will be hopeless; or, (3) the spiders will be conquered,again undesirable as anarchy will result. There he advised peace. It is a fact that when the Duke of Northumberland was besieged somewhat as in the poem, he did persuade the rebels to disband. The question arises whether he accomplished the result by some such reasoning. The argument as it stands, in its introduction, taking the point of view of the audience, and in its development by use of the dilemma, is worthy of Hawes' goddess of Rhetoric. All possible alternatives are discussed, the inevitable conclusion reached. At once it suggests the speech of Belial in Paradise Lost, said to be a model for parliamen;ary debate. Still more in its dry intellectual quality does it remind one of Dryden. And it is interesting in an age of formal formlessness to find so rigid an example of pure form. One more characteristic of Heywood's verse deserves to be pointed out, and that is his use of alliteration. He has a marked tendency to hunt the letter. Thus THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 115 He wafted his winges, he wagged his tayle Another illustration is 2 Oh sodayne sorowe, from setled solas, For so sat I in solas: as me thought. Oh fortune, false flaterer that euer was, In one moment, and in an other wrought. So furious, that both thaffects foorth brought, Furie, or flaterie... Such marked liking for alliteration is thoroughly English. The early poetry, of course, was purely alliterative, and it is this characteristic of Heywood's verse that has suggested the comparison with Piers Plowman. There is of course no necessity for localizing it in one poem. It is the common feature of early work. But Heywood's poetry is typically English, curiously unaffected by the foreign influence of his time. As Haber says 3 Classical antiquity one seeks in him in vain, even so is the knightly bone of the Elizabethan age strange to him; he is very bourgeois and through and through English; his material, his speech, his metre, his treatment, all is English, he is rooted in Chaucer, in the school of Chaucer, in the knowledge and expression of the people. But if this be true, the comparatively rapid oblivion that has overtaken his great work needs explanation. The first reason is that it needs too minute a knowledge of temporary conditions to be intelligible. But the second reason is that, even when he wrote, his poem was out of date. He was reproducing a past type, and even his modifications of the type did not save it. By Heywood's time, the humanists had done their part and Wyatt and Surrey had given an Italian color to English letters. From this point of view, the lack of appreciation of the critics is illustrative of the drying up of the purely English source of inspiration. In Heywood, then, we find the last modification of the formal poetry of the Middle Ages. With the great changes in the social fabric and in the mental point of view, the adaptation of the allegorical poem of the fifteenth century to the needs of the sixteenth presents a curious study. The author of the Court of Love tried 1 Page 27. 2 Page e9. Ibid., p. 113. 116 EARLY TUDOR POETRY to impose it intact upon the men of his generation. And in spite of his undoubted genius, he failed. Hawes, combining it with the chivalric romance, produced a hybrid that pleased. Skelton turned it to satire, and then contemptuously abandoned it altogether. And last of all Heywood rather pathetically endeavored to support the tottering structure by personalities and contemporaneous reference. And great was the fall thereof. And yet, all these modifications are combined and assimilated by the genius of Spenser into the Faerie Queene. There one finds the personified abstractions of the first, the chivalry of the second, the satire of the third, and the historical allusion, the episode of Burbon for example,1 of the fourth. So true is this that, without an understanding of the work of the first half of the century, the typical work of the last half must have seemed unintelligible. And without this knowledge, Spenserian critics have been driven far afield in their efforts to justify by literary precedent the varying developments of his poem. Actually the foundations for his structure were laid by obscure writers, each one contributing his quota. The many-sided genius of Spenser took this medieval tradition, combined it with humanism and with the Italian,-and the world has forgotten the lesser men. But just as it is illogical to praise the flower and ignore the root, so it is for the literary student of Spenser to pass by these contributors to the medieval tradition. There is a curious appendix to be placed at the end of this discussion of the medieval tradition; this is some account of the growth of Chaucer's reputation. At the beginning of the century he is named always in conjunction with Gower and Lydgate, and, as we have seen in Hawes and Caxton, with the preference given to Lydgate. He it is that to the writers of the early sixteenth century is the model and the great exemplar. At the end of the century, however, both Lydgate and Gower have faded into mere satellites of Chaucer, and it is he that Spenser acclaims as his poetic progenitor. This change may be explained by the growth in literary appreciation, that the genius of Spenser overleaped the centuries to recognize the genius of Chaucer. It is also due to the fact that of the three authors Chaucer's works were alone accessible in a collected edition. Thus, to a student of Chaucer, the Thynne edition, 1532, of the collected works is a fact of great importance, 1 Fverie Queene, V, xi. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 117 although of course a number of the separate works had been printed earlier in a number of editions. This collected edition was reprinted in 1542, and again about 1550. In 1561 appeared the edition called after Stowe the antiquary, and in 1598 the edition of Speght. Thus without there being any collected edition of the works of either Gower or Lydgate, there were five editions of Chaucer's complete works. It is in the second of these that The Plowman's Tale appears for the first time. This was composed by a contemporary of Chaucer about 1395.1 Speght's edition was followed by a criticism of it from the hand of Francis Thynne, the son of the old editor. In this he tells how his father ransacked the abbeys for Chaucer manuscripts and found another poem, The Pilgrim's Tale. Of this he tells the following curious anecdote.2 In whiche his editione, beinge printed but with one coolume in a syde, there was the pilgrymes tale, a thinge moore odious to the Clergye, then the speche of the plowmanne; that pilgrimes tale begynnynge in this sorte: "In Lincolneshyre fast by a fenne, Standes a relligious howse who dothe yt kenne," &c. In this tale did Chaucer most bitterlye enveye against the pride, state, couetousnes, and extorcione of the Bisshoppes, their officialls, Archdeacons, vicars generalls, comissaryes, and other officers of the spirituall courte. The Inventione and order whereof (as I haue herde yt related by some, nowe of good worshippe bothe in courte and countrye, but then my fathers clerks), was, that one comynge into this relligious howse, walked vpp and downe the churche, beholdinge goodlye pictures of Bysshoppes in the windowes, at lengthe the marLne contynuynge in that contemplatione, not knowinge what Bishoppes they were, in a large blacke garment girded vnto him, came forthe and asked hym, what he iudged of those pictures in the windowes, who sayed he knewe not what to make of them, but that they looked lyke vnto oure mitred Bishoppes; to whome the olde father replied, "yt is true, they are lyke, but not the same, for oure byshoppes are farr degenerate from them," and withe that, made a large discourse of the Bishopps and of their courtes. This tale, when kinge henrye the eighte had redde, he called my father unto hym, sayinge, "William Thynne! I dobte this will not be allowed; for I suspecte the Byshoppes will call the in questione for yt." To whome my father, beinge in great fauore with his prince (as manye yet lyvinge canne testyfye), sayed, "yf your grace be not offended, I hoope to be protected by you:" whereuppon the kynge bydd hym goo his waye, and feare not. All whiche not withstandinge, my father was called in 1 This is Skeat's dating. 2 Thynne's Animadversions together with The Pilgrim's Tale have been edited for the Chaucer Society by Furnival, with a preface by Kingsley. 118 EARLY TUDOR POETRY questione by the Bysshoppes, and heaved at by Cardinal Wolseye, his olde enymye, for manye causes, but mostly for that my father had furthered Skelton to publishe his 'Collen Cloute' against the Cardinall, the moste parte of whiche Booke was compiled in my fathers howse at Erithe in Kente. But for all my fathers frendes, the Cardinalls perswadinge auctorytye was so greate withe the kinge, that thoughe by the kinges fauor my father escaped bodelye daunger, yet the Cardinall caused the kynge so muche to myslyke of that tale, that chaucer must be newe printed, and that discourse of the pilgrymes tale lefte oute; and so beinge printed agayne, some thynges were forsed to be omitted, and the plowmans tale (supposed, but vntrulye, to be made by olde Sir Thomas Wyat, father to hym which was executed in the firste yere of Quene Marye, and not by Chaucer) with muche ado permitted to passe with the reste, in suche sorte that in one open parliamente (as I haue herde Sir Johne Thynne reporte, beinge then a member of the howse), when talke was had of Bookes to be forbidden, Chaucer had there for euer byn condempned, had yt not byn that his woorkes had byn counted but fables." As 4 matter of fact neither the Plowman's Tale nor the Pilgrim's Tale appears in the 1539 edition. Nor,l from its allusions to the Lincolnshire insurrection of 1536 and even by page and line to the Thynne edition of Chaucer, could it have ever been considered in that connection. Nor is Thynne's account of the contents of the tale quite accurate. Probably, as Professor Lounsbury suggests, Thynne confused it with the Plowman's Tale. But the Pilgrim's Tale was printed before 1540. And moreover, whatever may have been the name on the title-page, in the body of the poem not only is Chaucer quoted, but in addition at the end it is intimated that Chaucer's opinions are identified with those expressed there. When it is remembered that Thynne is telling of events that happened half a century earlier, and which confessedly he knows only by report, it is possible that there is the additional confusion of Wolsey with Cromwell, and that the objector was the Malleus Monachorum. In this case, the objection would be purely one of policy. On the other hand the traditional enmity of Wolsey with his father is probably accurate as well as the very interesting reason given for it. Actually the Pilgrim's Tale is an invective against "the Whore of Babylon," reiterating the stock charges, and advocating the reading of the Bible. It is the conventional poem of the Reformers. Its verse form is the octosyllabic couplet varied by nineteen stanzas in rime-royal. The significant fact here is that it is Chaucer that is chosen as the literary prototype. The 1 This was shown by Henry Bradshaw and confirmed by Lounsbury. THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION 119 very lack of an imitative attempt, the freedom from any pretence at literary archaism, seems to show that Chaucer was valued rather as a propogandist than as a poet. At Oxford, (the author is careful to state that he is an Oxonian), as well as in Parliament, Chaucer's works were read from a religious standpoint. But apparently they were read. And thus in a manner that would surprise no one more than Chaucer himself, his poems were accepted as being those of our first English author, and his influence passed on to the coming generation. CHAPTER III THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION The starting point for an understanding of the development of English poetry in the first half of the sixteenth century is the fact that the change in the pronunciation of the language between fourteen hundred and fifteen hundred to a measure broke the continuity in the development of the literature. Ordinarily the movement is gradual, each writer introducing modifications in themselves slight, but the cumulative effect of which, after half a century, becomes apparent in what is called a "new school." At that time, however, not only had the change in the language rendered former authors, such as Chaucer and Lydgate, unavailable as models, but also the demand for literary productions was great. With the Tudors was born a new age. The writers of this new age were in a curious situation. They could either adapt forms written in Middle English, which was fast being forgotten, or they could imitate forms used in other languages than English. Naturally the dilemma did not present itself to them as sharply defined as this. In trying to express themselves they took what forms they had, and did the best they could with them. And the form chosen depended both upon what the especial occasion required and upon the knowledge and preference of the writer. They wrote as best they knew. On the other hand, that they were limited to the alternatives of the dilemma, owing to the change in pronunciation, was felt by many of them and is clear to us. No one author, either, was limited to one kind of composition. Skelton, for example, has one poem in accordance with the practice of the medieval tradition, he shows a knowledge of humanism, and yet his characteristic work is in still another field, that of medieval, scholastic Latin; Hawes is affected by the scholastic theory of the "aureate language," but his work is along the lines of the medieval tradition. And so with the others. The condition is what is to be expected in an era of beginnings, when each writer is feeling his way to a manner of 120 THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 121 expression suitable to his idea. On the other hand, it is also true that each writer had his preferences for the kind of work that he wished to do, preferences sufficiently marked to allow him to be classed with others having the same characteristics. The first of these classes includes poems of the medieval tradition; 1 the second, those poems written in accordance with the precepts of the Medieval Latin poetics. The difficulty in discussing poems of this second class arises from the fact that the Medieval Latin poetics and the Medieval Latin poems illustrating them have been so largely forgotten. Latin poetry to us means the Latin poetry of Rome, the work of Vergil, or Horace, poems to be scanned according to well-known rules carefully studied by us in school. Today, when we speak of Latin poetry, that is what we mean. Of course we all know of the decline and fall of the Roman Empire, of the invasions of the barbarians, of the emergence of modern nationalities, of the institutions of feudalism, etc., etc., but most of us are ignorant of what happened to the Latin language during this long interval. We still allude to it in the terms of the past as being "monkish" Latin, or "barbarous" Latin, and assume it to have been used only by simple, uncultivated, unlearned men. But however their works may be regarded, they surely cannot be considered "naive." Albertus Magnus, Abelard, Saint Bernard, or Saint Thomas Aquinas can be thought of as unlearned only by those that dislike their learning. And surely no one now imagines that the great cathedrals were haphazard constructions, or assumes that the architects of them were not acutely conscious of the effect to be produced. The same holds true of the literature. Since literature, more than any other art, expresses the soul of an age, the poetry of the Middle Ages expresses the idealism, the acuteness, the mysticism and brutality of the men that wrote it. The medium through which much of the Middle Ages expressed itself was Medieval Latin. In form it differs radically from classical Latin; its prosody is accentual, not quantitative. In classical Latin the scansion is determined by the length of the syllables; this length, in turn, is in accordance with the complicated rules of prosody. For example, in the phrase "arma virumque cano," the first a is long by position and the second a is short by 1 Chapter II. 122 EARLY TUDOR POETRY nature so that, in reading, the first syllable has twice the value of the second. Such rules as these do not hold in Medieval Latin. Here the value of a syllable depends upon the stress. The first line of the most famous medieval hymn is Dies irae, dies ilia But according to the rules for the scansion of classical Latin the quantities are Dies irse, dies illa It is clear that the two systems of prosody are so different that poems composed according to one system cannot be scanned according to the other, except in rare cases. When it is added that the Medieval Latin poetry is rimed, a kind of poetry appears that differs fundamentally from that in classical Latin. The reason for so radical a change in the system of verse-composition is a problem for the Latinists. Briefly, it may be said that at one time, before Ennius, the Latin language was both quantitative and accentual, and that Greek influence turned the scale in favor of the quantitative system. In the hands of the great classic writers, verse obeying the rules of quantity is the accepted form. Yet, even in classical times, the Saturnian and Fescennine verses show accentual prosody. To the English reader the situation may be clarified by the analogy in the history of our own literature. The meter of all early English poetry is alliterative, the characteristics of which are that every long line is divided into two short lines or half-lines by a pause; each halfline contains two or more strong syllables; each strong syllable in a line should begin with the same sound and there is no rime. This system can be illustrated by the opening verses of the Prologue to Piers Plowman. The rime-letters are italicised. In a s6mer ses6n whan s6ft was the s6nne, I sh6pe me in shr6udes as I a sh6pe werie, In hibite as an heremite unh6ly of w6rkes W6nt wyde in this w6rld w6ndres to h6ri. About the fourteenth century under continental influences poetry was written according to an accentual rimed prosody. This has superseded the alliterative method of versification so that the latter seems strange to modern readers. Nevertheless, our ears THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 123 respond to the lure of subtle alliteration, and our poets play with it. Hear the sounds Shakespeare uses to describe Cleopatra's meeting with Anthony: 1 The barge she sat in, like a burnish'd throne, Burn'd on the water. The poop was beaten gold; Purple the sails, and so perfumed that The winds were love-sick with them. The oars were silver, Which to the tune of flutes kept stroke, and made The water which they beat to follow faster, As amorous of their strokes. Surely this passage owes it celebrity to a clever repetition of certain letters. Now suppose in the distant future, for reasons impossible to foresee, English prosody should return to an alliterative basis. In that case the analogy with what happened in Latin prosody would be complete. In Latin the return from the quantitative to the accentual prosody came with the fall of Rome and was at least concomitant with the introduction of music in the services of the Church. The fact that the very early chants consist of a series of half notes, terminated by a whole note, renders the quantitative value of each syllable equal. When quarter notes were introduced to quicken the measure, the poets placed the strength where the accent came. With the waxing power of the Church Latin prosody became accentual until the versification of the classic authors was largely forgotten. It was not completely forgotten, since all through the Middle Ages occasionally poems were composed according to the quantitative principles 2 and even in accentual poems quantity was not entirely ignored. In general, however, it must be remembered that a vast amount of poetry was written in Latin according to principles unknown to Horace. The amount of the literature shows that this Medieval Latin poetry possessed great influence. When the various vernaculars were in dialectic stages, before any vernacular had established itself as a national expression, men found in the Latin a medium of communication, not only between members of their own nation, but also with men of other nations. Consequently it was universal, 1 Anthony and Cleopatra, Act II, sc. ii. 2The reader is referred for examples to Ptce Latini Evi Carolini, edited by Ernestus Duemler. 124 EARLY TUDOR POETRY as no language is today. Nor was it in any sense a dead language. It was the vital speech of the educated. As such, all the lectures at all the universities were delivered in it,-and the Englishman at Paris or at Padua comprehended the speaker as well as if he were in Oxford. This fact explains the possibility of a personal following so great as that of Abelard. It was due to Latin that he was able to make his thought clear to the men of all nations that flocked to hear him in Paris. In Latin he spoke to the Italian, the Spaniard, the German, the Bohemian, the Hungarian, the Englishman, and the Frenchman, and by each he was perfectly understood.1 But not only was it the language of the university, it was also the language of the universal Church. And as the Church was the great conservative force, the unchanging center of a changing world, its language was to a very large extent free from earthly transmutations. Thus to the English author of the tenth century writing in Latin, was present the expectation that his work could be read with a fullness of meaning, not only by all men of every nationality of the tenth century, but by all the men of every nationality of all time. Under these circumstances it is no matter for wonder that there exists an immense literature written in the Medieval Latin. Through the ages accumulated the hymns of the Church,2 dealing with every variety of religious emotion and religious experience. Among these, there are some compositions in which religious eroticism is scarcely to be differentiated from secular love poetry, so that the passing from the holy to the profane is clearly easy. Certainly that passage was made. The forms and refrains of the ecclesiastical services were copied and parodied in poems whose content does not at all suggest their original models. Bands of wandering students sang the praises of Venus and Bacchus with more enthusiasm than restraint. Still more, the Latin of the Church was used to attack the abuses of the Church and the so-called Goliardic poetry is openly satiric. Consequently within the bounds of Medieval Latin literature may be found types of all varieties of composition. Fortunately it does not lie within the province of this study to 1 Of course this use of Latin by the University is still remembered in the name, the Latin Quarter. 2 Dreves' monumental Analecta Hymnica is in half a hundred volumes. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 125 discuss the origin of this literature or the interaction between it and the various vernaculars during the early centuries. The problem here is quite different. During the fifteenth century, particularly during the closing years, the comparison between Medieval Latin and English was very unfair. For, not only was the Latin more copious, but in addition the theory of composition in it had been worked out to the last refinement. For example, the Exempla honestae vitae consciously employs sixty-four rhetorical devices, giving the name to each, such devices as anaphora, epiphora, symploke, antithesis, rhetorical question, polysyndeton, asyndeton, word-play, climax, hyperbole, synecdoche, metaphor, allegory, etc., etc.' It is thus a textbook for the use of rhetorical figures, vastly more detailed, however, than even the English rhetorics of a century ago. The fact that the composition dates from the middle of the thirteenth century, while the manuscript is of the fourteenth, is indicative of its popularity. The fourth book of the Laborintus, not earlier than the thirteenth century, gives twenty-eight examples of various stanza-forms.2 John of Garlandia, 1250, lists forty-four species of stanza-forms. Since it is necessary to realize to what an extent this subject had been considered, I shall quote the summary at the end of his Ars Rithmica.3 Ritmus monomicus. Dispondeus. Trispondeus. Tetraspondeus bimembris. " trimembris. quadrimembris. Rithmus iambicus bimembris. trimembris. *" quadrimembris. Dispondeus bimembris cum iambica differentia. " trimembris " " " " quadrimembris " " " " antecedens, iambica differentia in secundo. Iambica differentia antecedens dispondaica differentia in secundo. 1 The Exempla honeste vitc is published with notes and an introduction by Edwin Habel, Romanische Forschungen, xxix, 131-154. 2 1 trattali medievali di ritmica latina, ed. by Giovanni Mari, for the R. Instituto Lombardo di Scienze e Lettere, 1899. In this, by giving eight of the poetical tracts, Sig. Mari has made possible careful study. I owe this reference to the kindness of Professor H. R. Lang. 3Mari, op. cit. 451. 126 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Trispondeus bimembris cum iambica differentia in tertio. trimembris " "1919quarto. quadrimembris " " " dyapente. antecedens, iambica, differentia subsequens. Jambica differentia antecedens trispondaica differentia subsequens. Tetraspondaicus bimembris cum iambica differentia. 9 trimembris 94 CE quadrimembris 9 41 199 antecedens iambica differentia subsequens. lambica differentia antecedens, tetraspondaica subsequens. Rithmus iambicus bimembris cum spondaica differentia in tertio. It 194 trimembris "4 "9 "9 tquarto. 99 CC quadrimembris di" " dyapente. 4-9 It 4 antecedeno, spondaicus subsequens. Spondaicus antecedens, iambicus subsequens. lambicus decasillabus qualis est ille rithmus. Dispondaicus bimembris cum consonancia spondaica que facit differentiam. trimembris "9 " 9 St quadrimembris 6 antecedens, consonancia spondaica subsequens. Trispondaicus bimemnbris cumn consonancia spondaica.. trimembris 4 99 1 94 quadrimembris I 1 antecedens, consonancia spondaica subsequens. Tetraspondaicus bimembris cum consonancia spondaica. CC trimembris 91C 49 quadrimembris 11 4 antecedens, consonancia spondaica subsequens. Ritlimus trispondaicus cum iambica differentia subsequente facit, duas species tredecim sillabarum. Sic erunt quadraginta quatuor. Perfecto libro sit laus et gloria Christo. A men. In other tracts, the prosody of the line is considered, and the proper vocabulary to be used, or the proper introduction of a quotation, or even the employment of curious verbal tricks. The effect of such treatises as these upon the modern reader is bewildering. The art of verse had become a science; poetry was an affair, not of the heart, but of the head; it is not an emotional outburst, so much as an intellectual exercise. As an intellectual exercise, it was taught in the university, a degree given for proficiency in its practice, and the question debated as to its place in the curriculum. Consequently such treatises as we have been discussing were written by serious men for serious men, and the technique of the subject, therefore, received careful consideration. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 127 At the very least, when a man is equally proficient in two languages, there is a reaction upon his use of each language, even when both languages are in the same state of development. The English of the child born in America of German parents that speaks German as his home tongue, can be clearly distinguished from the norm. Even in this extreme case there is a trace of accent and a tendency toward Teutonic grammatical construction. But in the fifteenth century there was no comparison between the development of Latin and that of English. On the one side the English language was in a chaotic condition, with but few poems to serve for models, and no systematic theory; 1 on the other, Medieval Latin had a vast and varied literature, a long list of venerated authors, and a fully perfected theory. Moreover, since Medieval Latin is both accentual and rimed, the similarity in structure made it possible to apply the precepts for the composition of verse in Medieval Latin to the composition of verse in English. But it must be remembered that the influence of Medieval Latin on English was on the form only. The situation is confusing, because in 1500 with the revival of classical Latin, which is called humanism, there is the influence of two literatures on English and yet both of these literatures are in the same language, Latin. Yet they are diametrically opposed, in both form and content. The classical Latin is pagan, quantitative, and unrimed; 2 the Medieval Latin is Christian, accentual, and rimed. And whereas classical Latin is national and local, singing the pride of Rome, Medieval Latin is necessarily without national values, and hymns the pride of the universal Church. Consequently whereas the contact with classical Latin had a very minor effect upon the form of poetry, but did give an immense intellectual stimulus, the contact with Medieval Latin gave a minor intellectual stimulus, but immensely affected poetic forms. Nor could it be expected to give a fresh point of view. The men writing in Medieval Latin were the same men writing in the vernaculars, expressing only individual modifications of the common thought. Thus a translation from Medieval Latin 1 Wilson's The Rule of Reason, 1551; "I take not upon me so cunningly and perfectile to haue written of the said arte, as though none could dooe it better; But because no Englishman until now, hath gone through with this enterprise, I haue thought meet to declare it may be dooen." His Arte of Rhetorique is two years later. 2 The influence of humanism is considered in Chapter iv. 128 EARLY TUDOR POETRY to English bears no mark of a foreign origin. This may be illustrated easily from the hymnal. Today our churches resound with hymns originally composed to voice the longing of cloistered monks of the Middle Ages, and our modern congregations find in them still a passionate expression of their own perfect faith. It may be objected that this illustration is unfair because it is drawn from religious emotion. The same fact may be shown, however, in purely profane literature. In the time of Charlemagne, the conflictus, a poetic debate between representative, or allegorical, figures became popular. From this time its popularity, since it combined in itself the diverse elements of the classical eclogue, the chants de danse, the village flyting, etc., continued with increasing vigor,' until it became a definite type. For example, the first part of Hawes' Example of Virtue belongs to this type. The popularity of these conflictus was both very great and long enduring. In the beginning of the ninth century Alcuin composed a conflictus, Veris et hiemis, where in stanzas of three unrimed lines Summer and Winter personified advance their peculiar attractions.2 In the middle of the reign of Henry VIII Laurens Andrews published The Debate and Stryfe Betwene Somer and Wynter, in four lined monorimed stanzas.3 Between these dates, in the six hundred years of the life of this conception, besides unknown Medieval Latin redactions, there are three French versions, a Genoese, a Dutch, and a Styrian copy, and presumably this by no means exhausts the list.4 Thus the whole subject of the conflictus is a tangled sleave; it originates in the Latin, developing in the vernaculars, reacting back upon the Latin and re-reacting back upon the vernaculars, and in the vernaculars influencing one another. The next obvious step was to have a dialogue where the parties gave opposing views, but were themselves not personified, such as appears in the Thrush and the Nightingale, and Thomas Feilde's Lover and a Jay. Hawes' dialogues between Amour and Pucel are just on the 1 This has been ably discussed by James Holly Hanford, Romanic Review, ii, no. 1 and 2. 2Alcuin's work is published in the Monumenta Germanice Historica, Paets Latini Medii Aevi, Vol. i; The Conflictus Veris et hiemis is p. 270. 3 This has been printed by Halliwell, Hazlitt (Early Popular Poetry of England, iii, 29, and by Arber in the Surrey and Wyatt Anthology, p. 206. 41 have taken this list from a note of M. Emile Picot, Aneiennes Poesies Francaises. X, 49. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 129 border line, while the Nutbrowne Maid is the extreme development. In the last, dramatic action is almost suggested, a fact that shows the relation of this type of poem to the early forms of the drama. For example, in the Consultatio Sacredotum th- question is first posed, twenty men each reply in a stanza, and then the summary is given by the preacher.l Obviously this is but one remove from the form of the early dramas. The relation between the Medieval Latin and the English is always close; even through the sixteenth century English versions of these Latin poems, such as the Golias attacks, occasionally appear, and are considered as being products of native genius.2 Theoretically, therefore, the English writers of the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, in search of models would normally turn to the Medieval Latin. That this was the actual as well as the theoretic sequence, at least in one case, is shown in the poem The epitaffe of the Moste noble and valyaunt Jasper late Duke of Beddeforde.3 It purports to record the lament of "Smerte, maister de ses ouzeaus" on account of the death of the Duke of Bedford (1495). As the sole remaining copy has Pynson's device, its date of publication is probably slightly later. What makes it remarkable is neither the sincerity of the grief, nor the poetic excellence of the phrase; it is due to the fact that the twenty metres employed and the various rhetorical tricks are explained by side-notes, in Latin. As these side-notes refer obviously to rhetorical treatises, the poem may be regarded as a series of experiments, each of which is differentiated and labelled. To comprehend what the author of this poem desi ed to accomplish it is necessary to refer back to the medieval rhetorics. Although it is impossible definitely to state exactly which treatises were in use in England in the fifteenth. century, this fact is of minor consequence since all the treatises give, under slightly varying phraseology, more or less the same (licta.4 The immediate problem, then, is first to formulate the principles of the Medieval 1Poems of Walter Mapes, Camden Society, ed. Wright, p. 174. 2 This is shown by the heading of the English translation, "written about the year 1623." "Very ancient rimes of the corrupt estate of the Churche, written by a certaine Englishman not unlearned (as it appears), above 200 yeeres agone, as wee may unjecture by the antiquity of the writing and of the characters." Poems of Walter Mapes, op. cit., p. 282. ' Printed in the App. of Dyce's Skelton, ii, 388. 4 Cf. Mari, op. cit., p. 374, ~ 3. 130 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Latin, and afterwards to show in each case its application to English verse. Of these there are three that need extended comment, the principles of ornamentation, of scansion of the lines, and of the combination of lines into stanza forms. By the word ornamentation I have translated the Latin colores, a good Ciceronian word. Thus the Exampla honestae vitae begins Rethoricos a me petis, o dilecte, colores; Eloquit phaleras a Cicerone petas. The same word is brought into English by Hawes; But rude people, opprest with blyndnes, Agaynst your fables wyll often solisgyse, Suche is theyr mynde, such is theyr folyshnes; For they beleve in no maner of wyse That under a colour a trouth may aryse. For folysh people, blynded in a matter Will often erre whan they of it do clatter.' Under this conveniently vague heading, are grouped all figures of speech, such as antithesis, rhetorical question, et al. As, however, such figures of speech are by no means the peculiarity of verse, Nicolo Tibino insists correctly that a consideration of them belongs properly to rhetoric, not to poetics.2 As such, there is no need to linger here. The significant fact to be recognized is that in the Latin the Englishman found all of these figures of speech explained and examples of their use. He thus had inherited a most elaborate and self-conscious system of rhetoric. With the second variety of colores, however, the modern reader will find himself much less familiar. This consists in the arrangement of words so distorted from their natural order that a desired effect may be produced. The simplest form of this is the anagram, where the first letter of the first word in each line spells a name. Such is the Envoy of Alison,3 or the stanza in the Ship of Fooles,4 1 P. of P. Cap. ix. See page 108 where the passage is cited in full. The N. E. D., giving this passage, explains colour as fiction, allegory; actually the meaning is more "poetic beauty," one of which is allegory. Compare the word colours as used by Wilson in the passage quoted p. 142. 2 Mari, op. cit., p. 469. Rethorica enim nil plus facit nisi quod orationes variis coloribus ac congruis exornat, prolixas breviando, correptas producendo. 3 Skeat's Chaucer, vii, 360. Quoted p. 139. 4 Jamieson's edition, ii, 208. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 131 eulogizing James of Scotland. But really to appreciate what is possible in this type of work, one must turn back to the poetic efforts of the pious monks, where not only the first letters spell a holy thought but the final letters, and by means of careful selection of medial letters, fancy patterns, such as crosses, diamonds, and squares, are outlined in the stanza itself. The amount of ingenuity required predicates a time of infinite leisure. Somewhat higher in the grade of poetic achievement may be ranked the color repetitio.' This repetition may be at the beginning, as in Hawes; 2 Woe worth sin without repentance! Woe worth bondage without release! or it may be at the end, as in Barclay; 3 where four stanzas end, shame doth the ensue; or it may be a combination of them both,4 as in the following instance: 0 sorrowe, sorrowe beyonde all sorowes sure! All sorrowes sure surmountynge, lo! Lo, which payne no pure may endure, Endure may none such dedely wo! Wo, alas, ye inwrapped, for he is go! Go is he, whose valyaunce to recounte, To recounte, all other it dyd surmounte. This masterpiece of ingenuity is labelled by Smerte simply "Color, repetico." The author here had not only to construct his stanza in the rime royal; in addition the final word of each line must begin the succeeding. Naturally he succeeds in little more than merely making sense. Another form, called by Smerte iteracio, that brings in the same idea of repetition, is the traductio dictionis de casu in casum. In the Ciceronian Epistle ad Herennium it is said that traductio is the figure that brings it about, that, when the same word is used frequently, not only it does not offend the mind, but even makes the oration more closely knitted together.5 1 John of Garlandia I trattati medievali, ed. Mari, op. cit., 420. 2 Example of Virtue, Arber, op. cit., 234-5. 3 Jamieson, op. cit., ii, 164. 4 Dyce's Skelton, ii, 389. 6 Ad Herenn. IV, 14, 20: Traductio est, quae facit, uti, cum idem verbum crebrius ponatur, non modo non offendat animum, sed etiam concinniorem oratiorem reddat. 132 EARLY TUDOR POETRY This in the Exempla honestae vitae is illustrated as follows: Grex illis cedit, gregis hos custodia tangit, Invigilantque gregi multiplicantque gregem. Smerte version is: Complayne, complayne, who can complayne; For I, alas, past am compleynte! To compleyne wyt can not sustayne, Deth me with doloure so hath bespraynte. The important fact to remember here is that a continuous repition of the same word does not argue an impoverished vocabulary, but that it was regarded as a poetic adornment.1 One more illustration to show the dependence of these writers on the Latin. Retrograde or transformed verses are such that when read from left to right they mean one thing, and from right to left another.2 A Latin illustration, taken from John of Garlandia, is Esse decorem de te, presul, gens provida dicit. This read backward produces Dicit provida gens, presul, te dedecorem esse. Smerte had also an example of this. Restynge in him was honoure with sadnesse, Curtesy, kyndenesse, with great assurance, Dispysynge vice, louynge alway gladnesse, Knyghtly condicyons, feythful alegeaunce, Kyndely demenoure, gracyous vtteraunce; Was none semelyer, feture ne face; Frendely him fostered quatriuial allaunce; Alas, yet dede nowe arte thou, Jaspar, alas! 1 Tertius modus dicitur equivocatio, et fit quando dictator non poterit invenire dictionem consonantem sue dictioni; recipiat eandem sub equivocationem significations vel declarationis. Exemplum de primo: si ad hanc dictionem "multa" velis habere consonantiam et non poteris alias, accipias eandem sub equivocatione, "multa" nempe in quantum est nomen adiectivum et collectivum plurale, et in quantum est nomen substantivum, et tune idem est quam "pena" ut in hoc versu: Nos patimur multas, etc., Mari. op. cit., 485. 2 Mari. op. cit., 393, 427. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 133 It would be robbing the reader to anticipate his pleasure in reading this backward! That such poetic curiosities as these that have just been cited were common either in the Latin or the English it is impossible to believe. Their employment would substitute intellectual ingenuity for poetic feeling. But the fact that they are found at all both in the Latin and in the English is significant, because they are so extreme that here there can be no question of vague borrowing, or an indefinable influence. There can be no question that certain peculiarities appear in English verse because they appear in Latin verse, and that to learn to write English they endeavored to adapt the principles taught for Latin composition. And the same reasoning holds true of other colores, the exclamation, the apostrophe, the rhetorical question, the antithesis, etc., etc., that were then, and are now, in ordinary use. The important fact is that, for the English author of the fifteenth century, the rhetorical value of each had already been definitely stated in the Medieval Latin. With a relation so close between the two languages it is natural to expect that in English poems Latin would appear. In the latter, it was regarded as an elegance to work in quotations from classical authors. In the Laborinthus the last nine verses of the stanzas of one section consist of lines from Juvenal, Theodulus, and Horace.' In England, therefore, particularly in divine poems, Latin lines from the Psalms and phrases from the Vulgate appear. Lydgate's Te Deum will serve as an example;2 Te deum laudamus! to the lord sovereyne We creaturys knowlech the as creatoure; Te, eternum patrem, the peple playne, With hand and herte doth the honoure; 0 ffemynyn fadir funte and foundoure, Magnus et laudabilis dominus, In sonne and sterre thu sittyst splendoure, Te laudat omnis spiritus. Or, there may be whole Latin lines completing the English rimescheme; 3 Mari, op. cit., 460-462. 2 MacCracken's Lydgate, op. cit., 21. 3T. Wright, Percy Society. Vol. 23. Song No. xiii. 184 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Salvator mundi, Domine, Fader of hevyn, blessyd thou be, And thi son that commeth of the, De Virgine Maria. Or, they are worked in as tags at the end, as in the dull Lamentation of Mary Magdalen, a dramatic monologue presumably written by a nun.1 I haue him called, Sed non respondet mihi, Wherefore my mirth is tourned to mourning O dere Lord Quid malifeci tibi, That me to comfort I find no erthly thing. Alas, haue compassion of my crying, Yf fro me, Faciem tuam abecondis, There is no more, but Consumere me vis. Associated with religion are the Noels at Christmas-tide; they are secular hymns. It is no matter for surprise to find the Latin carried over into them.2 Make we jow in this fest, in quo Christus natus est. A patre unigenitus, to a maydyn is cum to us, Syng we of hym and sey wolcum, veni, redemptor gencium, Agnoscat omne seculum, a bryth stare kyngges mad cum, For to take with her presens verbum superum prodiens, etc. Or the well-known carol that was so popular that there are at least three versions of it.3 Caput apri differo, Reddens laudes Domino. The bores heed in hande bring I, With garlands gay and rosemary; I praye you all synge merely, qui estis in convivio, etc. But with the Latin mingling in the songs of the Church and the Church festivals, the next step would be to find it in poems where 1 The poem is in English Poets, S. Johnson and A. Chalmers, i, 536; the comment is by Bertha M. Skeat, Cambridge, 1897. 2 T. Wright, Percy Society, Vol. XXIII, op. cit., xliv. T. Wright, Percy Society, Christmas Carols, xviii. - THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 135 the connection with the Church has been completely lost. So Smerte in bewailing the death of his lord drops into the phrasing. As a prynce penytente and full of contricion, So dyed he, we his seruantes can recorde: And that he may haue euerlastynge fruicyon, We the beseche, gloryous kynge and lorde! For the laste leson that he dyd recorde, To thy power he it aplyed, saynge iibi omnes, As a hye knyghte in fidelyte fermely moryd, Angeli celi et posestates! Wherewith payne to the hert him boryd, And lyfe him lefte, gyuynge deth entres. The next step is to have it used convivially in a drinking song.' The best tre, if ye tak entent, Inter ligna fructifera, Is the vyne tre, by good argument, Dulcia ferens pon era. Sent Luke seyth in hys gospell, Arbor fructu noscitur. The vyne beryth wyne, as I yow tell, Hinc alis preponitur. The first that plantyd the vynnayard, Manet in celi gau dio;... This continues for ninety lines, the alternate riming lines being English and Latin. One more example must suffice. This is apparently a three part song, at least it is headed by the phrase triplex pars, by Raff Drake. As the commonplace book, Appendix 58 of the Royal MS., has a number of the songs of the court musician Cornish, Drake probably had some connection with the royal chapel, and the date of the poem is probably in the last ten years of the reign of Henry VII.2 ffrere gastkyn wo ye be qui manes hic in pat'a for all yt here supportyth ye ye makyst ye way ad tartara tartara ys a place trewly pro te et consimilibus flor hym yt lyuyth in Apostasy absentyd a claustralibus, etc. I T. Wright, Songs and Carols, L. I Printed by Fliegel, Anglia, 12, M.8 136 EARLY TUDOR POETRY And this resembles the macaronic verses of the present day. It must be remembered that all these, and the countless others like them, appeared before the conventional date for the beginning of humanism in England, that therefore they show the close relationship between English and Medieval Latin, and that among many authors and for many purposes Latin was used almost interchangeably with the native tongue. In any case, such a condition would have affected the vocabulary of the English tongue to a very large extent. In addition, this influence came at a period when English word formations were shifting and the need of new words was being felt. Still more, it was endorsed by the precepts of the Medieval Latin. Since the effect of such precepts was so great upon the English language, and since also the documents are not accessible to the general reader, an English translation, the first one to my knowledge, may prove of interest.' It now remains to speak of the third section, namely the way to find rimes. Since doubtless the toilsome continuation of this work demands laborious exertion, it is fitting that in some way means should be given by which the ponderosity of this weight may be relieved. In the present chapter I shall declare ways by which rimes and the harmony of phrase may be found more easily. 1. The first method then of finding rimes is called dictionum debita derivatio, because, if the author in a time of necessity cannot find the necessary rime for a given phrase, let him see whether from another expression a derivative riming to his own expression whose rime he seeks, can be formed whether or not such an expression be known; for example, suppose the author wishes to have a rime for this word "formula"; nor can he find another except this word "norma"; but that does not make a sufficient rime; and therefore let him make from this word "norm" a diminutive "normula" that now rimes to his own expression. But debita derivatio must be used in that way whereby one does not sin against the foundation of rhetoric, which is grammar. 2. The second way of finding rimes is called compositio, and that occurs when the writer cannot find the necessary rime to any word; let him form it then by any compound word; for example, any one wishing to find the rime for this word " ficio," not being able otherwise, let him take the compound of this word "facio," as "perficio," etc. 3. The third way is called equivocatio; it occurs when the writer cannot find the rime for his word; let him take the same word under an equivocation of significance or meaning. Example of the first: if to his word "multa" you wish to have the rime and cannot do otherwise, take the same "multa" in equivocation, for truly 1 Mari, op. cit., 484. Trattato di Nicolo Tibino. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 137 sometimes it is an adjective and a collective plural, and sometimes it is a substantive, and then it is the same as "pena" as in that verse: Nos patimur multas, etc. And of the second: anyone wishing to have a rime of this word "flores," if he cannot do otherwise, let him take the same word verbally, and this is used so according to the evidence from various places. 4. The fourth way is called aliene dictionis introductio, and is employed when a rime cannot be found in the ordinary way. Then in the proper case either use the word of another speech, or one formed from it, just as many are accustomed sometimes to introduce Greek words, or words formed from the Greek, or from some other language; but nevertheless the formation from the Greek pleases me more, because all Latin is founded on Greek and agrees better with Greek than with the other languages. 5. The fifth way is nove dictionis fictio; this way is used when the riming word cannot be found by the writer; in which case let a new word be formed from the sound or the nature of the subject and that word introduced. But the writer should see to it that in some way such a word be comprehensible and intelligible; otherwise little praise follows, since his word or song cannot be understood. 6. The sixth way is called transumptio, and occurs when the word necessary for making the rime takes a new significance and in such transumption there is inherent, or is given, sufficient similarity; for example: if someone wishes to have a rime for the word "videt"; no other is possible except this word "videt," yet because it cannot be used in its own signification, let the same word assume a meaning in this extended significance. 7. The seventh way is called dictioni similitudinis adjunctio, and takes place when the author cannot find the rime; then he puts in some kind of fitting similitude, as is seen in the example: Ut ex spinis crescit rosa, in mundi delictis, semper finis dolorosa miscetur cum viciis. But this can be done by another color, that is called similitudo. 8. The eighth way is called contrarii positio. It is when the writer cannot find the riming word; let him use then the phrase of the contrary meaning with the negative sign; as, if from this speech: munera tua sunt mala, some one might wish to make a speech harmonizing in rime, let him in the prescribed mode say: tua dona, non sunt bona; so by this device let him make a phrase suitable in meaning, as, if one cannot rime a certain word, let him take its synonym, or its opposite with a negative, as has been shown. 9. The ninth way is called unius partis orationis pro receptio; this mode is when the writer cannot find in the paradigm the riming word, let him take another undeclinable part, such as an adverb, or a preposition, etc. Let him then take the synonym of that part, giving it the full meaning, and let him make that part declinable, as Laborinthus teaches in his de modis egregie loquendi. This is also shown in the following examples: 138 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Qui sunt absque nisi Non sunt homines minus visi; where this idea "nisi" is placed advowedly for its synonym. 10. The tenth method is called casuum mutatio, and this is used when the word does not rime in one case, let it then be varied into another riming case, and this is explained in the Viatico dictandi, treatise de commutatione dictionum. And I urge you to remember faithfully these said methods of finding rimes; for they are themselves not only valuable for finding rimes, but also for the ornamentation of writing and by them authors induce subtilty. The effect upon any language of such precepts as these naturally would be an increase of the vocabulary. Practically the author is told that, if he cannot find a riming word, he is at liberty to coin one; and the practice is advocated not only as a labor-saving device, but as producing that pearl of medieval literature subtilitas. It requires no great knowledge of human nature, as exhibited in the writings of the fifteenth century, to understand that such precepts would be read with avidity by the English authors harassed by linguistic difficulties. That such was the fact is shown by the examples in the poem by Smerte, who not only followed the precepts but in addition noted the fact in the margin. Thus his stanza Than, if it be ryghte, most of myght, thy godhed I acse, For thy myght contrary to right thou doste gretly abuse; Katyffes unkind thou leuest behind, paynis, Turkes, and Iewis, And our maister gret thou gaue wormes to ete; whereon gretly I muse: Is this wel done? answer me sone; make, Lorde, thyn excuse, is marked color Introductio. This is the fourth color in the list cited previously, and advocates the introduction of a word of foreign origin. In the stanza the b rime is given by accuse. Of the five necessary rimes, three, accuse, Jews, and muse were at hand. Therefore from the French, or possibly Medieval Latin abusare, he introduces the word abuse in the sense of to employ improperly, the first use of which as applied to things, recorded by the New English Dictionary, is a century later; and his first use of excuse, that which tends to extenuate a fault or offense is dated as 1494. In another stanza, by the fifth color, fictio, he increases the significance of the word. Bydynge al alone, with sorowe sore encombred... THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 189 Encumber in this figurative sense is new with Smerte. Still another illustrates the sixth, transumption in the line, Youre pleasures been past vnto penalyte. This is the first use of penalty given in the New English Dictionary, with the meaning suffering. And from the fact that Smerte affixes the side-notes it is clear that not only is he conscious of his innovations but he is proudly conscious of them. Consequently the fifteenth century is marked by the great number of new verbal coinages, especially from the Latin, although there are a number from the French. Thus was formed the "aureate" language. As an example of this, the stanza from the Envoy of Alison may be quoted, the one in which the first letters of the respective lines form an anagram of the name.1 Aurore of gladnesse, and day of lustinesse, Lucerne a-night, with hevenly influence Illumined, rote of beautee and goodnesse, Suspiries which I effunde in silence,, Of grace I beseche, alegge let your wrytinge, Now of al goode sith ye be best livinge. This was written and was accepted as beautiful English. In the Remedy of Love such words as allective, concupiscence, scribable, aromatic, redolence, jeoperdously, sembably, ortographie, ethimologie, ramagious, bataylous, and dissonant, (to choose only the more striking) are used in denunciation.2 The author explains that he was one of the three men flirting with the same woman, who tricked them all. It is to this melancholy incident that the poem is due. The piece belongs clearly to the type of the medieval attack upon women, but its language shows the beginning of the Renaissance. It is interesting, therefore, as showing to what extent even in ordinary verse the English language was affected by foreign importations. It is in Hawes, however, that we find both the fullest explanation of the theory and the'most extreme examples of its practice. His master Lydgate had versified3 "The depured rethoryke in Englysh language." 1 Skeat's Chaucer, vii, 360. 2 Chalmers' English Poets, i, 540. ' Pastime of Pleasure, Cap. xi. 140 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Consequently the selection of a vocabulary is a serious problem.1 "The dulcet speche from the langage rude, Tellynge the tale in terms eloquent, The barbary tongue it doth ferre exclude, Electynge wordes whiche are expedyent. In Latyn or in Englyshe, after the extent Encensyng out the aromatyke fume, Our language rude to exyle and consume." If the author neglects this principle, trouble follows.2 "For though a matter be never so good, Yf it be tolde wyth tongue of barbary, In rude maner wythout the discrete mode, It is distourbance to a hole company." This craving for the "aromatyke fume" in "fewe wordes, swete and sentencious", a sixteenth century expression of the theory of "le mot propre", results in a vocabulary enriched by such coinages as depured, puberitude, sugratif, perambulat, equipolent, brobate, solisgyse, habytaile, itarenge, teneorus, consuetude, etc. To a student of Latin the meaning of most of these words, and of others like them, is clear, although personally I confess to a doubt as to the significance of brobate and itarenge.3 The concrete application of this theory is terrifying. In the following stanza 4 the knight has won his lady and the effect upon him is described. "Her redolente wordes of swete influence Degouted vapoure moost aromatyke, And made conversyon of complacence; Her depured and her lusty rethoryke My courage reformed, that was so lunatyke; My sorowe defeted, and my mynde dyde modefy, And my dolorous herte began to pacyfy." The excesses of such a style rendered it innocuous. A reaction against "ink-horn" terms set in and simplicity was sought. This reaction was caused by, or was at least concomitant with, that 1 Pastime of Pleasure, Cap. xi. 2 Ibid, Cap. xii. a I recognize their fascination, but the New English Dictionary is here reticent. Pastime of Pleasure, Cap. xxxviii. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 141 closer and more sympathetic study of the classical authors that is called humanism. The movement was naturally slow, the nation tending to slough off some excrescences sooner than others. Thus Wilson in his Arte of Rhetorique (1553) feels it necessary to include the "tropes" of a word. These are: 1 A Metaphore or translation of wordes. A word making. Intellection. Abusion. Transmutation of a word. Transumption. Chaunge of name. Circumlocution. And the tropes of a long continued speech or sentence, are these; An Allegorie, or inuersion of wordes. Mounting. Resembling of things. Similitude. Example. Such a catalogue as this suggests Ad Herennium as seen through medieval spectacles, much more than the reasoning of Aristotle. That is the medieval side of his work. But it is preceded by an elaborate warning. This is the Renaissance: 2 Among all other lessons this should first be learned, that wee neuer affect any straunge ynkehorne termes, but to speake as is commonly receiued: neither seeking to be ouer fine, nor yet liuing ouer-carelesse using our speeche as most men doe, and ordering our wittes as the fewest haue done. Sore seeke so far for outlandish English, that they forget altogether their mothers language. And I dare sweare this, if some of their mothers were alive, thei were not able to tell what they say: and yet these fine English clerkes will say, they speake in their mother tongue, if a man should charge them for counterfeiting the Kings English. Some farre iourneyed gentleman at their returne home, like as they loue to goe in forraine apparell, so thei wil pouder their talke with ouersea language. He that commeth lately out of Fraunce, will talke French English and neuer blush at the matter! An other chops in with English Italienated, and applieth the Italian phrase to our English speaking, the which is, as if an Oratour that professeth to vtter his mind in 1I am quoting from the reprint of the 1560 edition, edited by G. H. Mair for the Clarendon Press 1909, 179. 2 Ibid, p. 162. 142 EARLY TUDOR POETRY plaine Latine, would needes speake poetrie, and farre fetched colours of straunge antiquitie. The Lawyer will store his stomacke with the prating of Pedlers. The Auditor in making his accompt and reckening, cometh in with sise sould, and cater denere, for vi, s. iiii, d. The fine courtier will talke nothing but Chaucer. The misticall wiseman and Poeticall Clerkes, will speake nothing but quaint Prouerbes, and blinde Allegories, delighting much in their owne darkenesse, especially, when none can tell what they doe say. The vnlearned or foolish phantasticall, that smelles but of learning (such fellowes as haue seen learned men in their daies) wil so Latin their tongues, that the simple can not but wonder at their talke, and thinke surely they speake by some reuelation. I know them that thinke Rhetorique to stande wholie vpon darke wordes, and hee that can catche an ynke home terme by the taile, him they coumpt to be a fine Englisheman, and a good Rhetorician. And the rather to set out this foly, I will adde such a letter as William Sommer himsefe, could not make a better for that purpose. Some will thinke and sweare it too, that there was neuer any such thing written: well, I will not force any man to beleeue it, but I will say thus much, and abide by it too, the like haue been made heretofore, and praised aboue the Moone. A letter deuised by a Lincolneshire man, for a voyde benefice, to a gentleman that then waited vpon the Lorde Chauncellour, for the time being. Pondering, expending, and reuoluting with my selfe, your ingent affabilitie, and ingenious capacity for mundaine affaires: I cannot but celebrate, & extol your magnificil dexteritie aboue all other. For how could you haue adepted such illustrate prerogatiue, and dominicall superioritie, if the fecunditie of your ingenie had not been so fertile and wonderfull pregnant. Now therefore being accersited to such splendente renoume, and dignitie splendidious: I doubt not but you will adiuuate such poore adnichilate orphanes, as whilome ware condisciples with you, and of antique familiaritie in Lincolneshire. Among whom I being a Scholasticall panion, obtestate your sublimitie, to extoll mine infirmitie. There is a Sacerdotall dignitie in my natiue Countrey continguate to me, where I now contemplate: which your worshipfull benignitie could sone impetrate for mee, if it would like you to extend your sedules, and collaude me in them to the right honourable lord Chaunceller, or rather Archgrammacian of Englande. You know my literature, you knowe the pastorall promotion, I obtestate your clemencie, to inuigilate thus much for me, according to my confidence, and as you knowe my condigne merites for such a compendious liuing. But now I relinquish to fatigate your intelligence, with any more friuolous verbositie, and therefore he that rules the climates, be euermore your beautreur, your fortresse, and your bulwarke. Amen. Dated at my Dome, or rather Mansion place in Lincolneshire, the penulte of the moneth sextile. Anno Milimo, quillimo, trillimo. Per me loannes Octo. What wiseman reading this Letter, will not take him for a very Caulf that made it in good earnest, and thought by his inke pot termes to get a good Parsonage. Doeth wit rest in straunge wordes, or els standeth it in wholseom matter, and apt declaring of a mans minde? Doe wee not speake because we would haue other to vnderstande vs, or is not the tongue giuen for this ende, that one might know what an other THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 143 meaneth? And what vnlearned man can tel, what this letter signifieth? Therefore, either we must make a difference of English, and say some is learned English and other some is rude English the one is court talke, the other is countrey speech, or els we must of necessitie banish all such Rhetorique, and vse altogether one maner of language. When I was in Cambridge, and student in the kings College, there came a man out of the toune with a pint of wine in a pottle port, to welcome the prouost of that house, that lately came from the court. And because he would bestow his present like a clarke, dwelling among the scholers: he made humblie his three curtesies and sayd in this maner. Cha good euen my good Lord, and well might your Lordship vare, vnderstanding that your Lordshippe was come, and knowing that you are a worshipfull Pilate, and keepes abominable house: I thought it my duetie to come incantiuante, and bring you a pottell of wine, the which I besech your Lordship take in good worth. Here the simple man, being desirous to amend his mothers tongue, shewing himselfe not to. bee the wisest man that euer spake with tongue. An other good fellowe of the countrey, being an officer and Maior of a toune, and desirous to speake like a fine learned man, hauing iust occasion to rebuke a runnegate fellwoe, said after this wise in a great heate. Thou yngrame and vacation knaue, if I tak ethee any more within the Circumcision of my dampnation: I will so corrupt thee, that all other vacation knaues shall take ilsample by thee. An other standing in much neede of money, and desirous to haue some helpe, at a gentlemans hande, made his complainte in this wise. I pray you sir be so good vnto me, as forbeare this halfe yeres rent. For so help me God and halidome, we are so taken on with contrary Bishops, with reuiues, and with Southsides to the King, that all our money is cleane gone. These words he spake for Contribution, Releef, and Subside. And thus we see that poore simple men are much troubled, and talke oftentimes they knowe not what for lacke of wit, and want of Latine and French, whereof many of our strange wordes full often are deriued. Those therefore that will eschue this folly, and acquaint themselues with the best kind of speech, must seeke from time to time such wordes as are commonly receiued, and such as properly may expresse in plaine maner, the whole conceipt of their minde. And looke what wordes we best vnderstande, and knowe what they meane: the same should soonest be spoken, and first applied to the utterance of our purpose. Now whereas wordes be receiued, as well Greeke as Latine, to set forth our meaning in the English tongue, either for lacke of store, or els because we would enrich the language: it is well doen to vse them, and no man therein can be charged for any affectation, when all other are agreed to followe the same waie. There is no man agreeued when he heareth (Letters Patents) and yet Patentes is Latine, and signifieth open to all men. The Communion is a fellowship, or a comming together rather Latin then English: the kings prerogatiue declareth his power roiall aboue al other, and yet I know no man greeued for these termes, being vsed in their place, nor yet any one suspected for affectation, when such generall wordes are spoken. The folie is espied, when either we will vse such wordes as fewe men doe vse, or vse them out of place, when an other might serue much better. Therefore to auoide such folly, we may learne of that most excellent Oratour Tullie, who in his third booke, where he speaketh of a perfect Oratour, declareth vnder the name of Crassus, that for the choise of words fower things should chefly be obserued. First that such 144 EARLY TUDOR POETRY words as we vse, should be proper vnto the tongue wherein wee speake, againe, that they bee plaine for all men to perceiue: thirdly, that they be apt and meete, most properly to sette out the matter. Fourthly, that words translated from one signification to an other (called of the Grecians Tropes) be vsed to beautifie the sentence, as precious stones are set in a ring to commende the gold. This long extract deserves careful consideration from the fact that Wilson has correctly diagnosed the trouble. He shows the presence of the ink-horn terms, and later, as we have seen, he explains their formation; he points out the tendency of the age towards their misuse; and finally by study of the classics he deduces the correct solution. In the same way it is the humanist Ascham that in the Toxophilus (1545) makes the same protest.1 He that wyll wryte well in any tongue, muste folowe thys councel of Aristotle, to speake as the common people do, to thinke as wise men do; and so shoulde euery man vnderstand hym, and the iudgement of wyse men alowe hym. Many English writers haue not done so, but vsinge straunge wordes as latin, french and Italian, do make all thinges darke and harde. Ones I communed with a man whiche reasoned the englyshe tongue to be enryched and encreased thereby, sayinge: Who wyll not prayse, that feaste, where a man shall drinke at a diner, bothe wyne, ale and beere? Truely quod I, they be all good, euery one taken by hym selfe alone, but if you putte Malmesye and sacke, read wyne and white, ale and beere, and al in one pot, you shall make a drynke, neyther easie to be knowen, nor yet holsom for the bodye. The total result of the movement was happy. The majority of the words thus hauled into English lost their foreign air and, sometimes with a changed significance, took their places in the language. The reader may amuse himself by considering, in the letter quoted by Wilson as the extreme of pedantry, how many of those words, perhaps in a derived form and a different meaning, are today quite normal. Adepted as a participle is unusual, but adept as a noun does not shock us; adnichilate terrifies when the humble annihilate leaves us perfectly placid. Thus the English language was sturdy enough to take care of itself; it both threw off the unnecessary and useless additions, and it assimilated the rest. In dealing with the question of colores, especially how the 1 Arber's reprint of the Toxophilus, 18. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 145 practice of them affected the English language, we are standing on fairly firm foundation. At least beneath us is the massive bulk of the New English Dictionary. The moment, however, we come to the question of pronunciation, the proper scansion of the line, or to the question of prosody, it is quite a different matter. As the syllable value of the final e varies with the individual writer, each line is a problem to us. What is still more unfortunate is the fact that each line was equally a problem to the scribe of the sixteenth century, whose redaction in almost all cases is the only one that has come down to us. Because the possible existence of the final e as a metrical factor was a mystery to him, and because in the sixteenth century the desire for the ipsissima verba was unknown, he conscientiously endeavored to improve the poems by making the lines more regular. The result is that we can never be sure that in any given case we have the words that the author wrote. Therefore we deduce principles from the text, and then correct the text in accordance with the principles. The result, however, is necessarily unsatisfactory. It is here, then, that we turn to the Medieval Latin theorists to find what is the basis for the scansion. In the Medieval Latin, as all the theorists agree, there is one main definition of rithm. This, as stated in the simplest and most primitive of the treatises is that rithm is the harmonious equality of syllables, held within a definite number.1 Other writers, carefully following Cicero, explain that the word comes from the Greek pv0to's, equivalent to the Latin numerus. This is, then, the basic point. Lines are classified primarily by the number of syllables contained in each. The limitation of this definition is at once apparent because, according to it, all the syllables will be of equal value. Verse composed according to this scheme would have the unaccented characteristic of French poetry. Although this is untrue either in Latin or in English verse, in the early ecclesiastical chants, where the music consists in a succession of half notes terminated at the end of the line by a whole note, such a definition fairly covers the facts. Equally of course when quicker measures were introduced, to follow the musical analogy the definition had to be modified. This was done by prolonging Mari op. cit., 383. Rithmus est consonans paritas sillabarum sub certo numero comprehensarum. 146 EARLY TUDOR POETRY some syllables and shortening others, thus recognizing accent.1 In this way are feet formed, the names of which are taken from the quantitative system. Thus an iambus is formed by a word accented upon the ultimate, and a spondee by a word accented upon the penult.2 For example, delight forms an iambic foot, and mother a spondaic foot. The line then takes its name from the last foot in it and the syllables are counted backward. An octosyllabic line with a feminine ending would then be termed a tetraspondaic line; with a masculine ending, a tetraiambic line. Aside from the nomenclature, this needs no comment in regard to English verse composition. It would produce lines as faultlessly regular as those of the eighteenth century. In actual practice, however, this theoretical regularity was modified by opposing tendencies. Of these, undoubtedly the most important was the old national system of versification, according to which poems were still composed in the fifteenth century. The numerous manuscripts of the Vision of Piers Plowman attest the popularity of the type. But there, versification is based upon stress, and the exact number of syllables to a foot is unimportant. To the ear trained in such a system, therefore, an occasional extra syllable in the line was a matter of indifference. There was thus a strong tendency to scan the line by the number of accents, rather than by the number of syllables. This native tendency received also subconscious strength from the nomenclature, borrowed from classical versification. Naturally, in an accentual system of prosody, spondees, dactyls, or anapests exist largely by courtesy. But as in the classical system a dactyl, or an anapest, is the metrical equivalent of a spondee, so in a five-accented ten-syllabic line it was easy to explain the introduction of extra syllables on the ground of the substitution of a dactyllic or anapestic foot for a regular spondaic. Still more, the Medieval Latinists claimed the license of slurring syllables, at least for the sake of rime, so 1 Mari, op. cit., 470. Propter quod nota quod per accentum non intelligo plus quam prolongationem et breviationem sillabarum, idest acutam et brevem ipsarum prolationem, ita quod per prolongationem sillabe singnatur acutus vel elevatus sonus, per breviationem gravis suspensio. Istud autem Laborintus exprimit per iambicum et spondaicum seu spondicum, volens per iambicus breviationem sillabe et per spondaicum prolongationem. 2 Of course this is not a true spondee, which is rare in English-the terms cover all trochees. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 147 mommona could be scanned as momma, secula as secla,1 etc. And the result of these three factors was that the author composed freely by ear, so that while theoretically a five-accented line had ten syllables, and only ten, actually, provided that the accents were correct, the exact number of syllables was immaterial. In the following passage, for example, Barclay is writing the heroic couplet, although few of the lines have only ten syllables. Nay, there hath the sight no maner of pleasaunce, And that shall I prove long time or it be night. Some men deliteth beholding men to fight, Or goodly knightes in pleasaunt apparayle, Or sturdie souldiers in bright harnes and male, Or an army arayde ready to the warre, Or to see them fight, so that he stande afarre.2 It is this freedom in the number of syllables and the placing of the accents, as well as the enjambment, that technically differentiates the couplet of the Elizabethans from that of the Age of Anne. Marlowe's line,3 The barbarous Thracian soldier, mov'd with nought is consequently strictly consonant with English usage. On the other hand the versification of Pope where And ten low words oft creep in one dull line shows the effect of the French, a really syllabic, prosody. And although not with Pope, at least in the hands of his imitators, verse became mechanical, a mere matter of counting syllables. But as the Medieval Latin, like the English, was accentual, such danger was not incurred by English imitators; at the same time the syllabic basis of prosody was insisted upon. In dealing with the question of the grouping of lines into stanza forms, we have definite data. For, not only is there the summary of John of Garlandia, written about the middle of the thirteenth century (quoted entire on pages 125-6) but in addition we have the 1 Mari, op. cit., 472. 2 Barclay, Second Eclogue. s Hero and Leander. First Sestiad, 81. 148 EARLY TUDOR POETRY fourth book of the Laborinthus, written probably a century later,1 in which twenty-eight of the possible forty-four combinations are illustrated. An examination of these two documents shows that Medieval Latin prosody is interesting not only for what it contains, but also for what it omits. With the exception of the ten syllable iambic line, the longest line possible is octosyllabic. But even this Iambicus Decasillabus is qualified by the clause, qualis est ille rithmus. The importance of this qualification is apparent when the verse form is studied. Diri patris infausta pignora, ante ortus damnati tempora; quia vestra sic iacent corpora, mea dolent introrsus pectora. If this were read Diri patris infafsta pignora it would be a normal five accented line. Really, however, as John of Garlandia confesses, it is iambic only by courtesy, since the last foot is dactylic. This is shown by a quotation from the same poem, Lamentatic Oedipi, given in another tract (circ. 1150) to illustrate a triple rime. But this reduces the verse to one of four accents only. If this be true, the iambic pentameter line, the line of blank verse, the sonnet, the heroic couplet, the rime-royal, and the Spenserian stanza do not appear. When one realizes the effect on English literature of the disappearance of all poems written in these and allied forms, the limitation of the Medieval Latin is at once apparent. And the second striking omission is that there is no provision for an intricate rime-scheme. You may have a couplet, triplet, quadruplet, in a line of two, three, or four accents closing in a b rime, you may have a quatrain with the second and fourth lines alone riming, the first and third and the second and fourth, or the first and fourth and second and third, but there is no prototype of such a form as the ballade or the rondeau. These rime-schemes, aab and abab, with their variations, thus form the staple of Medieval Latin poetry. In contrast with the wire-drawn verbal ingenuity of later work, the effect of the rime-schemes upon the reader is one of simplicity. Compare with these perfectly obvious forms, the rime-scheme of such a piece as the Lycidas, 1 Mari, op. cit., Prefazione, ~ 8. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 149 for example, where the ear is tantalized by the appearance or omission of the rime, each equally unexpected. Here the rimes appear with an obvious regularity; the accents fall with the tick of the clock. Meum est propositum In tabrena mori; Ubi vina proxima Morientis ori: Tune cantabunt laetius Angelorum chori: "Deus sit propitius Isti potatori." 1 This is really two mono-rime couplets of thirteen syllables. The form of this celebrated old drinking song is typically obvious. When the forms used by the English poets between Lydgate and Wyatt are examined, these same characteristics are to be found. Aside from the rime-royal, the "Monk's Tale" stanza and the heroic couplet, both belonging to the Chaucerian tradition, dignified by the use of Lydgate, and continued as the vehicle for formal literary effort, poetic forms are marked by short lines and simple rime-schemes. While all these are not necessarily borrowed from the Medieval Latin, it is worthy of notice that the majority are to be found discussed in the Medieval Latin treatises. Of these in the English the popular forms are aab-ccb, aabccd, aaab-cccb, and aaab-cccd for lyrics, and lines riming in couplets, tercets, or quadruplets for serious poems, both usually iambic. To illustrate the extent to which the English stanzaforms are taken from the Medieval Latin, the simplest method will be to list several of the poems in accessible collections under the appropriate heading. Two iambics, bimembris, with three iambic differentia. I was not past Not a stones cast So nygh as I could deme, But I dyd see A goodly tree Within an herbor grene.2 1 Confessio Goliardi, from Carmina Clericorum, Heilbronn, 1876. * Hazlitt, Early Popular Poetry, iii, 187, Armonye of Byrdes, Third stana. 150 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Two iambics, trimembris, with two iambic differentia. In an arbcur Late as I were, The fowls to hear Was mine intent. Singing in fere, With notes clear, They made good cheer, On boughes bent.1 Three iambics, trimembris, with three iambic differentia. In this tyme 6f Christmas Bytwyxte an oke and an asse A mayden delyuered was Of Christ her dere son dere. The hAsband 6f Mary (Saint) J6seph st6ode her bj And saide he wAs ready To sarue her if nede were.2 Four iambics, bimembris, with three iambic differentia. This is the very common narrative stanza, used in Sir Thopas. Pope, kyng, and emperoure, Byschope, abbot, and prioure, Parson, preste, and knyght. Duke, erie, and ilk baron To serve syr Peny are they boune, Both be day and nyght.3 The spondaic forms are much rarer, but as an example of dispondeus trimembris with iambic differentia, there is that of Anthony Wydville, Lord Rivers.4 Somewhat musing, And more mourning, In remembering The unsteadfastness; 1 Arber, Dunbar Anthology, 193, Thomas Feilde's Lover and a Jay. 2 Anglia, xii, 588. The accents are my own. I Hazlitt, op. cit., i, 161. A Arber, Dunbar Anthology, 180. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 151 This World being Of such wheeling, Me contrarying, What may I gums? I fear, doubtless, Remediless, Is now to cease My woeful chancel For unkindness, Withouten less, And no redress, Me doth advance. With displeasance, etc. This last is interesting not only as being spondaic in movement but from the fact that the rime in the differentia becomes the a in the succeeding verse. This peculiarity is called cum consonantia sequente immediate,l or caudati continentes.2 This same device is used in the Justes of the Moneths of May and June. The moneth of May with amerous beloued Plasauntly past wherein there hath been proud Feates of armes and no persones reproued That had courage In armoure bryght to shewe theyr personage On stedes stronge sturdy and corsage But rather praysed for theyr vasellage As reason was In whiche season thus fortuned the cac> A lady fayre moost beautyuous of face With seruauntes foure brought was into a place staged about Whereon stode lordes and ladyes a grete route.. etc.3 As this poem describes the jousts held by Charles Brandon, Giles Capell and William Hussey in May and June, 1507, according to 1 Mari, op. cit., 460. 2 Mari, op. cit., 404. Caudati autem continentes dicuntur cum cauda praecedentis cum consonanciis sequentis concordat per oranem rithmorum seriem. Hazlitt, op. cit., ii, 115. 152 EARLY TUDOR POETRY the title, it shows that also in the sixteenth century the Medieval Latin influence persisted. But the use of the pentameter indicates the anglicization of the measure. And the popularity of this type may be indicated by the fact that the majority of the poems in the Songs and Carols, edited by Wright, is in this category. Two variants of the type may be worth the mentioning, although both are obvious at a glance. The first is rithmus cum duplici differentia, where, instead of a single line cauda, the differentia is double.1 Vita iusti gloriosa, mors ut esset preciosa, apud Deum meruit; et qui sibi viluit a datore gratiarum cum fine miseriarum gratiam obtinuit, et decorem induit. And the second is where the differentia, either single or double, is repeated as a refrain. This is usual in carols and songs. In English examples of these are found as late as in the Lusty Juventus (circ.1540). Juventus makes his entrance singing.2 In a Herber grene, a sleepe where as I lay. The byrdes sang sweete in the myddes of the day I dreamed fast of myrth and play In youth is pleasure, in youth is pleasure, Me thought as I walked stil to aid fro. And from her company I could not go, But when I waked it was not so, In youth is pleasure, in youth is pleasure. Therefore my hart is surely pyght, Of her alone to haue a sight, Which is my ioy and hartes delyght, In youth is pleasure, in youth is pleasure. Finis. This is quite clearly iambic tetrameter, trimembris, with duplici differentia, repeated. So true is this, that it enables us to reject the foot a sleepe in the first line, as an intrusion of the typesetter. 1 Mari, op. cit, 426. 2The text of these two songs is taken from Mr. Wever's edition in the Tudor Facsimile Tets series. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 153 The text of the second song in the play, is, however, in a still worse condition, suggesting cynical deductions concerning the state of affairs in the printing establishment of John. Awdely dwelling in little Britayne strete without Aldersgate. Why should not youth fulfyll his owne minde As the course of nature doth him binde, Is not euery thing ordained to do his kinde? Report me to you, report me to you. Do not the floures spring fresh and gay, Pleasant and swete in the month of May? And when their time commeth they fade away, Report me to you, reporte me to you. Be not the trees in wynter bare? Like unto their kind, such they are, And when they spring their fruites declare Reporte me to you, report me to you. What should youth do with the fruits of age, But liue in pleasure in this passage, For when age cometh his lustes will swage Reporte me to you, report me to you. The first stanza, here, requires considerable adjustment before it returns to the original state. As blame for these errors should not lie with the author, but with the printer, these poems furnish interesting examples of the charm and melody of the medieval form in a late state. And, as has been said before, the content is simple and the medium obvious. The Medieval Latirist composed with major chords. Fortunately there is summed up in one poem most of the characteristics of the type, so that it may be considered as an epitome of Medieval Latin influence, the Nutbrowne Mayde. Like so much of the work that we have been discussing, it is anonymous. Skeat assumes that it was written by a woman, largely because it differs from much of medieval work in presenting the woman's side of the case. But as the author in the debate assumes the male part, reasoning from the effect of the poem as a whole does not seem conclusive. Rather there is a renaissance feeling of the importance of woman. Nor is the cause for its composition any clearer. It appears as an insertion for the first time in Arnold's Chronicle (circ. 1502), a curious collection of miscellaneous information, between an account of the tolls to be paid by English mer 154 EARLY TUDOR POETRY chan's sending goods to Antwerp and a statement of the differences of English and Flemish currencies. No comment is offered. Naturally it is to be found again in the second edition of the Chronicle, 1520. It must, however, have circulated in a separate form, as on February 17th., 1520, John Dorne sold a copy of it for one penny. During the eighteenth century it was published several times, probably owing to the celebrity it received from Prior's imitation of it, Henry and Emma. The result has been that it is one of the best known, if not the most read, poems of the period. Mr. A.R. Waller speaks of it as "in itself sufficient, in form and music and theme, to 'make the fortune' of any century." 1 Probably part of the enthusiasm aroused by the poem is due to the mystery surrounding the accident of its birth. Douce, in his edition of the Chronicle in 1811, conjectured that it was a translation from the German. This conjecture has a measure of plausibility because, as Arnold traded with the Low Countries, he might have found a version there. The great objection to it is that, since Douce's suggestion a hundred years ago, no such German original has been found. Nor should the source be sought in popular literature, Teutonic or otherwise. As Gummere says emphatically: 2 "The famous Nut Brown Maid, for example, a spirited and charming dramatic poem long ago laid to the credit of some woman as her oratio pro domo, her plea for the constancy of the sex, has not the faintest claim to its position in many a collection of popular traditional verse." And an analysis of the poem will justify Gummere's conclusion. In content the Nut Brown Maid gives a late medieval view of the perfect woman, belonging to the same class as does the Clerkes Tale of Chaucer. There, it will be remembered, patient Griselda serves as a model for all rebellious wives. The woman of the Proverbs is outdone! The Marquis of Saluzzo, after marrying a woman of low degree, determines to try her fortitude. This he does by depriving her of her children, by announcing that he will take a new wife, by driving her from the palace in only her smock, and finally by demanding that she prepare all things in joyous preparation for her supposed successor. Through it all Griselda passes triumphant. 1 Cambridge History of Eng. Lit. ii, 486-7. 2 Cambridge Hist. Eng. Lit., ii, 463. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 155 Men speke of Iob and most for his humblesse, As clerkes, whan hem list, can wel endyte, Namely of men, but as in soothfastnesse, Though clerkes preyse wommen but a lyte, Ther can no man in humblesse him acquyte As womman can, he can ben half so trewe As wommen been, but it be falle oF-newe.1 Much the same trials, although purely imaginary, does the Nut Brown Maid experience. Her lover tells her that he will fly to the greenwood to be an outlaw, that if she follows him she will lose her reputation, that she will be in danger, that she will suffer hardships, and finally that he has a mistress there already. Since none of these affect her constancy, the result is Thus haue ye wone An erles son/ And not a banysshyd man. Of course the immediate original may be a Teutonic piece, but as the original of the Chaucer is from Petrarch, and as Petrarch had an European vogue, in the case of so similar a conception there is no need to limit the hypothetic source to one nationality, or even to assume that the present poem is not the first. But whatever may have been the nationality of the original author, the presumption is, provided that the English version represents it fairly, that he was familiar with the Medieval Latin treatises. Whereas Petrarch employs Latin prose narration, the Nut Brown Maid is in the form of the conflictus. The poem is a dialogue between the author and the reader, in which each plays a definite part. The author is the lover, and the audience the Maid.2 Than betwene vs Lete vs discusse What was all the maner Betwene them too: 1Skeat's Chaucer, iv. 417. 'The quotations from the Nut Brown Maid are taken from Hazlitt's Early Popular Poetry of England, ii, 272. His text is based on collations from the editions of 1502 and 1520. This stanza form is very similar to the famous drinking song in Gammer Gurton's Needle. 156 EARLY TUDOR POETRY We wyl also Telle all the peyne in fere That she was in/ Nowe I begynne Soo that ye me answere/ Wherefore ye That present be I pray you geue an eare/ I am the knyght/ I cum be nyght As secret as I can/ Sayng alas/ Thus stondyth the case/ I am a bannisshed man.1 From here on each alternate stanza presents the man's case, the alternating stanzas replying with that of the woman, the final stanza returning to the original narrative position. The stanzas themselves are iambic dimeters, iambic trimeter differentia. The differentiae rime four times. Thus in both form and content the poem follows the precepts of the Medieval Latin.2 As such stanzas as those of the Nut Brown Maid, where there are both the differentia and the refrain, are closely allied to musical forms, the application of the Medieval Latin precepts to the English lyrics seems logical. That it is equally true in the case of the many-rimed, short-lined verse paragraph called the Skeltonian meter, remains to be shown. After dealing with anonymous writers, unknown, unsexed, it is with relief that one turns to the rugged personality of Skelton. Here at least, however much you may dislike the type of work, you are dealing with a man. His poem, the Bouge of Court, which belongs to the formal literary tradition, has been discussed,3 and the suggestion was there made of his relations with the court. It will be remembered that Skelton was praised for his learning by Caxton, and correctly, 1 As in this stanza the author assumes the masculine part, I fail to see wherein lies the internal evidence for feminine authorship. 2 The close relation between the Nut Brown Maid and the Latin of the Church is illustrated in the New Nut Brown Maid, where in much the same phraseology and in the same stanza form the dialogue is between the Virgin and the Christ. The first edition is by John Scott, 1537. Reprinted, Hazlitt, iii, 2. Apparently it is an attempt to utilize a popular piece for pious purposes. 3 Chapter ii. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 157 since apparently he had been given degrees by three universities. So far then as there is value in academic recognition, Skelton was quite rightly regarded as one of the learned men of his age. That the poet himself was conscious of these attainments, is equally certain. In reading his poems you are never allowed to forget that the author has enjoyed all the advantages that the quadrivium and the trivium could afford. Latin tags, Latin allusions, even Latin reminiscences occur at frequent intervals. In the Garland of Laurel he imagines himself received by the writers of all time. And a curious collection they are! Quintillian, Theocritus, Hesiod, Homer, Cicero, Sallust, Ovid, Lucan, Statius, Persius, Vergil, Juvenal, Livy, Aulus Gellius, Terence, Plautus, Seneca, Boethius, Maximianus, Boccaccio, Quintus Curtius, Macrobius, Poggio, Gaguin, Plutarch, Petrarch, Lucilius, Valerius Maximus, Vincentius, Propertius, Pisander, and the three English poets, Gower, Chaucer, and Lydgate. A somewhat similar, although not identical, catalogue is given in Philip Sparrow. If this may be considered as a list of reading to any degree typical' of academic training it raises curious doubts in the mind of the modern. The extent of his reading is surpassed only by his entire lack of critical discrimination. Poetry, drama, and prose, Greek and Latin, ancient and modern, poets and poetasters are all piled pell mell. And the greater proportion of it is in classical Latin. Greek authors are but slightly mentioned (and these were probably read in translation), of the Italian humanists he knows but three, and there is but one Frenchman.' Such was the knowledge of the past at the opening of the sixteenth century. The classics were by no means forgotten. On the other hand, however extensive may have been Skelton's knowledge of classical literature, it was surely not intensive. The medley of authors just quoted from the Garland of Laurel by no means shows the nice discrimination of a scholar. It savors of sacrilege to mention Homer and Virgil in the same breath with Lucilius 1Perhaps it is necessary to point out that to Skelton all these authors wrote in Latin, tlat he shows no knowledge of the Italian. To the sixteenth century humanist, Petrarch was the author of the Africa, etc., Boccaccio of De Genealogia Deorum, etc., and Poggio of the Faoetiae. Forgetting this cardinal fact some modern writers have lamented that he did not imitate Petrarch, the Petrarch of the Rimel 158 EARLY TUDOR POETRY and Vicentius! And although Philip Sparrow is a dramatic monologue put into the mouth of a young girl, the medieval confusion of scriptural, classical, and imaginary authors and characters seems typical of Skelton himself. He belongs to the former age and is not favorable to the men of the "new learning". At least that is my interpretation of the significant omission of certain names in his list. The Garland of Laurel fortunately may be definitely dated. It is limited on one side from the fact that it was published in 1523; on the other, since Colin Clout and the Magnyfycence are both mentioned, it could not have been composed much before 1520. But by 1520 the English humanists were in full flower. Grocyn was dead, Linacre had published his Galen, Colet had founded his school, Lily had been teaching there eight years, More had published his Utopia, and Erasmus had become a world figure. Yet none of these appear. It is impossible that he should not have known them, or at least of them and their work. Linacre, for example, was a tutor to Prince Arthur certainly part of the time that Skelton held the same position with Prince Henry. And with the various academic degrees which Skelton held, it is scarcely probable that he was at no time brought into definite relation with some member of the group. But his feeling toward them was apparently the reverse of cordial. Bale records the beginning of some verses attacking Lily, Lily's response to which has been preserved.1 The test was apparently his attitude toward Greek. He was thoroughly out of sympathy with the contention of Colet and Erasmus that Greek should be studied for its religious value. This at once lends significance to his acclaiming himself the British Catullus, without mentioning Horace.2 He felt, truly enough, that the introduction of Greek into the schools would be the end of the old curriculum. This at least is his attitude in the passage from Speke, Parrot: 3 "Monon calon agaton,' Quod Parato In Graeoo. Dyce 1, xxxvi. Verses cited p. 233. Dyce,, 8-9. 4 Does this transliteration of the Greek imply that the first printer of the poem had no Greek font? THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 159 Let Parrot, I pray you, haue lyberte to prate, For aurea lingua Graeca ought to be magnifyed, Yf it were cond perfytely, and after the rate, As lingua Latina, in scole matter occupyed; But our Grekis theyr Greke so well. haue applyed, That they cannot say in Greke, rydynge by the way, How, hosteler, fetche my hors a botell of hay! Neyther frame a silogisme in phrisesomorum, Formaliter et Graece, cum medio termino: Our Grekys ye walow in the washbol Argolicorum; For though ye can tell in Greke what is phormio, Yet ye seeke out your Greke in Capricornio; For they (ye?) scrape out good scripture, and set in a gall, Ye go about to amende, and ye mare all. Some argue secundum quid ad simpliciter, And yet he wolde be rekenyd pro Areopagita; And some make distinctions multipliciter, Whether ita were before non, or non before ita, Nether wise nor well lernid, but like hermaphrodita: Set sophia asyde, for euery Jack Raker And euery mad medler must now be a maker. In Academia Parrot dare no probleme kepe; For Graecefari so occupyeth the chayre, That Latinumfari may fall to rest and slepe, And Syllogisari was drowned at Sturbrydge fayre; Tryuyals and quatryuyals so sore now they appayre, That Parrot the popagay hath pytye to beholde How the rest of good lernyng is roufled up and trold. Albertus de modo significandi, And Donatus be dryuen out of scole; Prisians hed broken now handy dandy, And Inter didascolos is rekened for a fole; Alexander, a gander of Menanders ]pole, With Da Cansales, is cast out of the gate, And Da Racionales dare not shew his pate. Plauti in his comedies a chyld shall now reherse, And medyll with Quintylyan in his Declamacyons, And Pety Caton can scantly construe a verse, With Aveto in Graceco, and such solempne salutacyons, Can skantly the tensis of his coniugacyons; Settynge theyr myndys so moche of eloquens, That of theyr scole maters lost is the hole sentens." 160 EARLY TUDOR POETRY This passage is interesting as defining exactly Skelton's position. He is partly jealous of Greek as affecting the study of Latin and partly he is afraid of it as an instrument of scriptural reform. He is thus necessarily an opponent of the group of English humanists. This is one, then, of the peculiarities of Skelton's position. Although he can, and occasionally does, write humanistic Latin, he is far from being a humanist.1 The same is true as to his place in the English tradition. His Bouge of Court is an interesting individual modification of the conventional type of court allegory.2 Consequently we find him echoing the conventional criticism in regard to the conventional trilogy of English authors. Gower "first garnished our Englysshe rude," then Chaucer polished it, and Lydgate added the finishing touches.3 Owing to its early date, Gower's English is useless as a model, however excellent may be the content of his poems; Chaucer, on the contrary, is still available. His termes were not darke, But pleasaunt, easy, and playne; No worde he wrote in vayne.4 Lydgate "wryteth after an hyer rate" since it is difficult to understand his precise meaning. This is the stock criticism of the early sixteenth century. With a man uttering such views, it is natural to expect the use of the rime-royal as a stanza form. Actually he uses it not only in the longer poems, such as the Bouge of Court and the Garland of Laurel, but also for satire, as in the poems against Garnesche and in Speke, Parrot, for love pieces and poems on meditation. Not so normal are his experiments, where in one poem, The Auncient Acquaintance, he preserves the rime-scheme, although using lines with six accents, or with four accents as in the attack upon Mistress Anne. In this latter form is the dramatic song My darlyng dere, where the short lines lend themselves to vivid compression and swift narrative. Here, from the dramatic opening to the brutal ending, Skelton's own eulogy of Cf., Chapter IV. 2 Cf. Chapter II. 3 The passage is quoted at length, page 53. 4 It may be assumed here that Skelton is echoing Caxton's views as expressed in his edition of the House of Fame. The reader is referred to Lounsbury's seventh chapter where the Caxton is quoted. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 161 Chaucer may be applied to himself,-no word he wrote in vain. And this is the more worthy of comment as such work is not in accordance with the usual conception of Skelton's manner. One more characteristic of this division of his poems may be added. Skelton is curiously affected by the old English love for alliteration. In the poems against Garnishe, Garnyshe, gargone, gastly, gryme, it may perhaps be used merely for the comic affect. That certainly cannot explain its appearance, I wayle, I wepe, I sobbe, I sigh ful sore, in the elegy on the death of the Earl of Northumberland, nor its employment in the attack upon Mistress Anne. Womanhod, wanton, ye want; Youre medelyng, mastres, is manerles; Plente of yll, of goodnes skant, Ye rayll at ryot, recheles: To prayse your porte it is nedeles; For all your draffe yet and youre dreggys, As well borne as ye full oft tymre beggys. While of course it is not the old alliterative measure, such a line as What dremyst thou, drunchard, drousy pate would need little changing to make it conform to the old measure. It is allowable, I think, to infer that Skelton both knew and was affected by the earlier poetry. Actually it is neither the humanistic Latin nor the poetry of the English tradition that is associated with the name of Skelton. His fiery genius found its expression in poems formed on quite other models. What those models were is easily inferred from his biography. A man very learned, yet born too early for the full tide of humanism to have reached northern Europe, would naturally be learned in the literature of Medieval Latin. When it is added that such a man was enrolled in the ranks of the Church, every indication points to a certain direction. Consequently it is not 162 EARLY TUDOR POETRY surprising to find that he, like the others, ambidextrously, mixes Latin with his English.' What though ye can cownter Custodi nos? As well it becomyth yow, a parysh towne clarke, To syng Sospitati dedit oegros... Another example is in Ware the Hawk,2 Dir Dominus vobiscum, Per aucupium Ye made your hawke to cum Desuper candelabrum Christi cruciixi To fede 'pon your fisty: Die, inimice crucis Christi, Ubi didicisti Facere hoc, Domine Dawcocke? Here the Latin is used interchangeably with the English. With this use of Latin one would expect Skelton to show his knowledge of the aureate language. He himself, in a Lydgatian mood, regrets that 3 My wordes vnpullysht be, nakide and playne, Of aureat poems they want ellumynynge. But the reader feels he is unjust to himself. Such a stanza as the following shows that he is quite comparable even to Hawes.4 Allectuary arrectyd to redres These feuerous axys, the dedely wo and payne Of thoughtfull hertys plungyd in dystress; Refresshyng myndys the Aprell shoure of rayne; Condute of comforte, and well most souerayne; Herber enverduryd, contynuall fressh and grene; Of lusty somer the passyng goodly quene... He then compares the lady's features to the topaz, ruby, sapphire, pearl, diamond, emerald, and Relucent smaragd, obiecte incomperable. Dyce, i, 17. 2 Dyce, i, 164-5. a Dyce, i, 11. 4 Dyce i 25. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 163 This is all rather quaint, artificial, and affected, unless one realizes that he was writing according to the dictates of his age. In the same way he uses repeticio, as in the Magnyfycence, where eight successive lines begin with the word counierfet.1 And occasionally he uses actual cryptograms as where he substitutes numbers for letters or makes a jargon by transposing Latin syllables. In general it may be said that his knowledge both of the humanistic writers and the older English poets saved him from the excessive puerility of the worst of the school. Or perhaps there is so much more virility in his work than in that of the others, that the modern reader is more charitable and the puerility passes by unnoticed. In the scansion of the line, to follow the former order, Skelton uses the free procedure noticed before. This is easily seen in his most regular poem, the Bouge of Courte. Here as he is writing the iambic pentameter, theoretically each line should have but ten syllables. This is usually the case. In autumpne, whan the sonne in Virgine By radyante hete enryped hath our come; Whan Luna, full of mutabylyte, As emperes the dyademe hath worne Of our pole artyke, smylynge halfe in scorne At our foly and our vnstedfastnesse; The tyme whan Mars to werre hyrn dyde dres.. With the exception of the second line, where radyante was probably a trisyllable, every line has exactly ten syllables. That is not true of the next I, callynge to mynde the greate auctoryte, nor of His hede maye be harde, but feble is his brayne...2 This might be illustrated ad libitum. Obviously he writes by ear and provided that the accents fall correctly, he is little troubled by an extra syllable. The fact that the modern reader also is not troubled, shows how completely the old theory has been assimilated. 1 Dyce i, 240. 2 Dyce, i, 31. 164 EARLY TUDOR POETRY In stanza forms there is the abundance of short riming lines, characteristic of the Medieval Latin. Calliope, As ye may see, Regent is she Of poetes al, Whiche gaue to me The high degre Laureat to be Of fame royall,1 This is iambic diameter, trimembris, with riming iambic diameter. So many pointed caps Lased with double flaps, And so gay felted hats, Sawe I never: So many good less6ns, So many good sermons, And so few devocions, Sawe I never.2 This is iambic trimeter, trimembris, with differentia repeated. The addresses to the various ladies in the Garland are attractive studies in the Medieval Latin meters.3 These are obviously "lyrics" in the sense only that they are short emotional poems. Quite otherwise is it with at least some of the others; they are lyrics in that they were intended to be sung. Certainly that is the inference to be made from the title of the tract in which they are preserved. "Here folowythe dyuers Balettys and Dyties solacyous, deuysed by Master Skelton, Laureat." The poem My darling dere is headed by two lines obviously used as a chorus. But the question passes out of the bounds of inference with the poem Manerly Margery Mylk and Ale, since the music, written by Cornysshe, has been preserved for this.4 From the music we 1 Dyce, i, 197. 2 Dyce, i, 148. 3 It is unnecessary to quote them since they are easily accessible in the Oxford Book of English Verse (30 and 31) amd similar collections. 4Hawkins, History of Music, iii, 2. Ritson's note, "Since Sir J. Hawkins's transcript was made, the ms. appears to have received certain alterations, occasioned, as it should seem, but certainly not authorized, by the over-scrupulous delicacy of its late or present possessor" is inexplicable because the changes, as recorded by Dyce, are of the slightest. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 165 see that it was a three part counterpuntal madrigal. As the second voice supports alternately either the first or third, the poem is a dialogue on seduction, all voices mingling in the refrain. When transposed into modern notation, the music is really very attractive, with a distinct swing in the refrain.' The peculiar feature is that to such music should be set a poem dealing so brutally with such a subject. Again, although the treatises explicitly limit the number of single rimes to four, the stanza form here consists of five riming lines and a couplet. As actually, however, medieval Latin songs of the tavern had five or more lines riming together, the presumption is strong that then, as now, popular song-writers overrode academic restraint, and that this, therefore, is a studentenlied rather than a lyric. Although Cornysshe was a member of the Chapel Royal, it seems unlikely that such a song could be sung before a mixed audience, even in the Court of Henry VII. Rather, it must be regarded as a rare example of the popular song of the day. But not only does the music help us to a correct distribution of the parts in the dialogue, it is of still greater importance as indicating the pronunciation and the scansion. For necessarily the text must be substantially correct. In that case it can be stated positively that the final e was in no instance pronounced. So far as the number of syllables is concerned, the words were read nearly as they are today. In modern spelling the lines in the third verse would read By Christ, you shall not, n6 hardly I will not b6 japed bodily. They are clearly iambic tetrameter, the last accent falling upon the y rime. But they illustrate, also, the freedom used by the sixteenth century author in the number of his syllables, because, musically, the two short syllables in bodily are equalized with the one long syllable in hardly. The same condition is illustrated, in the extreme, by the fifth line of the first stanza, Tally valy strtwe, let b6 I say. Here the music shows the poet not only begins his line with four short syllables, but he throws his accent. He substitutes a num1 For the transcription I am indebted to Mr. Arthur Hague. 166 EARLY TUDOR POETRY ber of short syllables for the anticipated iambus. And in this, with its musical setting, the modern reader need feel no surprise. Exactly the same thing is done in such a university song as Any kind of man can make Alpha Delta Phi Any kind of man makes Psi U, etc. But this triple movement is a far cry from the "regularity" of the eighteenth century. Such poetic forms of Skelton as we have been discussing, however interesting in themselves, are not those by which he is best known. Skeltonical verse, or Skeltoniads as Drayton terms them, may be illustrated by the beginning of Colin Clout. What can it auayle To dryue forth a snayle, Or to make a sayle Of an herynges tayle; To ryme or to rayle, To wryte or to indyte, Eyther for delyte Or elles for despyte; Or bokes to compyle Of dyuers maner style, Vyce to reuyle And synne to exyle; To teche or to preche, As reason wyll reche? Say this, and say that, His hed is so fat, He wotteth neuer what Nor whereof he speketh; He cryeth and he creketh, He pryeth and he peketh, He chydes and he chatters, He prates and he patters, He clytters and he clatters. He medles and he smatters, He gloses and he flatters; Or yf he speake playne, Than he lacketh brayne, He is but a fole; Let hym go to scole, On a thre foted stole That he may downe syt, THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 167 For he lacketh wyt; And yf that he hyt The nayle on the hede, It standeth in no stede; The deuyll, they say, is dede, The deuell is dede. The form consists obviously of riming trimeter lines forming a verse-paragraph closed by one diameter line. The origin of so marked a form seems to have puzzled scholars. And the puzzle merely increases when it is found both in French literature, as the fratrasie, and in Italian, as the frottola. Unless the hypotheses be adopted that either it originated independently in three countries, or that, originating in one, it was borrowed by the other two, a common source must be sought. Clearly this common source is to be found in the Medieval Latin. Still raore, in the Renaissance such a form was regarded by the humanists as being characteristic of Medieval Latin. Consequently in the Epistolae Obscurorm Virorum the tetrameter variety was elaborately parodied. M. Petrus Negelinus writes pathetically... Quamvis valde timeo esse ita audax, quod debeo vobis ostendere unum dictamen a me compositum, qua vos valde artificialis in compositione metrorum et dictaminorum;... Namque ego nondum habeo bonuna fundamentum, et non sum perfecte instructus in arte poetria et Rhetorica... Quapropter mitto vobis hic unum poema per me compilatum in lauden sancti Petri, et unis componista qui est bonus musicus in cantu chorali et figuralik composuit mihi quattuor voces super illud. Et ego feci magnam diligentiam quod potui its rigmizare,, sicut est rigmizatum... Sancte Petre domine nobis miserere, Quia tibi dominus dedit cum istis clavibus Potestatem maximam, necnon specialem gratiam Super omnes sanctos: quia tu es privilegiatus, Quod solvis est solutum, in terris et per caelum, Et quicquid hic ligaveris, ligatum est in caelis... etc. Here this form of writing is obviously bound together with poor latinity. Again and again the authors return to the attack. The 168 EARLY TUDOR POETRY "Obscure Men" write verse letters, satires, lyrics,-and usually in this rimed form. The conclusion is unavoidable that the ecclesiastical party normally wrote in this way, since otherwise the satire would have lacked point. Fortunately the whole development of this type, the original Latin, the translation into English of the fourteenth century, the modification of the translation into the English of the fifteenth century, may be illustrated by a single poem. In the middle of the fourteenth century in his Polychronicon Higden inserted a rimed description of Wales. A few of the opening verses will show the type.1 Libtri finis nunc Cambriam Prius tangit quam Angliam; Sic propero ad Walliam. Ad Priami prosapiam; Ad magni Jovis sanguinem, Ad Dardani progeniem. Sub titulis his quatuor Terrae statum exordior; Primo de causa nominis; Secundo de praeconiis; Tandem de gentis ritibus; Quarto de mirabilibus. Haec terra, quae nunc Wallia, Quondam est dicta Cambria, A Cambro Bruti filio, Qui rexit bane dominio: etc. But in 1387 John Trevesa, at the request of Thomas,Lord Berkeley, translated the whole into English, priding himself upon the exactness of the translation. "In somme place I shall sette word for worde, and actyf for actyf, and passyf for passif arowe right as it stondeth withoute chaungynge of the ordre of wordes; but in somme place I must chaunge the ordre of wordes and sette actyf for passyf and ayenward; and in somme place I muste sette a reson for a worde, and telle what it meneth; but for al such chaungyng the menyng shal stande and not be chaunged...." 2 1 The text is taken from the Polychronicon Ranulphi Higden, Vol. I, pp. 894-897, ed. by Churchill Babington, and published under the direction of the Master of the Rolls, 1865. 2Quoted in Babington's ed. of Higden, I, p. lxi. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 169 With the duty of a translator so plainly stated, the relation between the Latin and the English is no longer in doubt. How pe book take] in honde Wales to fore Engelonde; So I take my tales And wende forp in to Wales, To that noble brood Of Priamus his blood, Knoweleche for to wynne Of greet Iubiter his kynne, For to haue in mynde Dardanus his kynde. In pis foure titles I fonde To telle pe state of pat Ionde. Cause of pe name I schall telle, And pan preise pe lond I welle. Than I schal write wip my pen Alle pe maneres of pe men,. Then I schal fonde To telle mervailes of pe longe. Wales hatte now Wallis, And somtyme highte Cambria, For Camber, Brutes sone, Was kyng, and pere dede won; etc. But in 1482, nearly a hundred years later, Caxton brought out the Polychronicon itself with Trevesa's translation. In respect to this last, in his preface he says: "I, William Caxton, a symple person, haue endeuoyred me to wryte fyrst ouer all the sayd book of proloconycon, and comewhat haue chaunged the rude and old Englyssh, that is to wete certayn wordes which in these days be neither vsyd ne vnderstanden, and furthermore haue put it in emprynte to thende that it maye be had and the maters therein comprised to be knowen.' 1 In other words, Caxton has modernized the book so that it accords with the standards of his time.2 Now this book taketh on honde Wales after Englond, So take I my tales, And wende into Wales, To that noble brood Of Priamus blood, Quoted in Babington's ed. of Higden. Vol. I, p. Ixiii. 2 Poems of Walter Mapes, ed. Th. Wright, Camden Society, p. 349. 170 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Knoleche for to wynne Of grete Jupiters kynne, For to have in mynde Dardanus kynde. In thise foure titles I fonde To alle the state of that londe; Cause of the nam I shall telle; And then preyse the lond and welle; Then I shall write with my penne Alle the maners of the menne; Thenne I shall fonde To telle mervailles of the londe. Of the name, how it is named Walis. Wales now is called Wallia, And somtyme it heet Cambria. For Camber Brutes sone Was prince, and there dyde wone, etc. But this English of the end of the fifteenth century is very like the "doggerel" of Skelton, the French of the fratrasie, or the Italian of the frottola. If the reasoning be right, it goes far to explain the contemptuous attitude toward Skelton on the part of his contemporaries. In the vulgar tongue Skelton was reproducing forms and points of view that were associated in the mind of his age with lack of dignity and restraint. Thus Barclay writing the full-sailed rime-royal,-a measure sustained by the great literary tradition, goes out of his way to sneer at Skelton's performance: It longeth nat to my scyence nor cunnynge For Phylyp the Sparowe the (Dirige) to synge. This might easily be interpreted as a personal fling at the author by Barclay; yet Skelton himself witnesses that this was a sufficiently ordinary attitude. Of Phillip Sparow the lamentable fate, The dolefull deteny, and the carefull chaunce, Dyuysed by Skelton after the funerall rate; Yet sum there be therewith that take greuaunce, And grudge thereat with frownyng countenaunce; But what of that? hard it is to please all men; Who list amende it, let hym set to his penne.... Garland of Laurel, 11. 1254-1260. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 171 Yet Philip Sparrow is a perfectly inoffensive poem, and written before the great satires. This disdain must have been due, then, not to the poem itself, but to the type to which it belonged', a type associated with the unruly side of university life. It is noticeable that the Garland of Laurel, Skelton's apoklgia pro vita sua, is itself composed in rime-royal. But as if in defiance of his critics, immediately after the passage quoted follow one hundred and fifteen lines in defense of Philip Sparrow in the Skeltonical measure! And that passage is itself broken by a conscious parade of four Latin hexameters. Here Skelton shows that he appreciates the force of the criticism, that he has the necessary learning to write in the manner of the age, and that he does not care to do so. With an author of so dominant a personality as that of Skelton, the poems would differ also in content from conventional work. Before realism was invented he would look out oil life with an eye, shrewd, perhaps jaundiced. With a courage such as his, he would speak out plainly. At all events that is clearly what Skelton did! The result is a long series of attacks and refutations. Nor is the sympathy of the modern reader always on the side of the author. Thus, one need not hold a brief for the Court of Henry VII without refusing to believe that it was peopled exclusively by such characters as those of the Bouge of Court. More did not find it so with Archbishop Morton. Nor did Skelton agree better with the scholars. He quarreled with Lily, with Barclay, with Gaguin (one of whose pieces Barclay translated).l None of these have survived, and from the list in the Garland, avowedly incomplete, we learn of others besides those that have come down to us. His attack seems to have been both general and particular, both national and individual, both jovial and bitter. As his poems against Garnesche are endorsed "By the kynges most noble commaundment", that was apparently a jesting match; and his epitaphs on John Clarke and John Jayberd, in however poor taste, were still intended to cause a smile. Quite otherwise is his exultation over the Scotch for the defeat at Flodden Field. In an entirely different vein is his Ware the Hawke, where, like a hawk, he pounces upon a parson for the truly objectionable practice of bringing his falcon 1 Defatuis mundanis, Englished by Barclay as Of Folys that ar ouer worldly,Jamieson, ii, 317. Brie notes, p. 31, that the last is perhaps preserved in B. C. 165b ms. at Trinity Coll. Cambridge. 172 EARLY TUDOR POETRY into the church at Diss.1 What he apparently considered his chief work, the poem beginning, "Apollo that whirllid vp his chare," 2 has been lost. This was so bitter that Skelton himself wished to suppress it, as when Occupacyoun mentions it, the poet comments: "With that I stode vp, half sodenly afrayd; Suppleyng to Fame, I besought her grace, And that it wolde please her, full tenderly I prayd, Owt of her bokis Apollo to rase. Nay, sir, she sayd, what so in this place Of our noble courte is ones spoken owte, It must nedes after rin all the worlde aboute. God wrote, theis wordes made me full sad; And when that I sawe it wolde no better be, But that my peticyon wolde not be had, What shulde I do but take it in gre? For, by Juppiter and his high mageste, I did what I cowde to scrape out the scrollis, Apollo to rase out of her ragman rollis." Although the poem be lost, it is possible, to guess its contents. A side note reads: Factum est cum Apollo esset Corinthi: Actus Apostolorum." The Vulgate gives the reference.3 Apollo was a certain Jew, eloquent, mighty in the scriptures, and fervent in the spirit. Presumably Skelton, taking him as an exemplar, spoke his mind freely on the condition of the Church in 1 This peculiar vice is noticed also by Barclay: "Another on his fyst a Sparhauke or fawcon Or else a Cokow, and so wastynge his shone Before the auters he to and fro doth wander With euyn as great deuocyon oas a gander" Ship of Fools, Jamieson, i, 991. 2 Dyce in his note on the passage, ii, 334 takes this as the line from Chaucer, the first line of the third part of the Squire's Tale. My suggestion is that Skelton is punning on it. Chare is a piece of work. 8Judaeus autem quidam, Apollo nomine, Alexandrinus genere, vir eloquens, devenit Ephesum, potens in scripturis. Hic erat edoctus viam Domini; et fervens spiritu loquebatur, et docebat diligenter ea, quae sunt Jesu, sciens tantum baptisma Joannis. Acts XVIII, 24-5. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 173 England. According to his own account the effect of his remarks was pronounced: "That made sum to snurre and snuf in the wynde; It made them to skip, to stampe, and to stare, Whiche, if they be happy, haue cause to beware In ryming and raylyng with hym for to mell, For drede that he lerne them there A, B, C, to spell." 1 And the last lines certainly suggest that the poem was inspired by eloquence other than that of St. Paul teaching the doctrine of the Christ.2 It must be confessed that such is his mental attitude, at least in the poems we have. Skelton is much more interested in smiting the enemy hip and thigh than he is in preaching the doctrine of heavenly love. He is a mighty warrior before the Lord. His Latin reading had not only given him a point of view from which to criticise English conditions, it had also furnished him models for exceedingly plain speaking. "The famous poettes saturicall, As Percius and Iuuynall, Horace and noble Marciall," 3 at least with the exception of Horace, were not restrained. Martial's satires certainly are characterized by keen merciless dissection of conditions, extreme expression of his results, and a complete disregard of the consequence to himself.4 Of course to the modern reader the poems pay the penalty of all satire, namely that they are unintelligible without notes. A realization of the questions at issue, whether the poem be Absalom and Achitophel, or 1 Dyce, i, 419-20. 2 In this interpretation I differ radically from Brie, op. cit., 72: "muss eine satir auf zeitgenossische dichter (Barclay?) gewesen, sein, in der ihire werke verspottet wurden." 3 Dyce i, 130. 4 Thus Why Come Ye not to Court avowedly follows Juvenal, 1207-11; "I am forcebly constrayned, At Iuuynals request, To wryght of this glorious gest, Of this vayne gloryous best,..." 174 EARLY TUDOR POETRY the Dunciad, or British Bards and Scotch Reviewers, is first essential before the reader can appreciate the brilliancy of the attack. Immediate success, gained by allusion to contemporaneous persons and events, is succeeded by increasing oblivion, as those persons and events recede into the past. Byron's bitterness toward Scott is still comprehended by the general reader, because the general reader still knows Scott, but who now cares for Pope's dunces? To a very large degree, Shadwell and Settle survive only because Dryden attacked them, and his scathing lines on Buckingham and Shaftesbury are most read in books of familiar quotations. To this general law of satire, in Skelton's case is added the particular disqualification that there is no general agreement in regard to the facts and that feeling still runs high. The literary value is consequently ignored in the heated controversy as to the truth of his accusations. On one side he is regarded as a coarse buffoon blaspheming in doggerel verse; on the other as an author who bears witness to the truth. Neither of these views concern us here. The only questions are, how far he believed what he said and to what extent he was able to give expression to his own convictions. And whatever opinion may be held as to the dignity of his manner, or the justification of his procedure, at least he must be credited with having produced work that by any criterion of literary criticism cannot be ignored. Of this type of political poem there are five, thus listed in the edition of Dyce: A replycacion agaynst certayne yong scolers abiured of late, &c.; Colyn Clout; Speke, Parrot; Why come ye nat to Courte; and Howe the douty Duke of Albany, &c. The most salient characteristic of these poems taken as a group is the obscurity. For this there are three reasons. The first is that to some extent this obscurity was intentional. As has been seen in the Bouge of Court, Skelton on one side belongs to the school representing the medieval tradition, one of whose critical tenets was that the use of "covert terms" acted as a stimulant to the reader. But whereas a conventional poet, such as Hawes, merely resorts to allegory, Skelton refines the theory into cryptogram. Loke on this tabull, Whether thou art abull To rede or to spell What these verses tell. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 175 Sicculo lutueris est colo buraari Nixphedras uisarum caniuter tuntantes.1 Henry Bradley, by recombining chosen syllables, has resolved 2 the lines into Sic velut est Arabum phenix avis unica tantum. Another illustration may be found in the Garland, where the letters in the name of his adversary are indicated by their numerical position in the alphabet. With a mind inclined naturally to such ingenuity, the temptation to deal in riddles must have been overpowering in those cases where the actions of powerful men were criticised. Such a method would be both profound and safe. On the other hand, in inverse proportion to the profundity of the poem would be its effect. Consequently Skelton is torn between two desires, first the natural wish to escape the consequences of too obvious expression of opinion, and secondly, the impulse to cast the weight of his influence on the side of the right. When one remembers both the power of Wolsey and his elaborate system of espionage, it is hard to restrain a thrill of admiration for this literary David. The end was of course inevitable. Goliath fell, it is true, but Skelton did not live to see the catastrophe he had helped to produce. In the sanctuary of St. Margaret at Westminister he dies beaten, his last words a confession of failure as he surrenders to the enemy dedicating with fulsome superlatives his last work to the Cardinal.3 Another reason for the present difficulty in understanding the poems in their entirety arises from the first, and yet is distinct from it. As we do not know the exact (late at which any poem was composed, or even published, we are never sure to what political event reference is made. With the exception of a copy of the Garland of Laurel, 1523, all of the early copies of the single poems are undated. As the first edition with a date, that of Thomas Marshe, 1568, is long posterior to the composition of the poems, there is very little external evidence. It is a happy chance that the one poem preserved in a dated issue is the Garland of Laurel, 1 Ware the Hauke, Dyce, i, 168. 2 The Academy, Aug. 1, 1896. 8 Dyce i, 206. 176 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Inpryntyd by me Rycharde faukes... The yere of our lorde god. M. CCCCC. XXIII. The. iii. day of October. In this long poem to justify the poetic laurel awarded him by the Countess of Surrey, is enumerated "sum parte of Skeltons bokes and baladis with ditis of pleasure, in as moche as it were to longe a proces to reherse all by name that he hath compylyd." Here, then, we have a list of poems, although admittedly not exhaustive, that is authentic and the poems of which must have been composed before October 3rd, 1523. Yet, of the five poems grouped above, two only are mentioned. There is little external evidence to guide us. There is yet another reason that invalidates the dating from the mention of the poems in the Garland, namely Skelton's manner of composition. It is inferentially probable that at least three of the poems are composites, formed from fragments written at different times. Consequently, while there is a certain unity in tone throughout any poem, the references to persons and events seem confused. An illustration of this difficulty is Speke, Parrot, a poem usually regarded as unintelligible. A cursory glance shows that, instead of a single poem, there is a group of short poems, several of which seem to be dated. Thus one section ends with the line "Penultimo die Octobris, 33~;" another, "In diebus Novembris, 34;" another, "15 kalendis Decembris, 34," etc. That these figures may refer to the year of the century is impossible, because Skelton died in 1529; that they may refer to the year of the reign of Henry VII is equally impossible, because he was on the throne but twenty-three years. Yet, since for years Skelton had been an official of the Court of Henry VII, and as such must have dated all his official papers from the accession of the King, it seems probable that for sentimental reasons or for the purpose of concealment he continued the reckoning. "Penultimo die Octobris, 33~" becomes merely October 30th, 1517. If this be true, Speke, Parrot forms a running commentary on the events in the years 1517 and 1518. Naturally at the time when they were written they were perfectly comprehensible to the court, for whom they were intended. So much was this the case that, in order to protect himself against a charge of treason, he uses nomenclature borrowed from the Book of Judges,-with the result that to the modern reader unable to date the poems accurately, the whole THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 177 seems a farago of nonsense.1 Likewise it seems probable that Colin Clout also was composed at different times, and that upon a poem, written on general conditions, he grafted later additions attacking Cardinal Wolsey. The chronological order of the five satires probably is Speke, Parrot, 1517-1518; Why Come Ye not to Court, 1521-23; The Duke of Albany, 1.523; Colin Clout,-1525; and the Replycacion, 1527.2 With these approximate dates for the composition of the poems, it is possible to show Skelton's conceptions developing through the ten years. First, his position must be remembered. In the Skelton of the apocryphal Merie Tales we have lost the real Skelton, chosen to be tutor to a prince o: the blood royal, praised by Erasmus for his learning, and patronized by the great house of Howard.3 A priori such a man would naturally be conscious of the existence of evil conditions and yet conservative in applying a cure. Naturally also he is intensely loyal to his former pupil, the King. Cryst saue Kyng Henry the viii, our royall kyng, The red rose in honour to florysh and sprynge! With Kateryne incomparable, our ryall quene also, That pereles pomegarnet, Chryst saue her noble grace! Speke, Parrot, 11. 36-39 Six years later his loyalty is as intense and more voluble. But nowe will I expounde What noblenesse dothe abounde, And what honour is founde, And what vertues be resydent In our royall regent, Our perelesse president, Our kyng most excellent: In merciall prowes Lyke unto Hercules; In prudence and wysdom Lyke vnto Salamon; 1 For a detailed interpretation, see Mod. Lang. Notes, Vol. xxx, 1915. 2Publications of the Modern Language Association, December, 1914. 3 Henry Bradley speaks of Skelton as "that extraordinary windbag." Academy, August 1, 1896. 178 EARLY TUDOR POETRY In his goodly person Lyke vnto Absolon; In loyalte and foy Lyke to Ector of Troy; And his glory to incres, Lyke to Scipiades; In royal mageste Lyke vnto Ptholome, Lyke to Duke Iosue, And the valiaunt Machube, That if I wolde reporte All the roiall sorte Of his nobilyte, His magnanymyte, His animosite, His frugalite, His lyberalite, His affabilite, His humanyte, His stabilite, His humilite, His benignite, His royal dignyte, My lernying is to small For to recount them all. Duke of Albany, 11., 423-458. This appreciation of the royal virtues does not err on the side of understatement. But this enthusiasm for the King does not extend to conditions in the kingdom. In an age of change he is unable to adjust himself to the new ideas. This feeling of protest finds expression-if so cryptic an utterance may be called expression,-in the group of poems, Speke, Parrot. The first part of it was obviously written in the medieval manner. The verse-form is the rime-royal; he triumphantly announces that it is an allegory. But that metaphora, allegoria with all, Shall be his protectyon, his pauys, and his wall.' Here, as we have seen, he objects to the study of Greek on the ground that it is both useless and dangerous. Yet he does not stop at this point. He passes on to the really dangerous topic of 1 Dyce, ii, 10. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 179 state affairs. Thus whatever appearance of unity there is is due to the device of putting widely different subject matters, written at different times, into the mouth of a parrot,-which occasionally makes confusion worse confounded by talking nonsense. The value of this device is at once clear; it enabled the author to string together whatever he chose, and also to shirk the responsibility for the interpretation of any part. The reader sees dangerous discussion of high polity; the author grins that he sees too much, that it is only a parrot speaking. The conclusion is inevitable that the events on which these poems form a commentary and the personalities alluded to under scriptural names, were so wellknown to the public that the poet feared to be more open. The key precedes the cypher. Speke, Parrot, then, marks a farther step than the Bouge of Court away from the medieval type.1 It must be confessed that the resemblance between such work as Speke, Parrot, and this type of medieval poetry has become exceedingly tenuous. The complete severance is made in the next poem, Colin Clout. Here the dream-structure is abandoned in favor of a single dramatic ego; personification and allegory change to direct statement; and the rime-royal is abandoned in favor of the Skeltonical verse. The scheme of the poem is very simple. Under the name of Colin Clout, the author purports merely to repeat what is being said: "Thus I, Colyn Cloute, As I go about, And wandrynge as I walke, I here the people talke." 2 Consequently he does not guarantee the truth of what he hears: "And eyther ye be to bad, Or else they ar mad Of this to reporte... " And he is filled with indignation that they are so loose-tongued: "But, under your supporte, Tyll my dyenge day 'I shall both wryte and say, I For further discussion, cf. Mod. Lang. Notes, vol. xxx (1915). 2Lines 287-290. 'Lines 504-506. 180 EARLY TUDOR POETRY And ye shall do the same, Howe they are to blame You thus to dyffame: For it maketh me sad Howe that the people are glad The Churche to depraue..." Nor should he be blamed because his motives are the best: " Make ye no murmuracyon, Though I wryte after this facion; Though I, Colyn Cloute, Among the hole route Of you that clerkes be, Take nowe vpon me Thus copyously to wryte, I do it for no despyte. Wherefore take no dysdayne At my style rude and playne; For I rebuke no man That vertuous is: why than Wreke ye your anger on me?" 2 It would be difficult to conceive a framework at once more flexible and more irritating than this. He is the friend that brings you unpleasant rumors about yourself, because he feels that you should know what is being said. And, as we have all found to our sorrow, there is no reply possible. One cannot argue-he does not say that he believes what he says-nor can you object to him-he tells you with the kindest of motives. You gnash your teeth in silent fury while he exhorts you to patience. Even in the conception of the mechanism of his poem Skelton is clever. Not only is the mechanism irritating, it is also flexible. As he pretends only to report, he is enabled to discuss matters in any order. In an incoherent way he takes up the condition of the whole Church. To any thoughtful observer the situation during the second decade of the sixteenth century seemed full of danger. The pretensions of the Church, as voiced by the Pope, to supremacy in non-ecclesiastical affairs, however logical from medieval precedent, ran counter to the growth of national feeling that tended to exalt the monarchical idea. This was not peculiar to England. 1 Lines 507-515. 2 Lines 1081-1093. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 181 Previously the conflict between Louis XII of France with the papacy indicated the same condition; but a few more years were to pass until Rome itself was to be given to be sacked by the troups of the Spanish Charles. Skelton is an acute diagnostician in selecting this as the root of the trouble. "For, as farre as I can se, It is wronge with eche degre: For the temporalte Accuseth the spiritualte; The spirituall agayne Dothe grudge and complayne Vpon the temporall men: Thus eche of other blother The tone agayng the tother; Alas, they make me shoder! For in hoder moder The Church is put in faute..." And it is the Church for which Skelton, as a member of the Church, is loyally fighting. In the conflict between these two parties, the Church and the State, Skelton counsels that the Church should give way. It is here that, like Erasmus, he shows his humanistic bias. His learning gives him sufficient perspective to perceive that while both are in the wrong, the onus lies more heavily upon the Church. And with steady scalpel he exposes the corruptions. The first criticism of the Church is that it has become parasitic. "Laye men say indede How they take no hede Theyr sely shepe to fede, But plucke away and pull The fleces of theyr wull... All to haue promocyon, There is theyr hole deuocyon, With money, if it wyll hap, To catche the forked cap (mitre)..." 2 "And surely thus they say, Bysshoppes, if they may, Small houses wolde kepe, Theyr soules lene and dull, 1 Lines 59-70. 2 Lines 75-89. 182 EARLY TUDOR POETRY But slumbre forth and slepe, And assay to crepe Within the noble walles Of the kynges halles, To fat theyr bodyes full, Theyr soules lene and dull, And haue full lytell care How euyll theyr shepe fare. Thus moved by an ambition, little spiritual, they are cowardly false to their trust, How be it they are good men, Moche herted lyke an hen... 2 And they have forgotten the lessons St. Thomas A Becket gave them! They sell the grace of the Holy Ghost! The result is the total disorganization of the Church. And howe whan ye gyue orders In your prouinciall borders, As at Sitientes, Some are insufficientes, Some parum spaientes, Some nihil inteUigentes, Some valde negligentes, Some nullum sensum habentes, But bestiall and vntaught; But whan thei haue ones caught Dominus vobiscum by the hede, Than renne they in euery stede, God wot, with dronken nolles; Yet take they cure of soules, And woteth neuer what thei rede, Paternoster, Ave, nor Crede; Construe not worth a whystle Nether Gospel nor Pystle; Theyr mattyns madly sayde, Nothynge deuoutly prayd; Theyr lernynge is so small, Theyr prymes and houres fall And lepe out of theyr lyppes Lyke sawdust or drye chyppes. I speke not nowe of all, But the moost parte in generall. 1 Lines 121-131. 2 Lines 168-169. s Lines 22-r/. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 183 And the ignorance of the clergy is both wide-spread and appalling, due primarily to the fact that the candidates are not selected with care. In you the faute is supposed, For that they are not apposed By just examinacyon In connyng and conuersacyon; They haue none instructyon To make a true constructyon: A preest without a letter, Without his vertue be gretter, Doubtlesse were moche better Vpon hym for to take A mattocke or a rake. Alas, for very shame! Some can not declyne their name; Some can not scarsly rede, And yet he wyll not drede For to kepe a cure, And in nothyng is sure; This Dominus vobiscum, As wyse as Tom a thrum, A chaplayne of trust Layth all in the dust. 1 On account of this demoralization the laity feel that the clergy cannot be trusted. Here Skelton does not hesitate to put into words accusations that we are told today originated with the Reformers: Of prebendaries and deanes, Howe some of them gleanes And gathereth vp the store For to catche more and more; Of persons and vycaryes They make many outcryes; They cannot kepe theyr wyues From them for theyr lyues; And thus the loselles stryues, And lewedly sayes by Christ Agaynst the sely preest. The inevitable result is the Reformation. And some haue a smacke Of Luthers sacke, 1 Lines 266-86. Lines 568-78. 184 EARLY TUDOR POETRY And a brennyng sparke Of Luthers warke, And are somewhat suspecte In Luthers secte; And some of them barke, Clatter and carpe Of that heresy arte Called Wicleuista, And deuelysshe dogmatista; And some be Hussyans, And some be Arryans, And some be Pollegians, And make moche varyans Bytwene the clergye And the temporaltye...1 In this passage Skelton is a loyal son of the Church. That it is possible for men to be seduced by the truth of the hideous heresies of Luther and Wycliff never enters his mind. The sole reason that he can conceive for such backsliding is that the evil lives of the clergy have rendered their Church contemptible. And the responsibility for this wretched condition rests upon the bishops. Through pride, vain-glory and hypocrisy they have ceased to be "lanterns of light." They are of the world, worldly, forgetting the lessons of their Master. Chryst by cruelte Was nayled vpon a tre; He payed a bytter pencyon For mannes redemcyon, He dranke eysell and gall To redeme vs withall; But swete ypocras ye drynke, With, Let the cat wynke! 2 1 Lines 542-558. 2 Colin Clout, 452-59. That Skelton is not alone in his opinion, is shown by Hawes, Convercyon of Swerers: My wordes my prelates vnto you do preche... The worlde hathe cast you in suche blyndnes Lyke vnto stones your hertes hathe hardnes... Wo worthe your hertes so planted in pryde Wo worthe your wrath and mortall enuye Wo worthe slouth that dothe with you abyde Wo worthe also inmesurable glotony Wo worthe your tedyus synne of lechery, etc. etc. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 185 Let them come forth at large, preach so simply that they may be understood, and all will be well. Thus Skelton is at one with Erasmus. He feels no need for reformation outside of the Church; it is reformation within the Church that is needed imperatively and rapidly. Therefore is he writing, not against the Church, but in behalf of the Church, and as a lover of the Church he cries out against those that defile Her sacraments. This attitude explains the bitterness of the poems,-the point of view of one that feels his cause betrayed, of the soldier abandoned by his general. The attack is also an appeal. And it is exactly this attitude that renders his criticisms significant. Personally he had nothing to gain and everything to lose. The heads of the Church, those from whom preferment was to be expected, were those that would be most antagonized. He is driven to speak by the force of his conscience. Nor is he an insignificant, peevish, unknown person,he is one of the powers of the Church himself, and the greatest writer in England. Therefore naturally in these poems there is very real force. The inevitable result of Skelton's analysis is that he tends more and more through these years to focus his invective upon Wolsey. To Skelton, Wolsey became more and more of the type that, by sacrificing the interests of the Church to those of the State, was betraying the Church. To him Wolsey did not have the prestige given by birth or education. When Skelton was at court Wolsey was a domestic chaplain, and, as a political factor, completely unknown. And as Wolsey, although Oxford B. A. and M. A., had never proceeded to the higher degrees, to the academic poet he seemed almost uneducated.' But how euer he was borne, Men wolde haue the lesse scorne, If he coulde consyder His byrth and rowme togeder, And call to his mynde How noble and how kynde To him he hathe founde Our souereyne lorde, chyfe grounde Of all this prelacy, And set hym nobly 1 Why Comel, 492-532. 186 EARLY TUDOR POETRY In great auctoryte, Out from a low degre, Whiche he can nat se: For he was parde No doctor of deuinyte, Nor doctor of the law, Nor of none other saw; But a poore maister of arte, God wot, had lytell parte Of the quatriuials, Nor yet of the triuials, Nor of philosophy, Nor of philology, Nor of good pollycy, Nor of astronomy, Nor acquaynted worth a fly With honorable Haly, Nor with royall Ptholomy, Nor with Albumasar, To treate of any star Fyxt or els mobyll; His Latyne tonge dothe hobbyll, He doth but cloute and cobbill In Tullis faculte, Called humanyte; Yet proudly he dare pretende How no man can him amende: But haue ye nat harde this, How an one eyed man is Well syghted when He is amonge blynde men? To us, to whom the Shakespearean play has invested the fall of Wolsey with the sublimity of a great catastrophe, it is difficult to get the point of view of Skelton, to whom Wolsey was merely an ill-educated upstart that was criminally ruining his own order, that by pleasing a young king he might maintain himself in power. To Skelton there is no dignity, merely devilish ingenuity, in the career of Wolsey. It is with this point of view that, from his coign of vantage in Norfolk, Skelton watched the rise of Wolsey. The beginning of the new reign was a period of storm and stress for the Church. To appreciate the questions at issue, it must be remembered that the Church was an entity, distinct from the State. Its independ THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 187 ence had been established by the sacrifice of the life of St. Thomas at Canterbury. The situation has been well summarized by Professor Van Dyke: 1 American ecclesiastical establishments are entirely voluntary, they have almost no endowments, and this puts them so entirely in the hands of the laity whenever they choose to use their power, that it is difficult for an American to appreciate the situation in England at the beginning of the sixteenth century. The clergy were a corporate body, freed from the ordinary jurisdiction of the common law, deciding matters connected with marriage and wills by courts constituted by themselves, having sanctuaries where the criminal who entered was free from arrest, enjoying an income two and a half times that of the Crown, owning real estate estimated at one-third the total of the kingdom, casting in the persons of the twentysix bishops and the twenty-seven mitred abbots almost two-thirds of the votes in Henry VIII's first House of Lords, and able as great landed proprietors to exert influence on elections to the House of Commons. And this formidable body confessed supreme allegiance to a ruler living in Rome whose predecessors had repeatedly claimed the divine and unquestionable right to dictate to kings and nations about the conduct of their affairs. But while theoretically the line of cleavage is thus distinct, practically action was usually unified, because the high officials of the Church were also apt to be high officials in the State. Yet obviously so complicated a situation would give rise to numerous complaints, and naturally the sympathy of the laity would be on the side of the State. This was shown by the law passed February 4th, 1513, that, for one year, the benefit of the clergy should be denied to all robbers and murderers, except such as were within the holy orders of a bishop, priest, or deacon. As such a law was a direct impingement by the State on the prerogatives of the Church, in 1515 it was attacked by the Abbot of Winchcomb. In turn the law was defended by Standish, Provincial of the Franciscans, who by this action naturally angered the clergy. He was therefore summoned to appear before the Convocation, a summons that he evaded by an appeal to the King.2 Ultimately the judges determined that all the Convocation who had taken part in the proceedings against Dr. Standish were subject to prcemunire; that the King could hold a parliament by himself and the temporal lords and commons, without the spiritual lords, who had no place there, except by reason of their temporal 1 Renascence Portraits, by Paul Van Dyke, 1905, 183-4. I Letters and Papers, Vol. 2, Part 1, # 1313. 188 EARLY TUDOR POETRY possessions. Then the judges and councillors, spiritual and temporal, assembled before the King at Baynard's castle, when the Archbishop of York, Cardinal, knelt before the King and said, in behalf of the clergy, that none of them had intended to do anything in derogation of the royal prerogative, and that for his part he owed his advancement solely to the King, and would never assent to anything in derogation of his authority; nevertheless that this matter of the convention of clerks before the temporal judge seemed to all the clergy to be against the liberties of the Church, which they were bound by oath to preserve. He therefore prayed the King that the matter might be determined by the Pope and his council at Rome. The King answered, "We think Dr. Standish has sufficiently replied to you in all points."... The Archbishop of Canterbury said, that in former days many holy fathers had resisted the law of the land on this point, and some had suffered martyrdom in the quarrel.... On this the King said, "We are, by the sufferance of God, King of England, and the Kings of England in times past never had any superior but God; know, therefore, that we will maintain the rights of the crown in this matter like our progenitors;... You interpret your decrees at your pleasure; but as for me, I will never consent to your desire, any more than my progenitors have done." It is difficult to overstate the importance of this extraordinary trial; in theory the principle of the reformation is here enunciated as it was afterwards in fact. No wonder Skelton feels that O causeles cowardes, 0 hartles hardynes! O manles manhod, enfayntyd all with fere! O connyng clergye, where ys your redynes To practise or postyll thys prosses here and there? For drede ye darre not medyll with suche gere, Or elles ye pynche curtesy, trulye as I trowe, Whyche of yow fyrste dare boldlye plucke the crowe. When, from the point of view of a churchman, the gravity of the issue is considered, the action taken by Wolsey cannot be termed courageous, with his assertion "that for his part he owed his advancement solely to the King, and would never assent to anything in derogation of his authority." To Skelton, it seemed that the champion of the Church had betrayed the Church to the State. For, in Wolsey in 1514 were united almost the highest powers of each; on September 10th, he had been created Cardinal, and on December 24th, Lord Chancellor. The Parrot bitterly laments that He caryeth a kyng in hys sieve. Dyce, ii, 19. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 189 Nay more, he is king! 1 Jupiter ut nitido deus est veneratus Olympo; Hie coliturque deus. Sunt data thura Jovi, rutilo solio residenti; Cum Jove thura capit. Jupiter astrorum rector dominusque polorum; Anglica sceptra regit. With all this power he might have saved the Church! He did not rise to his opportunity because he himself was beneath contempt.2 So myche raggyd ryghte of a rammes horne; So rygorous revelyng in a prelate specially; So bold and so braggyng, and was so baselye borne; So lordlye of hys lokes and so dysdayneslye; So fatte a magott, bred of a flesshe flye; Was nevyr suche a ffylty gorgon, nor suche an epycure, Syns Dewcalyons flodde, I make the faste and sure. So myche preuye wachyng in cold wynters nyghtes; So myche serchyng of loselles, and ys hymselfe so lewde; So myche coniuracions for elvyshe myday sprettes; So many bullys of pardon puplysshed and shewyd; So myche crossyng and blyssyng, and hym all beshrewde; Suche pollaxis and pyllers, suche mvlys trapte with gold; — Sens Dewcalyons flodde in no cronycle ys told. Dixit, quod Parrot. Unhappily, on his secular side, no more than on his ecclesiastical, did Wolsey act to the satisfaction of Skelton. It may be possible, perhaps, to infer jealousy, as an unconscious motive, on the part of the former tutor that saw another so firmly fixed in the affections of the quondam pupil. But also his very admiration for the King made him protest against the assumption of authority on the part of the minister. The story is told in Guistinian's Despatches,s that Francis I, on being told that Henry devoted himself to pleasure and solace, and left the cares of state to the Cardinal, rejoined, "By my faith, the Cardinal must bear him little good will; for it is not the office of a good servant to filch his mas1 Dyce, ii, 20. 2 Dyce, ii, 24. 3 Quoted by Brewer, Letter and Papers, Vol. 3, Part I, rxxii. 190 EARLY TUDOR POETRY ter's honor." It is the old complaint of the ego et meus rex. To us, with our appreciation of Henry's character and knowledge of Wolsey's downfall, this may seem trivial; to them, the Cardinal's power as attested by his magnificence overshadowed that of the King himself. So Skelton asks in bitterness 1 Why come ye nat to court?To whyche court? To the kynges court, Or to Hampton Court?Nay, to the kynges court: The kynges courte Shulde haue the excellence But Hampton Court Hath the preemynence, And Yorkes Place, With my lordes grace, To whose magnifycence Is all the conflewence, Sutys and supplycacyons, Embassades of all nacyons. Strawe for lawe cannon, Or for the lawe common, Or for lawe cyuyll! It shall be as he wyll:.... He dyggeth so in the trenche Of the court royall, That he ruleth them all, So he. dothe vndermynde, And suche sleyghtes dothe fynde, That the kynges mynde By hym is subuerted, And so streatly coarted In credensynge his tales, That all is but nutshales That any other sayth; He hath in him suche fayth. Such faith, in itself a lovely thing, would not be dangerous if, as Skelton remarks, the object of the trust were worthy. This, however, according to Skelton, he was not. As Chancellor of State, his foreign policy was a failure. His expedition to Calais, July-November, 1591, in which he attempted to mediate between 1 Why Come Ye Nat to Court, Dyce, ii, 39-40. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 191 Francis and the Emnperor had made England only ridiculous. The truce between England and Scotland, September 11, 1522, surrendered the advantages gained, with a net loss; Our mony madly lent, And mor madly spent:... Our armye waxeth dull, With, tourne all home agayne, With never a Scot slayne. The wardens of the East and West Marches, and the Earl of Northumberland, are standing by idle. The explanation for this condition is not the inefficiency of either the troops or the commanders, because the good Earl of Surrey terrified the French. The fault is not with them, it is with the man higher up; the Cardinal was bribed; 2 But yet they ouer shote vs Wyth crownes and wyth scutus; With scutis and crownes of gold I drede we are bought and solde; It is a wonders warke: They shote all at one marke, At the Cardynals hat, They shote all at that; Oute of theyr stronge townes They shote at him with crownes; With crownes of golde enblased They make him so amased, And his eyen so dased, That he ne se can To know God nor man. And in accusing John Meautis, the King's French Secretary, af treachery, he insinuates that Wolsey himself is in the pay of France.3 To explain why the chief minister of England should thus sell himself Skelton argues his notorious need for money. Even houses of ill fame are protected openly by the Cardinal. This is not surprising, since he is a man notoriously immoral. He 4 1 Lines 140-1; 147-9. 2 Lines 166-180. On March 15th, 1523, Brian Tuke is appointed secretary "vice John Meauties" but I do not know whether for the reason Skelton alleges. 4 Lines 222-223. 192 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Spareth neither mayde ne wyfe: This is a postels lyfe! But what could you expect from his birth? How be it the primordyall Of his wretched originall, And his base progeny, And his gresy genealogy, He came of the sank royall, (sang royal) That was cast out of a bochers stall. Yet it is this wretched creature, without birth, without education, that dares affront the old nobility of England! 2 Our barons be so bolde, Into a mouse hole they wolde Rynne away and crepe, Lyke a mayny of shepe; Dare nat loke out at dur For drede of the mastyue cur, For drede of the bochers dogge Wold wyrry them lyke an hogge. For and this curre do gnar, They must stande all a far, To holde vp their hande at the bar. For all their noble blode He pluckes them by the hode, And shakes them by the eare, And brynge [sj them in suche feare; He bayteth them lyke a here, Lyke an oxe, or a bull: Theyr wyttes, he saith, are dull; He sayth they haue no brayne Theyr astate to mayntayne; And maketh them to bow theyr kne Before his maieste. Consequently the only explanation he can find for the continued favor of the King toward the Cardinal is witchcraft, and he gravely cites a precedent in the time of Charlemagne! A more tempting precedent, however, occurs to him in the career of Cardinal Balue, who, like Wolsey, betrayed his king.3 1 486-491. 2 Lines 289-310. 3 Lines 736-740. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 193 Wherefore he suffred payn, Was hedyd, drawen, and quarterd, And dyed stynkingly marterd. Lo, yet for all that He ware a cardynals hat, In hym was small fayth... Such in substance is Skelton's indictment against the great Cardinal, poured forth in lines that tumble over one another without order. He returns to the charge, repeats accusations, his allusions refer to events in an unchronological order, and there is no regular procedure. The probability is that the various sections of the poem were composed at quite different times. Thus at line 393, only a little beyond one quarter of the completed work, he remarks: Thus wyll I conclude my style, And fall to rest a whyle, And so to rest a whyle, &c. The natural result is that the poem is powerful only in detail. As a whole it has the incoherence of anger. It is not worth while, therefore, to discuss the historical accuracy of the accusations; in fact, with the able championing of Brewer, the modern reader in his admiration for the great qualities of Wolsey is apt to forget that there may be another side. What concerns us here is purely literary. As literature, its main characteristic is its audacity. In an age of privilege, the boldness with which the poet dares to express his scandals and the vigor of the expression are astounding It is no wonder that half apologetically he shields himself behind the example of Juvenal. Its great merit is that it is a scathingly frank expression of personal opinion. And that, too, is its great weakness,-that it is the expression of merely personal opinion. This may explain why Wolsey could afford to overlook, provided he ever saw it, this attack upon his foreign policy and the personal invective accompanying it. The first was misunderstood and the second greatly exaggerated. And neither much interested the country at large. The average Englishman had not the materials at hand to enable him to discuss matters of state polity, and the vices of rulers tend toward enhancing their popularity with the common man by making them more human. In any case Wolsey's 194 EARLY TUDOR POETRY birth, manner, education, and morality were equally well known to the King, who alone was the judge. Consequently, although it is not probable that he read Why Come Ye not to Court with pleasure, or that he liked its author, it is conceivable that he may have regarded Skelton as the pestiferous gadfly awakened by his own success. But such reasoning scarcely holds with Skelton's most famous poem, Colin Clout,-more widely known than the rest, perhaps because from it Spenser borrowed his nom de plume. Of no poem, however, is the question of dating more difficult. In the enumeration in the Garland, while naturally its companion piece, Why Come Ye not to Court, is omitted, Colin Clout is listed as a "trifle" of "honest mirth" in the same category with Elinor Rumming, and the Latin side-note reads: "They smile more pleasantly at serious matters when described as jests." The inevitable inference is that the satire is general and not particular. On the other hand exactly the contrary, that the satire was directed at Wolsey and not in general, was the opinion of the poet's contemporaries. For example, Francis Thynne, writing long after of his father's difficulties, remarks: 1.... wherevppon the kinge bydd hym goo his waye, and feare not. All whiche not withstandinge, my father was called in questione by the Bysshoppes, and heaved at by Cardinall Wolseye, his olde enymye for manye causes, but mostly for that my father had furthered Skelton to publishe his 'Collen Cloute' againste the Cardinall, the moste parte of whiche Booke was compiled in my fathers howse at Erithe in Kente. Aside from the immaterial error of the place of composition,2 this testimony is of the highest value. The father of the writer had been injured, because it was believed that he had aided in the composition of a particular poem. It is scarcely conceivable that the son should have been confused about so important an event in his family history. That Thynne was not mistaken is shown by the fact that among the Lansdowne MSS.3 lines 462-480 of Colin Clout 1 Francis Thynne's Animadversions upon Speght's first (1598 A. D.) Edition of Chaucer's Workes, Chaucer Society, 1876, p. 10. 2 The house at Erith was not purchased by the elder Thynne until two years after Skelton's death. The entire passage is quoted in Chapter II, p. 117. 3 Dyce, i, 329. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 195 appear as an independent poem, entitled "The profecy of Skelton, 1529," and the passage prophesying A fatall fall of one That shuld syt on a trone., And rule all thynges alone... can refer only to Wolsey. Another witness that in this poem Skelton is attacking Wolsey appears in William Bullein.1 In 1564, if not earlier,2 he wrote a Dialogue against the Feuer Pestilence, in which he thus mentions Skelton: Skelton satte in the corner of a Piller with a Frostie bitten face, frownyng, and is scante yet cleane cooled of the hotte burnyng Cholour kindeled againste the cankered Cardinall Wolsey; wrytyng many sharpe Distichons with bloudie penne againste hym, and sente them by the infernal riuers Styx, Flegiton, and Acheron by the Feriman of helle, called Charon, to the saied Cardinall. How the Cardinall came of nought, And his Prelacie solde and bought; And where suche Prelates bee Sprong of lowe degree, And spirituall dignitee, Farewell benignitee, Farewell simplicitee, Farewell good charitee! Thus paruum literatus Came from Rome gatus, Doctour dowpatus, Scante a Bachelaratus: And thus Skelton did ende With Wolsey his friende. The obvious inference from such scattered references is that not only was Colin Clout read with reference to the Cardinal, but also that it circulated in fragments. This inference, made from external evidence, is corroborated by the internal evidence of the poem itself. Allusions are made to historic events that happened after the composition of the Garland. One illustration, that shows also the detailed nature of the attack, will suffice. 1 Early English Text Society, Extra Series, LII, 16. 2 The earliest edition reads "newly corrected." 196 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Buyldyng royally Theyr mancyons curyously, With turrettes and with toures, With halles and with boures, Stretchynge to the starres, With glasse wyndowes and barres; Hangynge aboute the walles Clothes of golde and palles, Arras of ryche aray, Fresshe as flours in May; Wyth dame Dyana naked; Howe lusty Venus quaked, And howe Cupyde shaked His dart, and bent his bowe For to shote a crowe At her tyrly tyrlowe; And howe Parys of Troy Daunced a lege de moy, Made lusty sporte and ioy With dame Helyn the quene; With suche storyes bydene Their chambres well besene; With triumphes of Cesar, And of Pompeyus war, Of renowne and of fame By them to get a name: Nowe all the worlde stares, How they ryde in goodly chares, Conueyed by olyphantes, With lauryat garlantes, And by vnycornes With their semely homes; Vpon these beestes rydynge, Naked boyes strydynge, With wanton wenches winkyng. Nowe truly, to my thynkynge, That is a speculacyon And a mete meditacyon For prelates of estate,...1 These lines apparently describe, as was pointed out by Ernest Law,2 a definite set of tapestries at Hampton Court. "Of these 1 Colyn Cloute. Lines 936-974. 2 A History of Hampton Court Palace, Qnd ed. 1890, I, pp. 63-65. As sketches of the designs are here given, the reader may see for himself the accuracy of Skel THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 197 six triumphs (Wolsey having duplicates of those of Time and Eternity), we at once identify three, namely, those of Death, Renown, and Time, as still remaining at Hampton Court in Henry VIII's Great Watching or Guard Chamber; while the other three-of Love, Chastity, and Eternity, or Divinity,-complete the set of six designs, which were illustrative, in an allegorical form, of Petrarch's Triumphs.... In each piece a female, emblematic of the influence whose triumph is celebrated, is shown enthroned on a gorgeously magnificent car drawn by elephants, or unicorns, or bulls, richly caparisoned and decorated; while around them throng a host of attendants and historical personages, typical of the triumph portrayed. Thus, in the Triumph of Fame or Renown, we have figures representing Julius Caesar and Pompey; and in the first aspect of the Triumph of Chastity we see Venus, driven by naked cupids, and surrounded by heroines of amorous renown, attacked by Chastity. The reader will now recognize how pointed is the reference to these tapestries in the following lines of Skelton's satire...." Unless there chanced to be in England and familiar to Skelton another set of tapestries allegorically representing Petrarch's triumphs-an hypothesis that does not seem probableSkelton's lines refer to these. They appear in Wolsey's inventory as "hangings bought of the 'xecutors of my lord of Durham anno xiiii0 Reg. H. viii." But as Ruthall, Bishop of Durham, died February 4, 1523, the passage is either an attack upon Ruthall, or the list in the Garland was written at the earliest only eight months before it was published by Hawkes. Neither alternative seems very probable. Although Ruthall caused to be built the great chamber at Bishop Aukland, the expression "royally" seems overdone to apply to that; nor does eight months' intermission between the composition of a poem and the publication of it seem in accordance with the leisurely methods of printing used in the 16th century. The simplest explanation of the difficulty, therefore, is the assumption that there were two versions of the poem. The first was a general attack upon ecclesiastical conditions, and as such was alluded to in the Garland. Skelton then added passages specifically attacking Wolsey, although not by name. Both external and internal evidence show that in a poem criticising ton's description. Mr. Law, however, gives no indication of the difficulty in the dating caused by his discovery. 198 EARLY TUDOR POETRY general conditions of the clergy, he inserted individual poems attacking Wolsey in particular, erasing the lines of cleavage.1 But the result of this condition, namely the joining of parts definitely attacking Wolsey upon parts that originally had little reference to him, is that the sixteenth century, not unnaturally, read Wolsey into the whole poem, that a satire upon a general condition became a satire upon a single individual. Wolsey is thus pilloried as the traitor to the Church. Whether or not this effect was intended consciously is impossible to say, although it may be argued that after the personalities in Why Come Ye not to Court there were no bounds to Skelton's audacity. Colin Clout becomes a passionate appeal to both the clergy and the laity to rebel. And the allusions are to events that, although now forgotten, at that time stirred all England. In 1523 the clergy of the Convocation, summoned by the Archbishop of Canterbury, on the first day of its meeting in St. Paul's were cited to appear before Wolsey in Westminster. There on June 2nd a war tax was voted "being no less than fifty per cent. income tax, to be paid by installments in five years." 2 Great was the indignation of the clergy over this assertion of the legatine power, "whiche was never sene before in England, wherof master Skelton a mery poet wrote. 'Gentle Paule laie doune thy swearde: For Peter of Westminster hath shaven thy beard.' " Colin Clout if not so "mery" is at least more outspoken: 4 But they are loth to mell, And loth to hang the bell Aboute the cattes necke, For drede to haue a checke; They ar fayne to play deuz decke, They ar made for the becke. 1Thus the lines, quoted by Bullein, How the Cardinall came of nought And his Prelacie solde and bought becomes (Dyce lines 585-6) Howe prelacy is solde and bought, And come vp of nought... 2 Brewer, Reign of Henry VIII, i, 494. 3 Hall, King Henry the VIII, ed. by Charles Whibley, i, 287. 4 Dyce, i, 317-318. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 199 How be it they are good men, Moche herted lyke an hen: Theyr lessons forgotten they haue That Becket them gaue: Thomas manum mittit adfortia, Spernit damna, spernit opprobria, Nulla Thomam frangit injuria. But nowe euery spirituall father, Men say, they had rather Spende moche of theyr share Than to be combred with care: Spende! nay, nay, but spare; For let se who that dare Sho the mockysshe mare; They make her wynche and keke, But it is not worth a leke: Boldnesse is to seke The Churche for to defend. The clergy of Henry II, typified by St. Thomas a Becket, were willing to die to defend the rights of the Church against the State,and the Church won; the clergy of Henry VIII, typified by Wolsey, weakly voted to surrender the possessions of the Church to the State, and had rather spend much of their share than to be encumbered with care. The biting antithesis is forced home! In 1524 Wolsey had procured from Clement VII bulls to enable him to found Cardinal College at Oxford and to endow it with the funds arising from the suppression of a number of small monasteries. Whatever may be the opinion of posterity concerning Wolsey's action in the matter, concerning the relative value of Cardinal College on the one hand and of the small monasteries on the other, to the sixteenth century it was a high-handed outrage.' To them, since by no possible latitude of construction could Wolsey be considered as carrying out the wishes of the donors, it seemed a misappropriation of funds. Skelton here is the mouthpiece of popular indignation:2 Relygous men are fayne For to tourne agayne In swula eculorum, And to forsake theyr corum, 1James Gairdner, The English Church, p. 81. 2Dyce, i, p. 32-327. 200 EARLY TUDOR POETRY And vagabundare per forum, And take a fyne meritorum, Contra regulam morum, Aut blacke monachorum, Aut canonicorum, Aut Bernardinorum, Aut crucifixorum, And to synge from place to place, Lyke apostataas. And the selfe same game Begone ys nowe with shame Amongest the sely nonnes: My lady nowe she ronnes, Dame Sybly our abbesse, Dame Dorothe and lady Besse, Dame Sare our pryoresse, Out of theyr cloyster and quere With an heuy chere, Must cast up theyr blacke vayles, And set vp theyr fucke sayles, To catche wynde with their ventales — What, Colyne, there thou shales! Yet thus with yll hayles The lay fee people rayles. And all the fawte they lay On you, prelates, and say Ye do them wrong and no ryght To put them thus to flyght; No matyns at mydnyght, Boke and chalys gone quyte; And plucke awaye the leedes Evyn ouer theyr heedes, And sell away theyr belles, And all that they haue elles: Thus the people telles, Rayles like rebelles, Redys shrewdly and spelles, And with foundacyons melles, And talkys lyke tytyuelles, Howe ye brake the dedes wylles, Turne monasteris into water milles, Of an abbay ye make a graunge; Your workes, they saye, are straunge; So that theyr founders soules Haue lost theyr beade rolles, The mony for theyr masses Spent amonge wanton lasses; THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 201 The Diriges are forgotten.; Theyr founders lye there rotten, But where theyr soules dwell, Therwith 1 wyll not mell. What coulde the Turke do more With all his false lore, Turke, Sarazyn, or Jew? I reporte me to you, 0 mercyfull Jesu, You supporte and rescue, My style for to dyrecte, It may take some effecte! Such quotations show wherein Colin Clout is more successful than its companion piece Why Come Ye not to Court. The latter is coarse, personal invective based on malignant gossip; the former appparently deduces its attacks from incontrovertible facts. In the first, the tone is that of a private quarrel; in the second, Skelton speaks with the nation behind him. And herein lies the power of the poem. The average man cared little for what did not immediately concern him, but in every act of his life the Church did concern him. When he saw her in danger, when the monks and nuns went wailing through the countryside, his anger was kindled. Thus whereas Why Come Ye not to Court presents the case of the Cardinal vs. the King, Colin Clout is Cardinal vs. the People. And no one was more keenly alive to the fact that his government was essentially popular than Henry himself. The popular discontent found its spokesman and its champion in the one poet that had both the courage and the ability to express it to the full. In Skelton the nation found its voice. The explanation of such daring utterance as Colin Clout is fortunately given us by Skelton himself in his next poem, A Replycacion agaynst Certayne Yong Scolers Abiured of Late, &c. This poem must have been composed after December 8th, 1527, because it was on that date 1 that the young scholars, Thomas Bilney and Thomas Arthur, abjured. And it is almost a certainty that the reference is to them. The first part of it consists of invective in mingled verse and prose. Then follows, with a sub-title,2 A confutacion responsyue, or an ineuytably prepensed answere to all waywarde or frowarde altercacyons that can or may be made or obiected agaynst Skelton laureate, deuyser of this Replycacyon, &c. This was first shown by Brie. 2 Dyce, i, p. 219. 202 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Apparently the poet feels that he may be criticised on the ground that it is none of his affair. To answer this objection he explains the function of the poet. If his opponents object that poetry "maye nat flye so hye" as to deal with matters appertaining to theology and philosophy, they are requested to remember the example set by David, whom Jerome (and the passage is cited at length with an English translation), calls prophet of prophets, and poet of poets. Thus with the functions of the poet are combined those of the prophet. Consequently for the poet he claims divine inspiration. Howe there is a spyrituall, And a mysteriall, And a mysticall Effecte energiall, As Grekes do it call, Of suche an industry, And suche a pregnacy, Of heuenly inspyracion In laureate creacyon, Of poetes commendacion, That of diuyne myseracion God maketh his habytacion In poetes whiche excelles, And soiourns with them and dwelles. By whose inflammacion Of spyrituall instygacion And diuyne inspyracion, We are kyndled in suche facyon With hete of the Holy Gost, Which is God of myghtes most, That he our penne dothe lede, And maketh in vs suche spede, That forthwith we must nede With penne and ynke procede, Somtyme for affection, Somtyme for sadde dyrection, Somtyme for correction, Somtyme vnder protection Of pacient sufferance, With sobre cyrcumstance, Our myndes to auaunce To no mannes anoyance...1 1 Dyce, i, p. 2Q9. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 203 Such a passage, coming as it does in the dawn of the Renaissance, is interesting as being so extreme an expression of a theory of poetics afterwards elaborated by Sidney and still current today. According to this theory, the poet as votes is only the medium through which the Divine Will expresses itself. Consequently,and Skelton does not hesitate to affirm the inevitable deduction,the responsibility for that expression rests, not upon the poet, but upon God. But this passage, coming in the context where it does, seems curiously apologetic. It is not quite clear for what he is apologizing. The body of the poem is an assertion of orthodoxy on the part of the poet and of virulent condemnation for those asserting the right of individual judgment contrary to the decrees of the Church. For this, surely, there would be no need to invoke the doctrine of plenary, poetic inspiration. The striking peculiarity of this situation becomes emphasized when taken in connection with the dedication of the poem. Honorificatissimo, amplissimo, longeque reverendissimo in Christo patri, ac domino, domino Thomea, &c. tituli sanctce Cecilie, sacrosancte Romance ecclesice presbytero, Cardinali meritissimo, et apostolicoe sedis legato, a latereque legato superillustri, &c., Skeltonis laureatus, ora, reg., humillimum dicit obsequium cum omni debita reverentia, tanto tamque magnifico digna principe sacerdotum, totiusque justitice cequabilissimo moderatore, necnon proesentis opusculi fautore excellentissimo, &c., ad cujus auspicatissimam contemplationem, sub memorabili prelo gloriosce immortalitatis, proesens pagellafelicitatur, &c. When one realizes that the very honorable, very great and by far the most reverend father in Christ is the same Cardinal Wolsey to whom but two or three years before Skelton was alluding in terms the reverse of complimentary, the question arises what is the explanation of such an astounding change of front. The situation presupposes both a moral obloquy on the part of the author and a general obtuseness on the part of the Cardinal. The obvious solution is, by denying Skelton's authorship, to put the blame upon the printer. However true this may be of the other three similar dedications,l it certainly does not hold here. Although printed by Pynson without date, yet as Pynson died in 1530, only a year after Skelton himself, the publication of the poem 1 The other three dedications of Skelton's poems appear long after his heath, and may perhaps be interpolations. 204 EARLY TUDOR POETRY must have been at the extreme only three years after its composition, and probably was during the poet's lifetime. Under these conditions the motive that might cause Pynson in Skelton's name to forge a dedication to the poet's avowed enemy seems inexplicable. Consequently the inference seems unavoidable that here the dedication is genuine. And as there is no record of any act of Wolsey to justify such a change of opinion, the explanation must be sought in the life of Skelton himself. Although in all this we are wandering in a maze of inference and guesswork, the answer to the question seems to have been found in a discovery of Dr. SeBoyar.1 In a report of the visitation of Bishop Nicke to the Cathedral of Norwich, 1526, he brought to light the fact that a Dominus Johannes Shelton has been accused of gravia crimina et nephanda peccata. The identification of this Dominus Johannes Shelton with the poet, whose name was sometimes so spelled, and who at this time was in the diocese of Norwich, seems to fill all the conditions. Traditionally it was with Bishop Nicke that his trouble arose.2 The difficulty came from his disordered life in general, and in particular from his having a concubine. But that this was the charge does not seem probable. When Wolsey's own laxity in such matters is considered, to him as judge it could not have been a serious charge. On the other hand, at a time when heresy was a capital offense, such extreme denunciation against the officers of the Church might easily be construed as an attack upon the Church itself. And if it be true that in 1526 he was arrested on a charge of heresy, both the Replycacion and the dedication are explained. In the poem he shows himself a zealous follower of the doctrines of the Church, severely censuring those that asserted the right of individual judgment, and cleverly adding an apology for the freedom of his poetic utterance; he then dedicates it to the Cardinal as an appeal for justice, as one totius justitic caquabilissimo moderatore. If this be the explanation, the appeal failed, and Wolsey's resentment was stronger than his sense of justice, because on June 21st., 1529, Skelton died in the sanctuary of Westminster. Four months later, his great enemy 1 Modern Language Notes, December, 1913. 2 In the Merie Tales of Skelton and in A. C. Mery Talys, although the precise anecdotes may be apocryphal, there must be a broad outline of fact. The parts relating to Skelton in both of these are reprinted in Dyce, i, lvii-lxxiiii. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 205 also died,-and in disgrace. To say that Skelton's satires caused the disgrace of Wolsey is absurd; to say that Skelton's satires, however, by powerfully stating popular discontent, and by this very expression increasing it, form an appreciable factor in the catastrophe is credible. As in the case of the humanistic prose, so out of English poetry was forged a weapon of attack, —and the power of the press became potent. From this point of view in the dedication there is an element of pathos. With the battle almost won, the poet surrenders in a sequence of fawning superlatives. Honorificatissimo, amplissimo, longeque reverendissimo in Christo patri! This analysis of Skelton's satires becomes justifiable, when it is realised that he is interesting, not merely in himself, but as a type of many unknown writers. By his relations with the Court and, probably by his personal idiosyncrasies, his personality was dominant at the time and has come down through the ages. But the form that he used was not peculiar to himself. "Skeltonic" verse was not his invention. Such an adaptation of the Medieval Latin was normal with the pre-humanistic Churchman. And as such poems were satiric, naturally they were anonymous.l Provided the arrow struck, it was immaterial from which bow it came. Written to attack an institution or a person, at a time when such an attack involved the author in peril of his life, printed, if at all, in the form of a broadside, it is literature for the day and hour. The wonder is that so much of it has survived. To us, ignorant of the local conditions, much of it is necessarily obscure and time has blunted its edge. But as these poems are classed together because of the form, and as the form was the common inheritance of the age, there is no necessary similarity in content between them. For example, the Vox populi is an attack upon the economic conditions in the reign of Henry VII, and, as such, may be profitably compared with the first book of More's Utopia; the Genealogye of Heresye, as the name implies, is against the reformers; and the Image of Ipocrysy is against the Church. Especially is it It is to be remarked in passing that, as the first collected edition of Skelton's works, that of 1568, was forty years after his death, the canon of his writings is far from being settled. All that he wrote is not included in the Dyce edition, nor is all in the Dyce edition by him. A modern critical edition of Skelton is, therefore, greatly to be desired! 206 EARLY TUDOR POETRY evident that, in the struggle following the Reformation, the same form was used by writers of both parties, because they had the same antecedents. And equally today such poems are interesting only to the antiquarian. In form they are characterized by the use of short riming couplets, or tercets, or even more, and by the fact that the poem is divided into verse paragraphs. In form, then, they resemble Skelton's satires. This is the simple type. Unfortunately for the purpose of the analyst, as authors are moved not by one but by several impulses, their works are rarely representative of one force only. This is the difficulty of the class that we have now to consider. With a measure of propriety they might be discussed under Medieval Latin influence, under humanism, and under Germanic influence. The stanza forms employed are both the rime-royal and the tetrameter stanza riming abbacc; they are polemic dialogues, and many are printed, if not actually written, in Germany. On the other hand, the Germanic factor is due to the effect of political difficulties. They were written by Englishmen, largely concerning English affairs, and with the desire that they should be read in England. Therefore, the Germanic element is reduced to the lowest fraction.' The fact that they belong to the group of polemic dialogues shows the humanistic influence. It is true that in Medieval Latin, one finds the conflictus,-a debate between personages representing antithetic points of view. The peculiarity here, however, is, as in so many of the Colloquies of Erasmus, that the characters combine to present a single impression. The dialogue is used for exposition and for attack. But there is nothing surprising in this combination of the three factors, the Germanic influence, humanism and the Medieval Latin. It belongs to the period. The cleavage between the Catholics and the Reformers has now become world-wide. The tone on each side has become contemptuous and bitter. No longer is it possible, as it was for Skelton and Erasmus, both to love the Church and to criticise her because of that love. The criticism, now, is generated by hate. But the methods by which the humanists had made effective their criticism had not been forgotten; their weapons were reforged for a more deadly battle. And if the Church had been restive under the well-intentioned satire of Erasmus and the State under the plain-speaking of Skelton, it was inevitable The reader is requested to refer to pp. 381 f. for a detailed discussion. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 207 that neither England nor any Catholic country would have been safe for these new writers,-that reformed Germany was of necessity their refuge. But these writers were not Germans and they were not humanists; dominantly they belong among those influenced by the Medieval Latin tradition. Although the majority of the early "martyrs" mentioned by Foxe belonged to the lower class, clearly some, such as Bilney, Barnes, Roy, Barlow, Frith and Tyndale, were educated in accordance with the theories of the order.1 And it was these men who voiced the feelings of their party. In them, the Reformation became articulate. However much they might be influenced by other forces, logically one would expect to find their work characterized by the peculiarities of the Medieval Latin. The illustration of this reasoning may be found in A Proper Dyaloge between a Gentillman and a husbandman eche complaynynge to other their miserable calamite through the ambicion of the clergye, published at Marburg 1530.2 Just at this time Tyndale was there translating the New Testament, and it was presumably from a member of the group associated with him that the dialogue emanated. As, on October 24, 1526, Tyndale's New Testament had been publicly burned at St. Paul's Cross, at Marburg the question of an English version of the Scriptures, it may be assumed, had paramount importance. The Roman Catholic party, according to More, did not object to an English version; they did object to that particular version on account of the numerous changes. The Reformers believed, or affected to believe, that any English version was forbidden. Yf the holy gospell allege we shuld As stronge heretikes take vs they would Vnto their churche disobedient. For why they haue commaunded straytely That none vnder great payne be so hardye To haue in englishe the testament. Which as thou knowest at London The bisshop makinge ther a sermon With shamefull blasphemy was brent.3 Cf. J. S. Brewer's, Calendar of State Papers, Vol. IV, Introduction, page dcl. 2 This has been reprinted by Arber in the same volume with Rede me and be not wrothe in his English Reprints series, p. 125. a Op. cit., 146-7. 208 EARLY TUDOR POETRY It would be difficult to find a more striking illustration of the folly of publicly prohibiting a book than this, the burning of Tyndale's version. The real motive was, of course, not understood, and the imputed motive given wide currency. The poem argues that the English version was forbidden, because the Church was afraid to have the people read it, since in life and dogma the Church had so departed from the teaching of the Christ; and that this had been the case for generations. Consequently Sir John Oldcastle and Duke Humphrey of Gloucester are cited as previous sufferers. To drive home the continued contumacy of the clergy, in the middle of the poem is inserted a prose tract "made aboute the tyme of kynge Rycharde the seconde." The main interest today in the piece is due to its curious composite nature. The first twenty-three stanzas are in the rime-royal; then follows the dialogue in the conventional scheme aabccb. The late date of composition is indicated, however, by the fact that the couplets are in pentameter and the differentia in tetrameter. Then follows the prose insertion. This significant sequence shows the natural development of the form for propagandist purposes, first the long and clumsy rime-royal, then the dialogue in stanzas, and finally verse entirely discarded for prose. Of literary value there is little. It was written for a particular time, and for a particular occasion. In so far as it met the exigencies of that time and of that occasion the author I was satisfied without considering the possibleicommendation of posterity. At least he may be praised for having kept his attack upon a definite intellectual level and free from violent personal abuse. Much the same general situation confronts us in the more celebrated satire Rede me and be nott wrothe, For I saye no thinge but trothe.2 This title is obviously ironic; in fact, whatever celebrity it enjoys is presumably due to its virulence. Although it was issued anonymously, as early as 1599 More in his Supplycacyon of Soulys 3 definitely names the authors as Friar Roy and Friar Jerome. This is in a measure confirmed by Tyndale in his Preface to the wycked Mammon. 1 This is often attributed to either Roy or Barlow. 2 This was reprinted in the Harleian Miscellany, in facsimile, by Charles Whittingham, Chiswick, in 1845, and by Arber in his Reprints. The facts concerning its authorship are given by Arber. 3 Quoted by Arber in his introduction. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 209 A yere after that and now xii monethes before the pryntinge of this worke/came one Ierom a brother of Grenewich also/thorow wormes to Argentine sayenge that he entended to be Christes disciple an other whyle and to kepe (as nye God wolde gyue him grace) the profession of his baptim/and to gett his lyuing with his handes and to lyuve no longer ydely and of the swete and laboure of those captyues whiche they had taught/not to byleue in Chryst: but in cuttshowes and russet coetes. Which Ierom with all diligence I warned of Royes boldnesse and exhorted hym to bewarre of hym and to walked quyetly and with all pacience and longe sofferinge acordinge as we haue Chryste and his apostles for an ensample/which thinge he also promysed me. Neuerthelesse when he was comen to Argentine William Roye (whose tonge is able not only to make foles sterke madde/but also to disceyue the wisest that is at the fyrst syght and acquayntaunce) gate him to hym and set him a werke to make rymes/whyle he hym selfe translated a dialoge out of laten in to Englysh/in whose prologe he promyseth moare a greate deal than I fere me he wyll euer paye. More's attribution is stated as a fact in Bale's life, the whole of which is here translated.1 William Roye, a not unlearned man of his age, wrote in his native language: Between a Christian Father and his Obstinate Son A Christian Dialogue Bk. 1. It is not unknown to you, dearest. Against Cardinal Wolsey Bk. 1. Go forthe ilytell treatous nothynge. And certain others. He flourished Anno Domini 1530. Such are the facts. It seems worth while to me thus to state in extenso the original authorities, to show how very slender is the foundation of fact upon which has been reared the mountain of assertion. Nor is this peculiar to this one case. Such works were almost of necessity published anonymously, the authorship was known to but few, and the modern attribution is based upon a casual reference. But if it be granted that More has reason for his belief, that the authors of the poem were the two friars William Roy and Jerome, from the Calendar of State Papers it becomes easy to identify them, because both appear in the political correspondence of the time. Roy has been sufficiently characterized by Tyndale, albeit somewhat unfavorably; again on the authority of More, it is supposed that he was burned as a heretic in Portugal.2 The Friar Jerome associated with him in the State Papers is Jerome Barlow. The 1 Scriptorum Britannice, 1559, p. 102 in the section In Ipsa Brytannia Nati. In translating the Latin I have used the actual English words of the poem. 2 More's Confutacyon, quoted by Arber. EARLY TUDOR POETRY most vivid picture of the pair is given in a letter to Wolsey from John West and John Lawrence, Observant Friars, dated June 12, 1529.1 From information given by John Stanleye, sometime the familiar of our convent at Richmond, we have made diligent inquiry for Roye in the Grey Friars in the town of Yarmouth, but can obtain no knowledge of him. A schoolmaster of the same town spake and drank with Roye betwixt Lestoe (Lowestoft) and Yarmouth, in Ascension week, and showed us the features and the secret marks of his face, the manner of his speaking, his apparel, "and how he does speak all manner of languages." On asking Roye whence he came and where he was going, he said he came from over sea, and would go to the North parts; so we took our journey from Yarmouth to Norwich, supposing to gain more knowledge of him. But coming to Langley Abbey we met a young man, come out of the North parts, from Lincolnshire, and we asked if he had seen such a person, and he said that two days before he had met the said person a little beyond Attellbryge on the way to Lyne, and another with him, who had a red head, which by all likelihood should be Jerome Barlowe, his companion. When they approached his company, Roye left the highway, and hid his face, but the fellow with the red head demanded of this young man the way to Lyne, and then they made great speed, which made the young man suspect that they had done some mischief. From this time Jerome Barlow disappears completely from view.2 We leave him with his red head still going north. In form, the work which gives to these two writers their precarious reputation is simple enough. The main body is a "brefe" (?) dialogue in two parts between the priest's servants, named Watkyn and Jeffray. The stanza is the octosyllabic aabccb,3 broken by occasional insertion of "ballads" in the rime-royal. But this is preceded by a series of introductions. The first three stanzas of rime-royal satirize bitterly the Cardinal. Then follows a prose 1 Calendar of State Papers, Vol. IV, Part 3, p. 2503. 2 It seems unnecessary to remark that there should be no confusion between Jerome Barlow, the Observant Friar, and William Barlow, the Augustinian canon, who afterwards became Bishop of St. Asaph, were it not that such confusion has been made in the Dictionary of National Biography. The only characteristic in common between them is that each wrote dialogues. 3 This is a common stanza form in Medieval Latin, i. e., Tales regunt Petri navem, hi nos docent, sed indocti, tales habent Petri clavem, hi nos docent, et nox nocti, ligandi potentiam; indicat scientiam. De Ruina Romce, Walter Mapes, ed. Wright, p. 220. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 211 letter to P.G.N.O. of five pages written in the conventional evangelical style. Fourteen stanzas in rime-royal succeed, forming a dialogue between the Author of the Work and the Treatise; this is an expansion of the "go little book" convention. This introductory matter is closed by thirty-four stanzas of a mock lamentation on the decease of the mass. These stanzas have the rimescheme of the rime-royal but vary from it, owing to the fact that the last two lines form a refrain, and the last line is always an octosyllabic, "Nowe deceased/alas alas." So far as the mere form is considered, it is what might normally be expected from the date and the authors. The bulk of the work shows the influence of Medieval Latin,-the writers had been Observant Friars,-but the dialogue is humanistic in its exposition of a single point of view, and the use of the rime-royal shows the influence of the English tradition. Thus, although there is novelty in the combination, each of the composing elements is familiar. The novelty in the content, however, consists in that portion which caused More to allude to the work as "the blasphemouse boke entytled the beryeng of the 'masse." Here the Mass is personified and announced as dead.l But th is is only a small fraction of the whole. The suggestion that the power of the gospel will compel the English clergy to bury the dead Mass, leads to an attack upon the Bishop of London for the burning of Tyndale's New Testament. And this, in turn, leads to an attack upon Cardinal Wolsey. From this point for page after page follows a succession of attacks upon the Church in England and her ministers. Clearly written for propaganda, for this purpose there is no insinuation too base, no slander too vile. They do not even spare the order of which they were formerly members! As it was written merely for the reading public of that age, the allusions require today a special knowledge of the period.2 They state that Hunn was murdered, that Standish is a Judas, and that Erastnus for writing his De Libero Arbitrio was paid by a pension from Henry. Naturally it is Wolsey who receives the full measure of their hatred. Every possible scandal is raked together to anathematize 1 For a discussion of Herford's theory of the German origin of this conception cf. p. 441. 2 To understand the work, Park's notes in the Harleian Miscellany, Vol. IX, are almost necessary. 212 EARLY TUDOR POETRY the great minister. Except for the royal family, Henry, Katherine and Mary, everyone connected with the Church and the orders of the Church is most foully dealt with. If there were any desire to present the truth, the work would be interesting as throwing light upon persons and conditions in a transition period; if the work represented even the opinions of a party, there would be an historic value. However wrong we might think them, we would be glad to know what people thought at the time. On neither of these counts does the piece seem to me to have much value. Written anonymously and circulated secretly, it is an underground sewer of vile, corrupted matter. To call it a satire is to justify billingsgate, since whatever power it may have arises from the fact that the two authors lack any restraint in making their nasty accusations. The plea may be made that they felt that in fighting against the party in power any method was justifiable, and that by their writing they were running the risk of their lives. However convincing this may be as an explanation of the motive, it does not alter the fact that the result is disgraceful.1 But poetry of this type in the Medieval Latin was not limited to the satiric. With Latin the common medium, naturally the poetic measures used by the Church were also employed to express all varieties of secular matters. At the taverns university students carolled the charms of Bacchus and Venus; lovers extolled the delights of their mistresses, and travellers wrote accounts of their experiences. But through them all runs an element of the impromptu. It is this that gives the poems their charm. The writers do not take themselves seriously, they are weighed down neither with literary dogma, nor with conventional morality. They breathe immortal youth, with its joyousness, its passion, and its unrestraint. To this type, perfection of form and a nicely coordinated balance of parts is foreign. There is no total unity and no logical development. Here, in despite of the axiom, the parts are greater than the whole. This condition it is that has caused such a variance of opinion concerning Skelton's poem, Phillip 1 As I have expressed my opinion emphatically, it is only fair to quote Arber's judgment: "Intrinsically it is one of the worthiest Satires in our language. Its spirit is excellent. I say no thinge but trothe is its true motto. It is more salt than bitter: and where bitter, it is more from its facts than its expression." P. 7. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION Sparrow. It is long, rambling, and incoherent. Its thirteen hundred and eighty-two lines are broken into three distinct parts; first a dramatic monologue, secondly, a commendation of the suppositious author of the first part, and thirdly, a protest against criticism. Between the three there is no, organic relation. Over half of the whole is occupied by the dramatic monologue from which the entire collection takes its name. This purports to be the lament of Joanna Scroupe, staying with the black nuns at Carowe, for the loss of Phillip, her sparrow, Whom Gyb our cat hath slayne.1 On this thin theme are strung descriptions of the sparrow, invectives against the cat, a long disquisition on literature, a mock mass of the birds, etc. The form employed is riming couplets of short lines. Even by this short analysis, the poem obviously belongs to the type found in Medieval Latin. But the fact that Phillip Sparrow is modelled after the neoLatin form, does not argue on the part of the poet ignorance of classical poetry. Although for his purpose he preferred this form, he both wrote humanistic Latin and read classical authors. His Poeta Skelton Laureatus Libellum suum Metrice Alloquitur is in regular elegiacs; his allusions to classical authors have already been mentioned. And he proclaimed himself the British Catullus. Therefore, those scholars that have seen in this poem a desire to imitate the second and third poems of Catullus are merely stating the case too strongly. Probably the fact that the Roman writer has previously bewailed the loss of a sparrow may have made the subject more attractive to the Englishman. Still more, certain similarities are suggestive. The lines, It had a veluet cap, And wold syt vpon my lap, And seke after small wormes, And somtyme white bred crommes; And many tymes and ofte Betweene my brestes softe It wolde lye and rest; It was propre and prest.' I Line 27. 2 Lines, 190-7. 214 EARLY TUDOR POETRY have a certain resemblance to the Latin nec sese a gremio illius movebat, sed circumsiliens modo hue modo illuc ad solam dominam usque pipiabat. Not unnaturally, in so loose a form as that which he had chosen, there was a tendency to put in any reminiscence or allusion that seemed germane to the subject. Since he knew the classics, that knowledge occasionally appears. But the value of the poem is not due to classical influence. That lies in the manner in which it mirrors the age and, also, the personality of the poet. The poem is read today partly because it furnishes so much information concerning literary conditions early in the sixteenth century. His struggle with the language, his estimation of Chaucer, Gower, and Lydgate, his account of the books then read, all combine to create a legitimate, although scarcely a literary, interest. From this point of view it is regarded, not so much as a poem, as a document, and as such is often quoted, just as in the present work there has been occasion to quote from it. Useful as this may be, it is by no means the only interest in this "exquisite and original poem," as Coleridge calls it. Skelton is a "merry" poet. Written before his mind was occupied with the turmoil of the age, he flings himself into whimsicalities and fantasies. It becomes an intensely personal expression. Dignity, reserve, restraint are cast aside and the poet and the reader talk face to face. And this is the merit of the chosen form. Dignity, reserve, restraint are not characteristics of tavern intercourse. But the use of concrete detail is thus characteristic. By means of it, the situation is completely realized, Joanna Scroupe and her sparrow are sharply placed before the reader, and for the moment time has lost its power. Somtyme he wolde gaspe Whan he sawe a waspe; A fly or a gnat, He wolde flye at that; And prytely he wold pant Whan he saw an ant; Lord, how he wolde pry After the butterfly! Lorde, how he wolde hop After the gressop! THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 215 And whan I sayd, Phyp, Phyp, Than he wold lepe and skyp, And take me by the lyp. Alas, it wyll me slo, That Phillyp is gone me fro! Such a passage as this, in its concreteness, strikes the keynote of the whole,-half humor and half pathos. The reader smiles at the grotesque catalogue and yet sympathizes with the little girl. It is not a great tragedy, but after all it was her sparrow. It is not a great tragedy, yet the woe of the child will today find response from those that love animals. Compared to it, Gray's Ode on a Favorite Cat seems hard and unfeeling. Both are jeux d'esprit, but Skelton's poem has more of the heart. The result of a Renaissance personality, familiar with the great classical tradition, thus deliberately writing in a medieval form and with a medieval point of view, is to produce a poem unlike anything in the preceding literature. It has been possible to show in the cases of the Bouge of Court, the satires, and Phillip Sparrow, from whence each derived the form and how that form was modified. The first derives from the medieval English tradition, the others from the medieval Latin. To the second group belongs the Tunnyng of Elynour Rummyng, a poem rather notorious than known.1 Yet it persisted in literature for two centuries,2 and more than all the rest of the poems put together explains the opprobrium Skelton's reputation received in the eighteenth century. After an introduction of ninety lines, describing Elinor Rumming, a disreputable aleswife, seven sections follow in which a series of scenes in the bar are presented. Not only is the subject itself a study of low life, the treatment, also, is realistic to the extreme. As a medium sample of the descriptive treatment, the following passage will serve. With, Hey, dogge, hay, Haue these hogges away! With,Get me a staffe, The swyne eate my draffe! 1 Roscoe's comparison of it with I Beoni of Lorenzo d' Medeci is misleading except in so far as the subject matter is concerned. The Italian poem is a jocose parody of the Divina Commedia and is in terza rima. 2 It is included in a modern form in the 1687 edition of Cleveland's Works. 216 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Stryke the hogges with a clubbe, They haue dronke vp my swyllynge tubbe! For, be there neuer so much prese, These swyne go to the hye dese, The sowe with her pygges; The bore his tayle wrygges, His rumpe also he frygges Agaynst the hye benche! With, Fo, ther is a stenche! Gather vp, thou wenche; Seest thou not what is fall? Take vp dyrt and all, And bere out of the hall: God gyue it yll preuynge, Clenly as yuell cheuynge! 1 This is realism. In his effort to set before us the degradation and squalor of Elinor's habitation, the poet shrinks from no detail however disgusting, from no expression however coarse. The same is true equally of the characters both of Elinor herself and her clientele. Another brought a spycke Of a bacon flycke; Her tonge was verye quycke, But she spake somewhat thycke: Her fellow did stammer and stut, But she was a foule slut, For her mouth fomyd And her bely groned: Jone sayne she had eaten a fyest; By Christ, sayde she, thou lyest, I haue as swete a breth As thou, wyth shamfull deth! 2 In sharp hard lines disgusting details are thrust upon the disgusted reader. If truth be beauty,-and only then-is this beautiful, because it is faithful to fact. But in its grotesque fidelity it is vital, with a vitality similar to that in the pictures of Jan Steen and the Dutch school. In both the reader is convinced that he is perceiving life as lived in the sixteenth century. So, compared to them, Guido Reni's simpering madonnas become insipid, and Hawes's allegorical fantasies fade away. And however unpleas 1 Lines 168-86. 2 Lines 335-46. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 217 ant may be the impression, yet such an impression is given that it is impossible to forget. Yet however unforgettable the impression, its unpleasantness is obvious even to the writer. He feels, himself, that he has gone rather far. I haue wrytten to mytche Of this mad mummynge Of Elynour Rummynge1 It is with this feeling, perhaps, that he adds to the work an apology. Ebria, squalida, sordida foemina, prodiga verbis Hue currat, properet, veniat! Sua gesta libellus Iste volutabit: Paean sua plectra aonando Materiam risus cantabit carmine rauco.2 It is thus a curious mingling of morality and humor. On the one side, like Barclay, he is a medieval preacher. He feels justified in descending into the depths that from them he may tell others to keep out. On the other, the reader has the unwilling conviction that descriptions written with such gusto show a familiarity with disreputable resorts unexpected in a scholar, and an enjoyment in them undesirable in a Churchman. Such a poem as this has done more to justify the epithet "merry" in an equivocal sense than the apocryphal Tales of Skelton. The coarse colloquialisms of Elinor Rumming, however strongly may be urged the excuse of morality, never would have come from the mouth of a "gentle" poet. They belong to the tavern, not to the cloister. And his art, in its most characteristic phases, belongs to the tavern, not to the university. Although the impromptu nature of the work belongs to the type, Skelton's overflowing spirits know nothing of academic restraint. The poems as units are without form and void. When his mind is started upon one line of thought, he is unable to select; he goes on and on. This is the explanation of those wearisome catalogues. The funeral of Phillip Sparrow is attended by sixty-six birds. Joanna Scroupe's list of reading embraces all the books the poet knew. But this means that Skelton had not learned the value of emphasis. Elynour Rummyng consists 1 Lines 619-21. 2 Dyce i p. 115. 9218 EARLY TUDOR POETRY of a series of descriptions of the various customers. And his satires are built upon a number of invectives, in which a concentric plan has been seen. Actually I question whether there was such a "concentric" conception in the mind of the poet, whether on the contrary the poems were not written each part by itself, without much regard to the relation of each part to the total work. At least there is no total effect. Such considerations as these explain to some extent the contemptuous attitude toward Skelton's work adopted by his contemporaries, since contemptuous it surely is. In an age from which so little even of the literature has survived, lack of comment concerning a work means nothing; the surprising feature about Skelton is that so much criticism has come down to us and that it is all unfavorable. The greatest personal force in literature of his age, he yet pleases no one. Churchman and courtier, scholar and humanist, all deny him. And these comprise the reading public of his day. This is the situation that requires explanation. Yet that explanation is simple. To the Churchman and to the courtier he figured as the great opponent of their respective institutions. And however true and however forceful abstractly may be either Colin Clout or the Bouge of Court, exactly in proportion as they are true and forceful, to the members of neither organization could they have proved agreeable reading. To the scholar his work brought the unrestraint of the unruly side of university life; to the humanist he was perpetuating the Medieval Latin forms against which humanism was marshalled as enemy in chief. That Skelton did not sympathize with the humanists is clear from his work; that the humanists disliked Skelton might almost be posited a priori. To them Skelton's models, the Medieval Latinists, were simply ignoramuses. They never tired of ridiculing the false quantities, and the jingling rimes.1 And since to them even the propriety of writing in English at all was questionable, the impropriety of writing English based upon such models was beyond a doubt. Naturally, then, Lily closes his epigram against Skelton by saying, Et doctus fieri studes poeta; Doctrinam nec babes, nec es poeta. 2 1 Epistole Obscurorum Virorum, passim. 2 Dyce, i p. xxxviii. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 219 This from the humanistic standpoint was the simple fact. According to the new learning, Skelton neither had the method, nor was he a poet. But unfortunately for Skelton, the new learning stamped its impress upon the Renaissance, even to our age in so far as we are part of the great movement. Consequently while the great authors of antiquity are now read and their manner studied, the Latinists of the Middle Ages are largely forgotten. In proportion as they were forgotten, Skelton became transformed from a powerful mordant satirist to a riotous buffoon. To the later Elizabethans he was a comic figure. Puttenham calls him a "rude rayling rhymer" belonging to the uncultivated stage in our language before it was polished by the introduction of Italian models. Meres adds that "Skelton... applied his wit to scurrilities and ridiculous matters, such as among the Greeks were called Pantomimi, with us Buffoons." Pope's epithet "beastly" goes only one step farther. Even in 1871 Carew Hazlitt, in re-editing Warton, thinks it a "strange notion" that Skelton wrote English well! Judgments such as these are based upon a natural misconception of the type of work Skelton aimed to produce. Instead of being a wild, fantastic, literary figure, actually he wrote in the manner of a past age. In this manner naturally he was not the only writer, and his seeming predominance is certainly due, although primarily of course to the vigor of his personality, in some degree, to the efforts of I. S. who newly collected his works, for Marshe's edition of 1568. As the poems apparently were in most cases issued separately, and as these separate issues survive if at all only in a single copy, were it not for his efforts, Skelton would be a much less imposing figure. Owing to his efforts, to the very bulk of the work, Skelton has imposed himself upon the imagination of the succeeding generations as sui generis at the expense of contemporary writers, and his reputation has swallowed theirs. But if it is clearly understood that he is only the most prominent of those writers following the precedents of the Medieval Latin and that his work is, therefore, typical of a class, generalizations drawn from this particular are sound. In such poems the lines are short, rarely more than octosyllabic; the rime-scheme is simple, either in riming couplets, triplets, etc., or in a stanza form aabccb. In content, in contrast to the humanistic fondness for abstractions, EARLY TUDOR POETRY they are concrete; in contrast with the artificiality of the Petrarchan convention, they are realistic. With this recognition of the type there ceases to be the necessity of enumerating the poems that belong to it. Of these there are quite a number that survive, and that is probably but a small proportion of those that were written. They are usually anonymous, they were published separately, and today they appear either in single issues as curiosities, or in collections like the Harleian Miscellany, Arber's anthologies, Hazlitt's Early Popular Poetry, etc. In each case the editor feels that he has discovered a curious record of the past, a fragment of the "popular" poetry of the age. Of course such poems are not popular in the sense that the ballad is popular. The authors were highly educated according to the standards of the time, and the conventions by which they wrote were definite. In so far as the content is realistic, they approach satire. And their concreteness gives pictures of scenes in more or less low life. They thus form a class by themselves. Although this recognition of the type saves us from a wearisome catalogue, or perhaps it is better to say it enables the student to make his own wearisome catalogue, two poems demand attention from their notoriety. The first is London Lickpenny, long attributed to Lydgate. This attribution is due to the fact that Stow in his Survey of London states that it is by him, and a late MS. (1600?) is headed "A Ballade compyled by Dan John Lydgate monke of Bery about - yeres agoe, and now newly ofl'sene and amended"! External evidence of the late sixteenth century concerning poems of the fifteenth may be discounted at once. For internal evidence Miss Hammond's conclusion must be accepted. "In this matter of internal evidence, there is not a shred to render Lydgate's authorship probable... That a series of reprints, beginning with the year 1775, should have firmly connected this poem with Lydgate's name, is but one of the freaks of literature; the existence of such a series of reprints does not, however, add a jot to the evidence for Lydgate as author of the poem." 1 With the traditional author thus removed, the problem of authorship is thrown back upon the manuscripts. Unhappily of these there are two, both in poor condition and differing widely. The well-known 1 Miss Eleanor P. Hammond (Anglia 20, 404), has very ably given the facts In the MS. a blank space is left between about and yeres. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 221 version (MS. Harley 367) in a seven-line stanza is probably a recension of an eight-line version (MS. Harley 542), and this in all probability is inaccurate. Apparently a scribe endeavored to modernize the poem by reducing the "Monk's Tale" stanza into the rimeroyal, although keeping the octosyllabics. The other alternative is that both are recensions of an older original, conceivably by Lydgate. With such lack of data there is no value in conjecture as to authorship. Nor is the question of the dating much clearer. The situation of the hero of the poem, his difficulties with the law, suggest the chaotic conditions around 1500,-a date partially sustained by the mention of Flemings in the poem. And the fact that the stanza form belongs to the English tradition, although in octosyllabics, argues a transition period. The value of the poem lies in the concrete detail, the casual pictures of old London, the stock in the shops, the roguery in the courts, etc. As the refrain is But for lack of money I might not speed, the satiric element is evident. It is to be noted, however, that this satiric element is only indirectly satiric, since the satire consists merely in the selection of disagreeable details. Thus there is no impetus of personal attack as in Rede Me and Be Not Wrothe and Why Come Ye Not to Court, no accusations hurled against an order as in Colin Clout. The aim is rather a cynical exposure of the social conditions. But in doing this the author found himself confronted by the necessity of making a list of social evils with little connection between them. Some device was necessary to tie the heterogeneous matter together. In London Lickpenny the obvious method is adopted of writing in the first person, of having the ego experience a series of adventures and then by binding the whole into a semblance of unity by the use of the refrain. This is the simplest way. In the Bouge of Court Skelton employs the elaborate allegorical machinery of the English tradition.1 This may have suggested to him the advantage of reversing the former conception, namely, instead of having one person go to many places, to have many persons come to one place. By this means he achieved what is called in the drama unity of place. This is the method of procedure in Elynour Rum1 Cf., p. 95-96. EARLY TUDOR POETRY myng. Here the stage is set and the various characters personifying the various evils of drunkenness are brought before the reader. The great example of this type in European literature is the Narrenschiff of Sebastian Brandt.1 In 1494 he brought out in dialectic German a long poem in which the unity was furnished by the concept of putting his characters on board a boat. This was rewritten in Latin by Locher in 1497 and that in turn translated into English by Barclay in 1508; although it is possible that Brandt's work may have been the parent of all these various modifications, his work, either in the original German, or the Latin, or the English versions, differs from the poems we have been discussing in that the dramatic framework is scarcely used. In the Narrenschiff, the ship is merely the receptacle of the fools who are then described. But there is no definite relation between them and the boat, and no action between the fools themselves. Whereas in the English type there is distinct dramatic action and a suggestion of dialogue. This distinction has a concrete application in the consideration of Cocke Lorrelles Bote.2 It survives in a unique copy in the Garrick Collection, British Museum. Unhappily this copy is mutilated and probably badly printed. Half of it is in the stanza form aabccb, but for no apparent reason it drops into couplets, many of which are really monorime. The scansion is very irregular, but apparently the lines are octosyllabic. Both forms, then, are the normal Medieval Latin measures. And the Medieval Latin is also suggested by the repetition of words.3 So far as the form alone is concerned, it quite clearly represents the Medieval Latin strain. As the poem has come down to us, the fragment begins a little before the middle.4 Cock Lorell, the captain, is receiving recruits. These are first characterized. 1 Cf. p. 48. 2 This was reprinted for the Roxburge Club in 1817, in an edition limited to thirty-five copies; an edition of forty copies in 1841 with an introduction by James Maidment; in 1843 for the Percy Society with an introduction by Edward F. Rimbault; and again in an edition of one hundred and one copies in 1884 with an introduction by J. P. Edmond. 3 Color Repeticio; twelve successive lines begin with some. 4 The six A pages are lost, the poem beginning with B i. The text that I am using is that published by J. and J. P. Edmond & Spark, Aberdeen, 1884. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION The nexte that came was a coryar And a cobeler his brother As ryche as a newe shorne shepe They offred Cocke a blechynge pot Other Jewelles they had not Scant shoes to theyr fete The coryer dresseth so well his lether That it would drynke water in fayre weder Therfore he hath many a crystes curse And tho the cobeler for his cloutynge The people blesseth hym with euyll cheuynge To knytte faste in his purse 1 Very quickly, however, this passes into a mere catalogue. There is taylers tauerners and drapers Potycaryes ale brewers and bakers Mercers fletchers and sporyers Boke prynters peynters bowers Myllers carters and botyll makers, etc.2 for eighty-eight lines. This part closes with the statement, in which the weary reader is inclined to put trust, that Of euery craft some there was Shorte or longe more or lasse All these rehersed here before In Cockes bote eche man had an ore.3 They then joyously cruise about London and, when night comes, extend their voyage over the whole of England. It is evident'y in the nature of a vision, because suddenly an ego appears, The bote swayne blewe his whystell full shryll And I wente homwarde to mowe shame stere.4 Very cLriously on his return he meets with a company of persons of both sexes in the Church who are vainly seeking Cock Lorell! And the poem ends with a pious ejaculation. Although undated, since it was printed by Wynkyn de Worde it must have been done before 1534 when he died. A more definite indication of the dating is the fact that the five illustra 1 Page t. 2 Page 10. Page 14. 4 Page 17. EARLY TUDOR POETRY tions are free imitations of the originals in the Narrenschiff.1 But as Barclay's adaptation of The Ship of Fools was printed by Pynson in 1509, it scarcely seems probable that Wynkyn de Worde would have thus copied his rival. It is more likely that for his English poem he copied illustrations from the Latin edition of Locher. The dating of the poem, then, would be around 1500. But if this be true, the similarity between Cock Lorell's Bote and the Narrenschiff becomes very slight. Professor Herford thinks that the first was suggested by the chapter Das schluraffen schiff of the latter and quotes the lines from Barclay to show the resemblance.2 Here shall Jacke charde, my brother Robyn hyll With Myllers and bakers that weyght and mesure hate All stelynge taylers: as soper; and Manshyll Receyve theyr rowme. But these lines are in neither the German nor the Latin! Nor has the chapter, a curious Odyssey in classic seas, much resemblance to the vividly local voyage of Cock Lorell. Whatever similarity may be found in such passages, then, is probably due rather to the omnivorous Barclay than to the anonymous author of Cock Lorell's Bote. But the moment this conception that Cock Lorell's Bole is an English modification of a foreign idea is abandoned, the poem appears as the Medieval Latin type and its characteristics become normal. There is nothing surprising in its incoherence, its cataloguing, or its concreteness. They all belong to the type. Nor when judged in comparison with others of the same sort does it seem noteworthy. Surely it lacks the swing of London Lickpenny, and the author has not a tithe of the power of Skelton. Even the last character1 Herford, Literary Relations op. cit., 342. "All the five woodcuts in the Cock Lorell's Bote are free imitations of originals in the Ship of Fools. None stand in very obvious relation to the text. That at B ii., (a Fool, with outstretched tongue, standing before a tree up which a magpie is ascending to her nest) is from the chapter Of to much speaking or babling. That at B iii., (the hunter whose dogs are divided between the attractions of two hares running in opposite directions) is taken from the illustration to the chapter Of him that together would serve two masters. Those at B.v. and C ii, are identical, and are freely adapted from the Universal Ship (Schluraffenschiff). That on C iii, (four Fools playing cards round a table) is also freely adapted from the chapter on Card players and dysers." I quote Professor Herford's note as I have never seen the original. 2 Ibid, page 347. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION istic, the use of concrete detail, has been overstressed. There is, of course, an antiquarian interest in allusions to old London. There came suche a winde fro wynchester That blewe these women ouer the ryuer In wherye as I wyll you tell Some at saynt Kateryns stroke a grounde And many in holborne were founde Some at saynt Gyles I trowe Also in aue maria aly and at westmenster And some in shordyche drewe theder With grete lamentacyon. [Page 8.] Naturally in comparison with the humanistic moralizations of Barclay, this seems startling. In comparison, however, with the vividness of Elynour Rummyng it is quite simple. The reader finds also the list of fools after Lydgate, the pre-Reformation joking on religious immorality, and the characteristic indirect satire. It is in fact so definite a specimen of the type that, were it not for the notoriety it has obtained from the mis-classification, the amount of space here given to the discussion could not be justified.l Its conformity to the type seems to imply an early dating. At least, in poems of the middle of Henry's reign the reader is conscious of a mingling of elements. The Hye Way to the Spittal Hous, compiled and printed by Robert Copland, by its allusion to the Act of 22nd Henry Eighth 2 and its mention of false popery 3 must have been written in 1535. Here then we shall find the late development of this type. It opens with twelve stanzas of rimeroyal, the body of it is in the heroic couplet, and it closes with the 1 A question, quite apart from the literary one, arises concerning the historicity of Cock Lorell. Samuel Rowlands in 1610 states that he was a tinker and lived until the year 1533. Unhappily, aside from the date, he seems to have gathered his information from a tract printed by John Awdely in 1566, in which Cock Lorell is a character. I can find no historical allusion to such a person, and the name, Chief Knave, is a priori, against such historicity. On the other hand Cock Lorell is alluded to by Feylde, Controversy between a Lover and a Jay (ante 1530), in Hye Way to the Spyttel Hous (1535?), Doctor Double Ale (1545?), Heywood, Proverbs (1556), Gascoigne, Adventures of Master F. I. (1577), and by Ben Johnson, Gypsies Metamorphosed. As this wealth of allusion through the century cannot be explained either from the historical standpoint or from the popularity of the particular poem, we must be dealing here with a lost proverb. 2V. 376. V. 551. 226 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Lydgatean apology. In its cataloguing it suggests the Order of Fools. So far it follows the lines of the English tradition. Yet instead of the expected allegory, or the conflictus, there is a humanistic dialogue. But instead of the humanistic point of view, there follows a realistic description of vagabondage in London. The poem proper opens with the conventional astronomical beginning, to change suddenly into the concrete.1 But playnly to say, even as the tyme was, About a fourtenyght after Halowmas, I chaunced to come by a certayn spyttell, Where I thought best to tary a lyttell, And vnder the porche for to take socour, To abyde the passyng of a stormy shour; For it had snowen, and frosen very strong, With great ysesycles on the eues long, The sharp north wynd hurled bytterly, And with black cloudes darked was the sky. Lyke as, in wenter, some days be naturall With frost, and rayne, and stormes ouer all. While standing there he enters into conversation with the porter of the hospital in regard to the type of person aided by it. This hospital refuses the professional beggar, the false soldier, the false priest, and the false student of medicine. Incidentally these are all characterized and their tricks exposed.2 This occupies five hundred and sixty-two lines. Here comes a distinct break. Tell me shortly of all folke in generall, That come the hye way to the hospytall. Then follows roughly five hundred lines more of condensed cataloguing of the various evil doers. Suggesting the scholastic tradition, Latin appears in the verse, but instead of the accentual Medieval Latin it consists of Biblical quotations, or humanistic verse. The power of the poem lies in its concrete detail. The professional beggars have their haunts 3 where 1 I am using the text in Hazlitt's Early Popular Poetry, 1866, IV, 26. 2 These characterizations may be compared with those of the beggar, the soldier and the priest in Mother Hubberd's Tale. 3 It will be remembered that two hundred years later the unsavory crowning of Shadwell as Mac Flecknoe took place in the Barbican. THE SCHOLASTIC TRADITION 927 Close to the Walls which fair Augusta bind, (The fair Augusta much to fears inclin'd) An ancient fabrick raised t'inform the sight, There stood of yore, and Barbican it hight: Mac Flecknoe, 64-7. In the Berbycan and in Turnmyll strete, In Houndesdyche and behynd the Flete...1 This particularization may be illustrated in another way, in the long account of the fraud perpetrated by the rogue physician. In company with his servant he arrives at a farm house. As he feigns that he cannot speak English, With, me non spek Englys by my fayt: My seruaunt spek you what me sayt,2 his servant conducts the conversation, all of which tends to the glorification of his master's skill. While they talk, the rogue discovers a "postum" in the stomach of the child. He will cure it, but he will take no pay. And these two depart. The trap being thus baited, the third member of the gang arrives the next day, makes the same diagnosis, praises the "doctor" in whose favor in any case the family is now prejudiced because he took no money, and the gang live upon the family for a fortnight. Each step in the process thus outlined is developed with definite detail. We are told what the hostess said, the servant said, the doctor said. The last apparently speaks French with Italian reminiscences. For example, Dys infant rumpre vng grand postum,3 Viginti solidi pour fournir vostre coffre,4 Non, poynt d'argent, sayth he, pardeu, ie non cure.5 A description such as this of the "clewners" 6 gives the difference 1 Vv. 241-2. 2 Vv. 439-40. 3 V. 467. 4 V. 482. 5 V. 484. 6 This variety of rogue is not listed in Harman's Caveat or Warning for Common Cursitors, 1573. 228 EARLY TUDOR POETRY between the scholastic tradition and the humanistic attitude. Whereas humanism tended to stress generalizations and abstractions, scholasticism tended to stress the individual. That is the change made by Locher in re-writing the scholastic Narrenschiff, and when Barclay in accordance with his scholastic training introduced the English specific detail, he produced quite unconsciously the effect of the original German. Consequently between the Ship of Fools and the Hye Way there is a puzzling resemblance, the difference consisting only in the amount of stress. In a humanistic original Barclay interpolates scholastic detail; to a scholastic treatment Copland adds the humanist's love for generalizations. If the resemblance of the first half of the Hye Way is to the Ship of Fools, the second half suggests Cock Lorelles Bote. Instead of a general crowd of knaves, "The thyrde persone of Englande," 1 coming to the boat, an unestimated, but innumerable, crowd of fools seek refuge in the hospital. The beneficiaries are more numerous than the guests of Cock Lorell, because the latter are expressly included.2 In any case, the number would be greater, since all are reckoned that may come to this sad end,-vicious priests, and clerks, bailiffs, stewards, provision-buyers, renters, paymasters, creditors, negligent receivers, lazy farmers, merchants of poor judgment, thriftless craftsmen, penniless courtiers, knaves, taverners, etc., etc., even to the husband and wife that quarrel. Thus, while the Bote enumerates all the rogues of England, the Hye Way lists also all the unfortunate. By this method the author gives a vivid and sinister picture of social conditions during the middle of Henry's reign. This vivid but sinister view of society may be said to be both the literary contribution and the limitation of this type. On the one side it may be argued that there is a very real value in having thus thrust upon the reader the fact that life in those days was not all beer and skittles. With the sporadic popularity of the swashbuckler novel, with its romantic love and clashing sword-play, the 1 Cocke Lorelles Bote... fifth line from the end. 2 The Hye Way, 1058-60. Copland. Come ony maryners hyther of Cok Lorels bote? Porter. Euery day they be alway a flote: We must them receyue, and gyue them costes fre... THE SCHOLASTIC TLRDITION 229 realization that life then was real and, to the majority, somber, justifies the existence of such works. Its limitation is equally obvious. While the reader feels convinced that Elinor Rumming existed, and that frauds and cheats abounded, it does not make for pleasant reading. Necessarily there is, and can be, no elevation. So he puts down the work with the feeling that it is not worth the effort, that it is too late to reform, and that ignorance is bliss. There is enough that is sordid around us without the accumulation of past centuries. Such poems, not only in form but even in content, have been relegated to the special student. For since each age has its own problems and is equally careless of the sufferings of the past, so this type gradually passed away without having a definite effect upon the following literatures. Skelton's saturnine personality alone survived the wreck, although in a distorted shape, while kindly oblivion has overtaken the others of the school. CHAPTER IV HUMANISM At the same time that some men of the Renaissance were trying to create a new literature by reviving and modifying old medieval forms of verse, others turned to foreign literatures in search of models. This is what was to be expected. In literature there is no protection for the native product; that must compete with foreign importation and is often driven out. Such a catastrophe had fallen upon the alliterative verse forms of Early English poetry; in the fourteenth century they had succumbed before continental verse-forms, which, in turn, had become naturalized, and become English just as the Norman conquerors had become English, and the assimilation was complete. The contest between the established poetry and the foreign, although continuous, is rarely so apparent as in the reign of Henry VII and that of his son. Owing to the break in literary continuity, due to the wars of the fifteenth century, not only were the traditional poetic forms obsolete, but even the very language in which they were written, had changed. When the country was again in a sufficiently peaceful condition to permit of much writing, the question was put to each author what forms to use. Some revived the medieval tradition; 1 others experimented in adapting those from the Medieval Latin; 2 still others turned to classical Latin for their models. And as the classical Latin writers were pagan, rather than Christian, and dealt with mundane affairs rather than with "divine" theology, their imitators and followers were called humanists. Humanism may be defined as a revival of interest in classical life and in classical literature. Such an interest may manifest itself in various ways. Some humanists advocated the substitution of Latin for the vernacular as a literary medium. Others felt that English written according to classical principles would be the ideal condition. Still others were satisfied with assimilating the classical attitude toward life. And there were some writers whose human1Chapter 2. 2 Chapter 3. 230 HUMANISM 231 ism went little farther than the use of names and allusions drawn from classical stories. It is not possible to date accurately the beginning of the movement. The statement is not true that Latin was not read during the Middle Ages. So far as the language is concerned, it was always known, because it was the language employed in the services of the Church. Consequently as every clerk must know Latin, and as the greater proportion of the educated was to be found among the Clergy, the use of Latin in a book not only did not hinder its circulation, but it was actually an aid, since it freed the thought from the limitations of the vernacular. Consequently, from the very earliest times and aside from any merely ecclesiastical use, books were written in England and by Englishmen in the Latin language. Yet during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries there was a shifting of emphasis from the spiritual to the literary interest in the classics. It is one thing to read Ovid as a possible precursor of Christianity, and quite another to read him as an erotic poet. This change is shown by contrasting the proportion of theology and literature in such a list as that of the library of Oriel College in 1379, with the books sold in Oxford by John Dome in 1520. The first lists almost exclusively works dealing with theology; the second has a large proportion of literature. In 1379 the library of Oriel had but one hundred and twenty books. These were the result of painful hours of weary scribes. They were written, page after page, in longhand, and the initials were illuminated and inclosed minatures of the Virgin and the saints. Each volume bore witness to an age when time was of little value and when readers were few but earnest. Thus the dream of the Clerk of Oxenford in Chaucer's Prologue is to have Twenty bokes, clad in blak or reed, Of Aristotle and his philosophye. When one has the instincts of a scholar and but twenty books, it follows that those books are studied carefully. It follows also that one is quite careful in choosing them. And Aristotle was regarded as the best mental discipline to prepare one for studying theology. But by 1520 with the great decrease in price came an increase in the number of books and a corresponding decrease in the im 232 EARLY TUDOR POETRY portance of any one book. Thus if one had to choose between the Bible and Shakespeare, presumably we should all choose the Bible; if, however, we might have both, the result would be an extension of Shakepeare's influence. Automatically, without considering other factors, the invention of printing worked in favor of literature. But while the invention of printing with movable type accelerated the development of the humanistic impulse by making the classical authors accessible, the actual transition was by no means instantaneous, nor is it so marked as the name, re-birth, seems to imply. Naturally, with Latin as the universal medium of communication during the Middle Ages, there was no time when the classical authors were not read and their verse-forms studied. Consequently in medieval authors, such as John of Salsbury, allusions to them are frequent. And John of Garlandia appends a series of hymns in the meters of the Odes of Horace to his Art of Riming. Again in the medieval treatises can be found careful explanations of the quantitative foot. It must be remembered that, although it was the Medieval Latin that was normal, classical Latin was not forgotten. The best illustration of this condition is to be found in the work of Skelton. He had received his training in the medieval manner at three universities, and his reputation was that of one of the learned men of his age. It is in this guise that he appears in the first notice we have of him, namely that by Caxton. But that the poet himself was conscious of these attainments is equally certain. Latin tags, Latin allusions, even Latin reminiscences occur at frequent intervals. In his satire Juvenal and Martial are his shield and his buckler. Over and over again he insists that their plain speaking justifies his plain speaking. And it may be remarked in passing that the practice of Martial would serve as a precedent for any amount of foul personalities! In Skelton's list of authors, the great majority belong to classical literature. Nor did he refrain from versifying in imitation of classical Latin models. In 1512, according to the date given in the title of the poem, he wrote twenty-four lines of elegiacs celebrating the virtues of the late king. As he quaintly remarks, they were written at the request of Islip, Abbot of Westminster; perhaps it is hypercritical, then, to object that they show no personal feeling. Like so much of HUMANISM 233 humanistic verse, they seem artificial. The same classical tendency is apparent when in his own person he apostrophizes his work: Ite, Britannorum lux O radiosa, Britannum Carmina nostra pium vestrum celebrate Catullum! Dicite, Skeltonis vester Adonis erat; Dicite, Skeltonis vester Homerus erat. Barbara cum Latio pariter jam currite versu; Et licet est verbo pars maxima texta Britanno, Non magis incompta nostra Thalia patet, Est magis inculta nec mea Calliope. Nec vos poeniteat livoris tela subire, Nec vos poeniteat rabiem tolerare caninam, Nam Maro dissimiles non tulit ille Ininas, Immunis nec enim Musa Nasonis erat.1 Naturally, therefore, he practiced the gentle art of Latin verse. To those pieces that have come down to us, conventional elegies on court subjects, Warton gives the epithet "elegant." More to our purpose, however, is the fact that he felt sufficiently at home in the language to write jocosely and easily poems which show a mastery of the medium. This side of his work deserves careful consideration because the originality and vigor of his highly individual manner in his English poems tends to cause it to be ignored. It must be strongly stated that Caxton's enthusiasm was for Skelton, the Latinist. In the same way, there is nothing in Whitington's eulogy that suggests that Skelton wrote in English. However apt we may think the following criticism as applied to the Latin verses, it is comically inappropriate if it is intended to characterize the intentionally rough-and-tumble effect of the English.2 Rhetoricum sermo riguo fecundior horto, Pulchrior est multo puniceisque rosis, Unda limpidior, Parioque politior albo, Splendidior vitro, candidiorque nive, Mitior Alcinois pomis, fragrantior ipso Thureque Pantheo, gratior et violis... etc. And of course it was because of this reputation as a Latinist that he received the greatest honor of his life, the appointment as tutor 1 Garlande of Laurell. Lines 1521-82. 2 Dyce, 1, xvi-xix. e34 EARLY TUDOR POETRY to Prince Henry, later Henry VIII. Together with the poet laureate-ship, this is his great rebuttal against Garnesche. The honor of Englond I lernyd to spelle, In dygnyte roialle that doth excelle: Note and marke wyl thys parcele; I yaue hym drynke of the sugryd welle Of Eliconys waters crystallyne, Aqueintyng hym with the Musys nyne. Yt commyth the wele me to remorde, That creaunser was to thy sofre(yne) lorde: It plesyth that noble prince roialle Me as hys master for to calle In hys lernyng primordialle.1 That this was the fact, we have unexpectedly the testimony of Erasmus. His visit to the children of Henry VII is too well known to need comment. In the preface to the poem, De Laudibus Britanniae, which he wrote on his return home, occurs the statement: "domi haberes Skeltonum, unum Britannicarum literarum lumen et decus," and in the poem itself the verse, Monstrante fonteis vate Skeltono sacros. That here Erasmus with his limited knowledge of English was referring to Skelton's English poems,-and this position is sometimes taken,-is inconceivable. There is no patronizing attitude. Erasmus was a poor foreign scholar, with his reputation yet to make, who was then looking for a position and a patron. Skelton was a famous scholar, tutor to a prince. Under these circumstances there is no exaggeration in the statement. Nor is there any avoiding the inference that it was the Latinity of Skelton that gave him his early reputation. But with all this, it yet remains that Skelton not only was not a humanist, but he was a bitter opponent of humanism and the group in England supporting it. The touchstone differentiating the two groups is to be found in the attitude taken toward Greek. When the "Greeks" vanquished the "Trojans" at Oxford, humanism had arrived. The beginning of the movement, of which this was an incident, may be localized in Italy and personified by Petrarch. The Italian language is a natural outgrowth of the Latin; Italy 1 Dyce, i, p. 129. HUMANISM 385 was the home of the Latin Church; and wherever you go in Italy the mind is recalled to the greatness of Rome by the greatness of the surviving monuments. Arenas, gateways, arches, temples, not only in the City of Rome but throughout the peninsula, memorialized the time when Italy was Rome and Rome was the world. Even through the Middle Ages the spirit of the past and reverence for Vergil as the poet of that past survived, although in an imaginative and grotesque form.1 It is Vergil that leads Dante on his pilgrimage, and it is Vergil that Petrarch took as his model. Petrarch stands at the parting of the ways. His allegorization of the 3Eneid is medieval; his enthusiasm for the artist Vergil is prophetic of the coming age. When Petrarch, as an old man, began the study of Greek, the new age had begun. Greek thought and Greek literature, lost in western Europe, had been preserved by the Byzantine scholars. But as the Greek Church declined and the Greek Empire was unable to withstand the attacks of the Turks, the old causes of rivalry, in a measure, disappeared, and little by little scholars with a knowledge of Greek penetrated western Europe. Italy from its geographical situation was first affected. Greek was welcomed with avidity. It was not that here and there an isolated scholar, a pedantic bookworm, turned to it; the whole educated class felt its fascination. The situation was paradoxical and unparalleled. Not only the gentle aesthete but the hardened man of action was equally enthusiastic.2 The situation is epitomized in the story of the finding of the embalmed body of Julia, a Roman woman. According to the tale, the enthusiasm for her more than modern beauty, the extreme laudation that did not hesitate to institute invidious comparisons between it and that of the saints of the Church, and finally the quiet suppression of the body by the fearful Pope, all typify in one dramatic episode the new age. It is not necessary here to discuss humanism in Italy. The substitution of the pagan for the Christian ideal of life, of Plato for Aristotle in the domain of thought; the great stimulus that came from the contact for the first time with the great Greek literature,-all this has been done again and again. It is suffi1 See Comparetti, Vergil in the Middle Ages. 2 J. A. Symonds, Renaissance in Italy, The Age of Despots, pp. 134-135. 236 EARLY TUDOR POETRY cient here, if it be recognized that the effect was to make of Italy a center of world culture. As the characteristic medieval institution of feudalism had never there obtained a firm foothold, so that there was less to destroy, plus the advantage of nearness to Constantinople, in the progress of the new spirit Italy was nearly a hundred years in advance of the northern nations. The petty despot of a petty Italian town, without morals and stained with crime, arrogated to himself claims of equality with the kings of the untutored barbarians,-and had his claims allowed. Aretino, an unscrupulously clever blackguard, is decorated with a golden chain by Francis of France, and dedicates a volume of his letters to Henry of England. To the modern reader, used to the dominance of England, it is all inexplicable. He will never understand the sixteenth century until he makes a mental reversal; it is Italy, not England, that is dominant in the first half of the sixteenth century. That England should have lagged so far behind was her misfortune, not her fault. There is the dawning of the Renaissance in Chaucer. The lovely tradition that relates the meeting between him and Petrarch,-a tradition that, if it be not true, we all feel ought to be true,-represents dramatically the entrance of the new age into England. In the next generation the character of the "Good" Duke Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, in its general outlines recalls the Italian prince. The library given by him to Baliol, in contrast with the library of Oriel, has a surprising percentage of mere literature. Unhappily the development to be expected from such a gift was retarded by the Wars of the Roses. A state of unrest continued until the establishment of Henry Tudor. Then with the settled condition of the country, there grew up more and more a band of scholars studying the Latin, and especially the Greek. Perhaps due directly to the gift of Duke Humphrey the first humanistic studies centered at Oxford. Grocyn, Linacre, Colet, Lily, Sir Thomas More, formed a group, the like of which could scarcely be found in any one place in Europe, and has justified the well-known enthusiasm of Erasmus. These men, however, were the first generation. Groscyn and Linacre had studied under Chalcondylas and Politian at the Florentine court of Lorenzo. It was from Italy they brought back the first great enthusiasm for the new learning. HUMANISM 237 The effect of this enthusiasm for the Latin and Greek languages, the desire to improve the native vernacular, differed in poetry and prose. The fact that the Latin poetry is quantitative, rendered the classics less available as models. At first what English poetry gained from the study of classical poetry, (while theoretically stressing serenity and broadness of outlook,) actually is shown-since the faults are best imitated-by the frippery and artificiality of the English. It is, therefore, no matter of surprise, however much it may be a matter of regret, that the first poetic effort should be to naturalize the most absurdly artificial of all forms, the pastoral eclogue. The life of Alexander Barclay is still largely enveloped in shadow. In all probability he was a Scotchman, but he had lived a long time in England. Connected with the Church, he had the leisure to write, and connected with the court, he had the inclination. In 1514-the dating is due to internal evidence-he brought out the first five eclogues in English. The publication of these must have been irregular. Bale, writing in 1550 to 1552, credits him with ten; this must be an error. The first three appeared first, the fourth and fifth straggled along later, but the prologue, which assumes that they were all written at the same time, was affixed to the edition containing the first three only. The three, as stated on the title-page, were "gathered out of a booke named in Latin, Miseriae Curialium, compiled by Eneas Siluius Poet and Oratour." The selection of AXneas Silvius (1405-1464) is not hard to explain. A thorough man of the world and a voluminous writer,1 on becoming Pope under the name of Pius II, he issued his rhetorical apology, which heads his works. And as Pope he tried to unite Christendom against the Turks. Thus he pleased both parties; the sinners by his writings and the saints by his retraction. The De Curialium Miseriis, that Barclay elected to versify, is a letter to John Aich of sixteen pages of Latin prose. After an anecdote showing his father's dislike of courts, he gives three orders of fools; those who do not know what they wish; those who wish the harmful; and those who, to attain their desires, seek the wrong way. To one of these belongs the courtier who seeks honor, fame, power, riches, or pleasure from a king. His life while at court is not agreeable, and, when abroad, he suffers the inclemency of the 1 The edition of Basel, 1551, which I have used, contains 1086 folio pages. 238 EARLY TUDOR POETRY weather. This dilemma he proves by extremes, ignoring the tertium quid. From the Ciceronism of the style, it is quite clearly an academic exercise, a pleasing paradox. This jeu d'esprit, written thirteen years before he became Pope, was apparently taken by Barclay as having the full papal authority. He stresses his author over and over again. So writeth Pius (whom some Eneas call) 1 These be the wordes of Shepherde Stiuius (sic) 2 Which after was pope, and called was Pius. No, but harke man what sayth the good pope Siluius.3 This is justified by the fact that the main part of the first three eclogues, (which fill twenty-seven large folio pages), is taken from Eneas Silvius. The First Eclogue deals with the subject in general; the Second with the life at court; and the Third with the life abroad. From the second come the very realistic descriptions of court-life, which are worth quoting for a counter-reaction against the usual romantic impression. They are paraphrases from the Latin, but at the same time in Barclay's mind they applied to English life. Coridon, forsooth it is as thou doest say, But these be thinges most chiefe and principall, Onely reserued for greatest men of all: As for other clothes which serue the commontie, Suche as I tolde thee or els viler be, And still remayne they vnto the planke cleuing, So blacke, so baudie, so foule and ill seming, Of sight and of cent so vile and abhominable, Till scant may a man discerne them from the table. But nowe heare what meat there nedes eate thou must, And then if thou mayst to it apply thy lust 4 Thy meate in the court is neyther swanne nor heron, Curlewe nor crane, but course beefe and mutton, Fat porke or vele, and namely such as is bought For easter price when they be leane and nought, Thy fleshe is restie or leane, tough and olde, Or it come to borde unsauery and colde, 1 Certayne Egloges by Alexander Barclay, 1570; Spenser Society, 1885, p. 11. 2 Ibid., p. 7. 3 Ibid., p. 7. 4 By a misprint, this line is repeated in 1570 ed. HUMANISM 239 Sometime twise sodden, and cleane without taste, Saused with coles and ashes all for haste, When thou it eatest it smelleth so of smoke That euery morsell is able one to choke. Make hunger thy sause be thou neuer so nice, For there shalt thou finde none other kinde of spice. Thy potage is made with wedes and with ashes, And betwene thy teeth oft time the coles crashes, Sometime halfe sodden is both thy fleshe & broth, The water and hearbes together be so wroth That eche goeth aparte, they can not well agree, And ofte be they salte as water of the sea. Seldome at chese hast thou a little licke, And if thou ought haue within it shall be quicke, All full of magots and like to the raynebowe, Of diuers colours as red, grene and yelowe, On eche side gnawen with mise or with rattes, Or with vile wormes, with dogges or with cattes, Uncleane and scoruy, and harde as the stone, It looketh so well thou wouldest it were gone. If thou haue butter then shall it be as ill Or worse then thy chese, but hunger hath no skill, And when that egges halfe hatched be almost Then are they for thee layde in the fire to rost. If thou haue peares or apples be thou sure Then be they suche as might no longer endure, And if thou none eate they be so good and fine That after diner they serue for the swine. Thy oyle for frying is for the lampes mete, A man it choketh the sauour is so swete, A cordwayners shop and it haue equa]l sent, Suche payne and penaunce accordeth best to lent, Suche is of this oyle the sauour perillous, That it might serpehtes driue out of an house, Oftetime it causeth thy stomake to reboke, And ofte it is ready thee sodenly to choke. Of fishe in some court thy chefe and vsed dishe Is whiting, hearing, saltfishe and stockfishe, If the daye be solemne perchaunce thou mayst fele The taste and the sapour of tenche or ele, Their muddy sapour shall make thy stomake ake, And as for the ele is cosin to a snake, But if better fishe or any dishes more Come to thy parte it nought was before, Corrupt, ill smelling, and flue dayes olde, For sent thou canst not receyue it if thou would. 240 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Thy bread is blacke, of ill sapour and taste, And harde as a flint because thou none should wast, That scant be thy teeth able it to breake, Dippe it in potage if thou no shift can make, And though white and browne be both at one price, With broune shalt thou fede least white might make thee nice, The lordes will alway that people note & see Betwene them and seruauntes some diuersitie, Though it to them turne to no profite at all, If they haue pleasour the seruaunt shall haue small. Thy dishes be one continuing the yere, Thou knowest what meat before thee shall appeare, This slaketh great parte of luste and pleasour, Which slaketh daynties moste diuers of sapour, On one dishe dayly nedes shalt thou blowe, Till thou be all wery as dogge of the bowe, But this might be suffred may fortune easily, If thou sawe not sweter meates to passe by, For this vnto courtiers moste commonly doth hap, That while they haue broune bread & chese in their lap, On it faste gnawing as houndes rauenous, Anone by them passeth of meate delicious, And costly dishes a score may they tell, Their greedy gorges are rapt with the smell, The deynteous dishes which passe through the hall, It were great labour for me to name them all, And Coridon all if I would it were but shame For simple shepheardes suche daynties to name. With broune bread and chese the shepheard is content, And scant see we fishe paste once in the lent, And other seasons softe chese is our food, With butter & creame then is our diner good. And milke is our mirth and speciall appetite, In apples and plommes also is our delite. These fill the belly although we hunger sore, When man hath inough what nedeth him haue more, But when these courtiers sit on the benches idle, Smelling those dishes they bite vpon the bridle, And then is their payne and anger felt as gall When all passeth by and they haue nought at all. What fishe is of sauour swete and delicious While thou sore hungrest thy prince hath plenteous Rosted or sodden in swete hearbes or wine, Or fried in oyle moste saporous and fine, Suche fishe to beholde and none thereof to taste, Pure enuy causeth thy heart nere to brast, Then seing his dishes of fleshe newe agayne, HUMANISM 241 Thy minde hath torment yet with muche great payne, Well mayst thou smell the pasties of a hart And diuers daynties, but nought shall be thy parte. The crane, the fesant, the pecocke and curlewe, The partiche, plouer, bittor and heronsewe, Eche birde of the ayre and beastes of the grounde At princes pleasour shalt thou beholde abounde, Seasoned so well in licour redolent That the hall is full of pleasaunt smell and sent, To see suche dishes and smell the swete odour, And nothin to taste is vtter displeasour. That can Amintas recorde and testify, But yet is in court more payne and misery. Brought in be dishes the table for to fill, But not one is brought in order at thy will. That thou would haue first and louest principall Is brought to the borde oft times last of all. With breade and rude meate when thou art saciate, Then commeth dishes moste sweete and delicate. Then must thou eyther despise them vtterly, Or to thy hurt surfet, ensuing gluttony. But if it fortune, as seldome doth befall, That at beginning come dishes best of all, Or thou haste tasted a morsell or twayne, Thy dish out of sight is taken soone agayne. Slowe be the seruers in seruing in alway, But swifte be they after, taking thy meate away. A speciall custome is vsed them among, No good dish to suffer on borde to be longe. If the dishe be pleasaunt, eyther fleshe or fishe, Ten handes at once swarme in the dishe. And if it be fleshe, ten kniues shalt thou see Mangling the flesh and in the platter flee: To put there thy handes is perill without fayle, Without a gauntlet or els a gloue of mayle. Among all these kniues thou one of both must haue, Or els it is harde thy fingers whole to saue: Oft in suche dishes in court is it seene, Some leaue their fingers, eche knife is so kene. One finger gnaweth some hasty glutton, Supposing it is a piece of biefe or mutton. Beside these in court mo paynes shalt thou see, At borde be men set as thicke as they may be. The platters shall passe oft times to and fro, And ouer the shoulders and head shall they go. 242 EARLY TUDOR POETRY And oft all the broth and licour fat Is spilt on thy gowne, thy bonet and thy hat. Sometime art thou thrust for litle rowme and place, And sometime thy felowe reboketh in thy face. Betwene dish and dish is tary tedious, But in the meane time thogh thou haue payne greuous, Neyther mayest thou rise, cough, spit, or mese, Or take other easement, least thou thy name may lese. For such as this wise to ease them are wont, In number of rascoldes courtiers them count. Of meate is none houre, nor time of certentie, Yet from beginning absent if thou be, Eyther shalt thou lose thy meat and kisse the post, Or if by fauour thy supper be not lost, Thou shalt at the least way rebukes soure abide For not attending and fayling of thy tide. Onions or garlike, which stamped Testilis, Nor yet sweete leekes mayst thou not eate ywis. These passages, all from the Second Eclogue, illustrate Barclay's method. They are "gathered" out of the Latin. Aside from the inevitable dilution that comes from translating prose into verse, they follow the Latin almost line by line. But not quite. Even here Barclay wishes to adapt his material to his English reader. Therefore he omits the various citations from classical authorities that AEneas Silvius felt necessary. And in Italy, evidently, vegetables formed a large part of the diet. Among the ruined dishes in the Latin is included a list of cabbages, turnips, pulse, peas, beans, and lentils. But as they did not figure largely in the English diet, Barclay passes on to cheese and eggs. In regard to the extreme anecdote of the finger in the pie, _Eneas Silvius is quite careful to report it as a story that "they say" once happened to a Florentine dining at the table of an Archbishop of Stirgonia (Gran, Hungary). The Italian gave it as a possible occurrence in a far country. Barclay for the uncultivated English audience has no hesitation in telling it as the usual happening at an English court. When one considers the content of these eclogues, realistic if not satiric, the pastoral form seems ideally unfortunate. It is neither the classical conception, "toying with Amaryllis in the shade," nor does it reflect the actual conversation of shepherds. There is something grotesque in the thought that it is in such work that the pastoral eclogue makes its appearance in English literature! The HUMANISM 243 reason for the employment of the pastoral form may be due to the example of Octovien de Saint-Gelays, -Bishop of Angoul~me in whose La Chasse et le Depart d'Amours, 1509, is included the Debat du Seigneur de court et du Seigneur des champs.l On a spring morning, the author, leaving Paris for Tours, meets a group of cavaliers. Among them are two, the Lord of the Court, and the Lord of the Country, who in a dialogue discuss the respective advantages of each locality. If two writers at about the same time happened to translate the Latin prose into a dialogue in verse, the coincidence is at least striking. The probability seems to me that Barclay, in choosing the particular piece for his verse experiment, followed episcopal precedent. The main source of his form, however, is quite another person. In his Prologue, after mentioning Theocritus and Vergil as writers of eclogues, he continues: 2 And in like maner nowe lately in our dayes Hath other Poetes attempted the same wayes: As the moste famous Baptist Mantuan The best of that sort since Poetes first began. Baptista Spagnolo, usually called Mantuanus (1448-1516) was the General of the Carmelite Order. His ten Eclogues, first printed in 1498, achieved an immediate popularity,-which they held for a century.3 With no more intimation than But to the Reader nowe to returne agayne, First of this thing I will thou be certayne, That flue Egloges this whole treatise dothe holde, To imitation of other Poetes olde. he proceeds to graft Mantuan upon the first three eclogues and to combine others of his to form the last two.4 As an illustration 1 As I have never seen this, I judge of it solely from the thesis on Octovien de Saint-Gelays, by L'Abbe H. J. Molinier, 1910. From the few verses cited, the resemblance between it and the Barclay is no more than would come from versifying a common source. 2 Certayne Egloges, ibid., p. 1. 3 They have been edited by W. P. Mustard, Professor in Johns Hopkins University, with an excellent preface. Professor Mustard has placed all students of English in his debt by tracing the sixteenth century imitations of Mantuan. 4 " Barclay's fourth is a paraphrase of Mantuan's fifth; his fifth is a paraphrase of Mantuan's sixth, with the insertion of a long passage taken from Mantuan's 244 EARLY TUDOR POETRY of his method, the First Eclogue will serve. The first thirty-seven lines from Mantuan's Third Eclogue are here expanded to one hundred and eight lines. In reply to the question, of what crime are we guilty, the reply is the single line Iurgia, furta, ire Venus, et mendacia, rixte. This in Barclay's version becomes eight lines. Nowe trust me truly though thou be neuer so wroth, I nought shall abashe to thee to say the troth: Though we shepheardes be out of company, Without occasion we liue vnhappely, Seke well among vs and playnly thou shalt see Theft, brauling, malice, discorde, iniquitie, Wrath, lechery, leasing, enuy and couetise, And briefly to speake, truly we want no vice. Poor Barclay! " Briefly to speake" was out of his power! The next three hundred lines are original, and then seven and a half pages are adapted from iEneas Silvius. Thus the First Eclogue is a curious composite of three quite different materials. But it must be said that all the three are assimilated into an unity, and that, the unity of an English poem. This is accomplished by the interjection of local detail, and personal references, even in the midst of the translated portions, and especially by the long transitional passages that are entirely English in tone. The first of these may be illustrated from the First Eclogue; the Latin says that a man is a fool, if he choose the worse rather than the better route to Rome; for Rome, Barclay gives a wide range of choice. As if diuers wayes laye vnto Islington, To Stow on the Wold, Quaueneth or Trompington. To Douer, Durham, to Barwike or Exeter, To Grantham, Totnes, Bristow or good Manchester To Roan, Paris, to Lions or Floraunce. seventh (9-56).... The beginning of the first is due to the beginning of Mantuan's third (1-37), and the punning allusion to Bishop Alcock (p. 5) is adapted from Mantuan's allusion to Falcone de' Sinibaldi (ix, 213 ff.) The beginning of the second repeats a passage from Mantuan's second (1-16); the beginning of the fourth reminds one of Mantuan's ninth (117-119) and tenth (137-141, 182-186); and toward the close of the fifth (p. 45) there is a passage which comes from Mantuan's second (66-78)." Professor Mustard's Introduction, p. 48. Then he comments on the resemblance between the riddles in the Prologue. HUMANISM 245 Twelve English towns are here given, three French, and but one Italian, and Rome itself is unmentioned. Eneas Silvius makes an exception of the courts of good princes, (and he names a list), ending with his particular prince. Barclay carefully copies this list, ending, however, with an English reference. Of suche could I count mo then a twentie score. Beside noble Henry which nowe departed late, Spectacle of vertue to euery hye estate,... And Henry the eyght moste hye and triumphant, No gifte of vertue nor manlines doth want,... But while I ought speake of courtly misery, Him with all suche I except vtterly.1 And equally the same effect is gained by his use of peculiarly English idioms and very vulgar English words. Thus in the Fifth Eclogue he illustrates with a huckster, a costermonger, a hostler and a barmaid named Bess, all of whom had learned to cheat in the city. "What needeth more processe, no craft of the Citie Is, but is mingled with fraude and subtiltie: Saue onely the craft of an Apoticary, That is all fraude and gilefull pollicy.2 Naturally the poems read as though they were original compositions. This effect is increased by the insertion of long portions that are not translations. In the Fourth Eclogue there are four eightline stanzas on sapience, and thirty-nine stanzas of lamentation on the death of Sir Edward Howard. There is a casual allusion to Colet.3 I tell thee Codrus, this man hath won some soules This device is still more apparent in the long eulogy of Bishop Alcock of Ely, in the First and the Third Eclogues. It is really a discussion of the condition of the English Church. Morton, Archbishop of Canterbury, "which woned in Mortlake," and Alcock, Bishop of Ely, have died.4 The first is praised for his patronage of "thinges pastorall," and the second particularly 1 Page 6. 2 Page 44. s Page 33. 4 They both died in 1500. N46 EARLY TUDOR POETRY for his care for Ely Cathedral. But he adds that this cock I was a protection against the foes of the Church. And while we slumbered he did our foldes kepe, No cur, no fcxes, nor butchers dogges wood Coulde hurte our fouldes... This cocke was no more abashed of the foxe, Then is a lion abashed of an oxe. The difficulty in discussing an allegory is that there is a danger of reading into it more than is intended. Yet the punning on the name Alcock, suggests that by the "fox" may be meant Richard Fox, Bishop of Winchester and Lord Privy Seal. The story is told of him by Erasmus, who learned it of Sir Thomas More, that he raised a loan from the clergy. Those who were finely dressed, he argued, could afford to pay; to those poorly clad, however, he declared that, as they must be saving money, they also could afford to pay. This tale is dated by FoWler 2 in 1504. And if this be true, the "butcher dog" may be aimed at Wolsey who by 1507 was 3 " intimate with the most powerful men at court, especially with Richard Foxe." This seems rational in spite of Ward's protest.4 How far there may be other allusions concealed under the cloak of the allegory awaits an answer by the special student of the poems. But upon the identification of these allusions depends also the dating. Externally there is no help because none of the five early editions have any date. As one, however, is by Pynson, who died in 1530, they must be before that year. And as Alcock and Morton died in 1500, they must follow that year. These are the two limits. In his Prologue Barclay himself gives this account. So where I in youth a certayne worke began, And not concluded, as oft doth many a man: Yet thought I after to make the same perfite, But long I missed that which I first did write. 1 It is unnecessary here to see an imitation of Mantuan as does Professor Mustard (op. cit., 493). Alcock himself was accustomed thus to pun upon his own name. 2Dictionary of National Biography, Fox. 3 James Gairdner, Dictionary of National Biography, Wolsey. 4 " Little is known as to his relations to Cardinal Wolsey, an allusion to whom has been very unreasonably sought in the mention of "butchers dogges wood (mad)." Dictionary of National Biography, Barclay. HUMANISM 247 But here a wonder, I fortie yere save twayne, Proceeded in age, founde my first youth agayne. To finde youth in age is a probleme diffuse, But nowe heare the truth, and then no longer muse. As I late turned olde bookes to and fro, One litle treatise I founde among the mo: Because that in youth I did compile the same, Egloges of youth I did call it by name. And seing some men haue in the same delite, At their great instance I made the same perfite, Adding and bating where I perceyued neede. This is so like Mantuan's prose prologue to his Eclogues that coincidence is out of the question.' But here again, it is not the similarity that is important; it is the difference. Whereas Mantuan was fifty years old, Barclay is careful to state accurately that he was but thirty-eight; Mantuan found his book with a friend, and Barclay his among his papers, etc. The reason why these petty details are of importance is that they show that in all probability Barclay is telling what did happen. As has been said, the Eclogues is a compilation. There were probably certain separate works, such as the Alcock passages, the proverbs of Solomon, the Towre of Vertue and Honor to Sir Edward Howard, and the versification of the Miserie Curalium. To these from internal references varying dates may be attached. The Alcock passages allude to dates from 1500-07; the AEneas Silvius portions around 1509; the Towre must be after 1513. Then later, just as he says, he re-wrote the entire mass in the framework adopted from Mantuan, although the AEneas Silvius portion had probably previously existed in the form of a dialogue. Thus there are inconsistencies. Alcock and Morton are spoken of in terms that suggest that their deaths are comparatively recent (1500); then Henry VII has apparently but lately died (1509); and he bewails the death of Sir Edward Howard (1513). Also there are minor discrepances. A character, Faustus, tells him a fact that, 1 "Audi, O Pari, aenigma perplexum quod (Edipodes ipse non solveret. ego quinquagenarius et iam canescens adulescentiam mean repperi, et habeo adulescentiam simul et senectam... anno praeterito, cum Florentia rediens Bononiam pervenissem, intellexi apud quendam litterarium virum esse quendam libellum meum quem olim ante religionem, dum in gymnasio Paduano philosophari inciperem, ludens excuderam et ab ilia setate Adulescentiam vocaveram...." Mantuan, Mustard's ed., p. 62. 248 EARLY TUDOR POETRY word for word, is taken from XEneas Silvius, and yet in the same eclogue he quotes Eneas Silvius by name. It seems clear that in his Adding and bating where I perceyued neede, he did not always succeed in eliminating the lines of the addition. As to the time when this final revision was made, there is no means of determining. As by 1521 he had published a French beginner's book, and as Pynson also published other works attributed to him, it seems probable that he must have given the Eclogues their final form not long after 1514. But the important fact is that they represent a combination of the works of his youth, and that these separate works were very free translations, or rather adaptations from Latin authors. It is this same union of translation and originality that marks Barclay's chief work, The Ship of Fools, and which makes it perplexing. Yet the genesis of it is clear. In 1494 Sebastian Brandt, the professor of jurisprudence in the new University at Basel, published his poem Narrenschiff. His mind was bourgeois in type, positive, narrow, and prejudiced in favor of the status quo. In this respect he was typical of the majority of his contemporaries. These qualities are reflected in the 3517 octosyllabic couplets of the poem. The name comes from the symbolism of a boat, laden with all sorts and varieties of fools, arranged in categories. Although written in Allemaine German, its colloquial and proverbial style rendered it extremely popular.1 The next step was to free it from dialectic limitations in order to appeal to an European public. With Brandt's concurrence and under his direction, Jacob Locher adapted the poem, as Barclay phrases it, "to the Vnderstondinge of al Christen nacions where Laten is spoken." 2 But this joint production is far from being merely a translation from the German. Locher (Philomusus) later became an opponent of scholasticism; even in 1497 his feeling for classical culture led him to modify and to soften the original. In general he changes the stress from Biblical to classical characters, and omits and expands in deference to his humanistic audience. Consequently, to speak 1 There were nine German editions before 1500. 2 For a detailed discussion of the relations of these three editions, the reader is referred to an article by the present writer in The Modern Language Review, Vol. VII, No. 3, July 1913. HUMANISM 249 of Locher's work as a translation is scarcely accurate; founded upon the German, and in most cases preserving the ideas and illustrations of the German, it is yet an independent work. The colloquial vivacity has been crushed into sonorous Latin. The importance of this distinction lies in the fact that it is Locher's version, not the original, that Barclay avowedly imitates. But the Locher is only the basis of Barclay's translation. The fact that his readers had the verses of his Actour before their eyes apparently made him feel free to add on whatsoever additional matter he saw fit. Occasionally he reverts to the German original. Often, however, he adapts the amplification of the French. For example, from the same chapter of "Disordered Love," the Latin dismisses the Anthony and Cleopatra story in four lines. The details, filling thirty lines in the English are taken from Riviere. And he feels quite at liberty to add his own material. The Envoy of the Actour, Vol. 1, p. 174 has the first verse literally translated, as is indicated; the second, however, is original, without any indication. The same is true, to a still more confusing degree, of the Prologue. Here four pages are translated from Locher, and then without any indication he adds two pages in the first person, using his own name. With the Latin, it would be perfectly clear; without the Latin, it credits him with many opinions on satire. The same is true of the Argument. It opens: Here after foloweth the Boke named the Shyp cf Foles of the world: translated out of Laten, French and Docke into Englysse in the Colege of saynt Mary Otery By me Alexander Barclay... and without any indication the rest of the page is taken from Locher. Naturally readers of the Jamieson have seen a personal reference in such sentences as: For I haue but only drawen into our moder tunge, in rude langage the sentences of the verses as nere as the parcyte of my wyt wyl suffer me, some tyme addynge, somtyme detractinge and takinge away suche thinges a semeth me necessary and superflue wherefore I desyre of you reders pardon of my presumptuous audacite trustynge that ye shall holde me excused if ye consyder ye scarsnes of my wyt and my vnexpert youthe. I haue in many places ouerpassed dyuers poetical digressions and obscurenes of Fables and haue concluded my worke in rude langage as shall apere in my translacion." 1 1 Sensus enim duntaxat notasque vernaculi carminis simplici numero latrine transtulimus. Quapropter et veniam prsesumptEe nostrse audative ab omnibus lectoribus nos consecuturos confidimus si prius ingenii nostri mediocritatem: et 250 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Actually it is but a free version from the Latin. And the next sentence: But the speciyl cawse that mouethe me to this besynes is to auoyde the execrable inconuenyences of ydilnes... and to the vtter derision of obstynat men delitynge them in folyes and mysgouernance. is taken from the French.1 The following sentences are rather vaguely suggested by Riviere, and the end is original. Thus the Argument is not a bad epitome of the whole. The basis is the version of Locher, which was printed immediately before, but upon it Barclay felt at liberty to add whatever he either found in other versions, or invented.2 As this method of composition, or translation, is followed also in the Mirror of Good Manners (1520?) from Mancinus, it is possible to discuss Barclay's use of material. In the first place, the basis of the poem, whichever it may be, is a foreign original. This is emphasized apparently, when the fame of the author will give weight to the admonitions. Nevertheless, the actual translation is but part of the whole, and Barclay's own additions (with the exception of some of the envoys in the Ship of Fools) are not indicated. Sometimes this additional matter is merely dilution. Such, for example, is his rendition of the one line of Mancinus, Nil melius latiis portat mercator ab oris, into No merchaundise better in Martes mayst thou finde Then this little Booke within it doth conteyne, No better thinge bringeth the marchaunt out of Inde, From Damas or Turkie, from Damiate or Spaynge, From costes of Italy, from Naples or Almaygne. In all other Nations most forayne, far and straunge, Can man finde no better marchaundise nor chaunge. teneros lanuginis annos considerauerint. poeticas nempe egressiones: et fabulosam obscuritatem studiose proeterii: nudisque et natiuis verborum structuris: facilique sententiarum iunctura: opus absolui. Locher, 1497. 1 Fraustadt. 2 Ship of Fools, Jamieson, 1, 146. The great foly, the pryde, and the enormyte Of our studentis, and theyr obstynate errour Causeth me to wryte two sentenceq or thre More than I fynde wrytyn in myne actoure. HUMANISM 251 Usually, however, it is not simple expansion. The fact that in the early editions the Latin text paralleled the English, made him feel at liberty to add his own reflections, to drive the point home by local allusions, by comments on his contemporaries, or by illustrations drawn from English literature..... for why my wyll is gode Men to induce vnto vertue and goodnes I wryte no lest ne tale of Robyn hode Nor sawe no sparcles ne sede of vyciousnes Wyse men loue vertue, wylde people wantones It longeth nat to my scyence nor cunnynge For Phylyp the Sparowe the (Dirige) to synge.1 Or he may enlarge the point in gnomic, antithetic phrases. What difference betweene a great theife and a small, Forsooth no more but this to speake I dare be bolde, The great sitteth on benche in costly furres of pall, The small thiefe at barre standeth trembling for colde, The great thieves are laded with great chaynes of golde, The small thiefe with yron chayned from all refuge, The small thiefe is iuged, oft time the great is Judge.2 Naturally this stylistic peculiarity allows him to work in a large number of proverbs,-a feature that for some reason seems to be counted unto him for righteousness. The effect of such treatment is to make the poems read like original compositions. The foreign material, German, Latin, or French, whichever it may be, has been thoroughly assimilated, and adapted to his English audience. Therein lies his art. He is not a poet but a preacher, taking and adapting to his purpose whatever he thinks may improve the morals of his readers. Thus his works are no more satires than is a sermon. These are sermons versified. It was suggested to him that he modernize a "Confession of Lovers" (Gower's Confessio Amantis?); whereupon he produced the Mirror of Good Manners, which Much briefly conteyneth foure vertues cardinal, In right pleasant processe, plaine and commodious, With light fote of meter, and stile heroicall, Rude people to infourme in language maternall, 1 Ship of Fools, II, 881. Mirror of Goode Manners, Spenser Society, p. 34. EARLY TUDOR POETRY To whose understanding maydens of tender age, And rude little children shall find easy passage.1 History is silent on the comments made by his patron, when he learned of the substitution. Even Gower is light reading compared to Barclay! And purely for his readers' good, without a thought of self-advertisement, we find him Exhorting and praying the dwellers of Englande, This new and small treatise to reade and understande.2 To the same reformatory spirit are due the Eclogues. In his own mind, there is little pretence of a literary interest. But if that any would nowe to me obiect That this my labour shall be of small effect, And to the Reader not greatly profitable, And by that maner as vayne and reprouable,... If any suche reade my treatise to the ende He shall well perceyue, if he thereto intende, That it conteyneth both laudes of vertue, And man infourmeth misliuing to eschue, With diuers bourdes and sentences morall Closed in shadowe of speeches pastorall.3 The reader of the Ship of Fools is admonished Amende your lyfe and expelle that vyce away. Slomber nat in syn. Amende you whyle ye may.4 Naturally therefore, disdaining "Clio nor olde Melpomene" 5 he hopes for The glorious sight of God my sauiour. 6 Obviously the "light fote of meter and stile heroicall" is merely the literary sugar to the moral pill.6 1 Mirror of Goode Manners, Chap. on Prudence. 2 Ibid, Prologue. 8 Certain Egloges, ibid, Prologue. 4Ship of Fools; Exhortation. 6 Certain Egloges, ibid. 6 No name I chalenge of Poete laureate.... Then who would ascribe, except he were a foole, The pleasaunt laurer vnto the mourning cowle. Certain Eglogues, Prologue. HUMANISM 253 Not only is he a preacher, but even in the dawn of the Renaissance he is still medieval. His only advance seems to be in his objection to the excessive use of the syllogism, then in vogue. In other respects, he stands still. At a time when, for better or for worse, the human intellect was convulsed in the pangs that were to result in the birth of our present age-spirit, in the age of humanism, he tells us: 1 There is yet in prudence another fault and crime, And that is, when people agaynst good reason Wasteth and spendeth in vayne study longe time, Searching things exceeding their dull discretion, For some thinges harde be in inquisition, Requiring great study, long time and respite, Yet graunte they no profite, no pleasure nor delight. In the age of Copernicus, he asks What profiteth it man to search busily The courses of the stars hye in the firmament. What helpeth this study, here is time mispent. And in the age of Columbus, he questions Whereto dost thou study to purchase or obteyne The science of artes or craftes innumerable? Or to recount the countries and landes variable Over all the worlde, where both the lande and water Had their first beginning and situation? Thus his influence is curiously negative. The Ship of Fools with its detailed discussions of the minutia of life is the longest book of don'ts in existence. Like all such categories it is dispiriting. It is retrogressive in that the aim is to hold back the whirl of the world. His form, like his content, belongs to the past age. In his longest poem, The Ship of Fools, the Latin elegiacs, which were adapted from the German octosyllabic couplets, are expanded into the seven line rime-royal. Heroic couplets are used for the Eclogues and couplets of sixes for the Mirror of Good Manners. For the envoys to the chapters of the Ship of Fools he is apt to use the 1 Mirror of Goode Manners, ibid; Prudence. 954 EARLY TUDOR POETRY stanza form of the French ballade riming ababbcbc; sometimes the stanzas are joined by a definite refrain.' The French origin, if in this case it be not a translation or adaptation, is shown by the fact that one refrain is entirely in French.2 One envoy is a metrical tour de force of five stanzas with but three rimes and with a refrain.3 Even his verse-forms, as well as his conceptions, carry over into the Renaissance medieval conditions. Such, then, is the significance of his work. In comparison with the poems of the English tradition, he brings to the coming literature a satiric force, a downright plainness, and a concreteness that was lacking. He trades in personal allusions and undignified illustrations. Like a popular preacher, all he asks is that his audience get his point. And ye Jentyl wymen whome this lewde vice doth blynde Lased on the backe: your peakes set a loft. Come to my Shyp. forget ye nat behynde. Your Sadel on the tayle: yf ye lyst to sit soft. Do on your Decke Slut: if ye purpos to come oft. I mean your Copyntanke: And if it wyl do no goode. To kepe you from the rayne. Ye shall haue a foles hode.4 This is not literature in the sense that the Court of Love is literature, nor has it the humor of Heywood. Yet it has a boisterous, rough, colloquial vigor. There is strength here, but no subtlety. This, then, is the earliest poetic attitude of humanism; preserving somewhat the form and somewhat the content, yet without attempting to transfer either the form or the content, Barclay writes an original English poem. In the same category and contemporaneous with Barclay, whom he mentions, is Henry Bradshaw.5 The date of his death, 1513, is given by a ballad which appears in the first edition (by Pynson) in 1521. Inferentially he died young,-an inference that is further supported by his reference to Barclay, none of whose work 1 Jamieson 1, 284. Thus his Balade of the translatour in the honoure of the bleasyd Virgyn Mary, moder of god has two refrains. 2 Ilz sont toutz mortz ce monde est choce vayne, 1, 268. 3 Lerne to lyuve by the rede Rose redolent, 2, 16. 41, 38. The punctuation is so obviously wrong that it is not misleading. 6 His poem, The Life of Saint Werburge, has been edited for the E. E. T. S. by Dr. Carl Horstmann. HUMANISM 255 antedates 1500. His only poem is a life of the patron saint of Chester, Saint Werburge, in 789 stanzas of the rime-royal. Like the Ship of Fools, the main interest of this lies in the evidence it affords of the close union of the English tradition with early humanism. In form it closely follows the precedent of Lydgate. It opens with the usual astronomical allusion, followed by meditations upon the mutability of fortune, and it ends with the usual apology. Instead, however, of invoking Chaucer, Gower and Lydgate, Bradshaw omits Gower and substitutes Barclay and Skelton. The body of the poem is a rimed chronicle. On the other hand, exactly as in Barclay's poems, the original is a Latin work. In this case, it is the passionary preserved then in the monastery and since lost. For as declareth the true Passyonary, A boke wherein her holy lyfe wryten isWhiche boke remayneth in Chester monasteryI purpose by helpe of Ihesu, kynge of blys, In any wyse to reherse any sentence amys, But folowe the legende and true hystory, After an humble style and from it lytell vary. 1 But again like Barclay, he grafted other material. Vnto this rude werke myne auctours these shalbe: Fyrst the true legende and the venerable Bede, Mayster Alfrydus and Wyllyam Maluysburye, Gyrarde Polycronycon and other mo in deed. 2 The result is a compilation of early English history, the genealogy and life of the Saint, her miracles and the miracles of her shrine. As the whole of these works are in Latin, not unnaturally there are stanzas where, as the English has failed him, Latin is substituted and the vocabulary is aureate.3 Yet in spite of the mongrel nature of its origin, the poem has a certain narrative ability and a naive faith that explain, if they do not justify, the eulogy of its editor. The uncertainty of scansion, which evokes the wrath of Professor 1 Book I. Stanza 100. 2 Book I. Stanza 19. 3 Dr. Horstman gives a long list of such words as pudical, odible, etc. Introduetion, pp. xxxviii-xxxix. 256 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Saintsbury, is sufficiently illustrated in the quotations given. As in Barclay, the spirit of humanism is lacking; the author is a medieval monk, grimly versifying the acts of his saint for the moral edification of mankind. The poem is therefore only a more extreme example of the type represented by Barclay. Its interest lies in the late date of its composition; its significance lies in the beginnings of humanism shown in it. Much the same pseudo-humanism is shown in the Epigrams 1 of John Heywood.2 His reputation for "mad merry wit" is sufficiently attested by Camden, whose illustrations scarcely impress the modern reader.3 Of more importance is his statement that Heywood was the "first" epigrammatist. To his immediate successors, at least, his epigrams were the most widely known of his work. They were first published in 1562. Yet it seems probable that, as in the case of the Spider and the Flye, many of them were written during the middle years of the reign of Henry VIII. Still more the tradition, credited to Gabriel Harvey and followed by Fuller and Wood, asserts that in his verses he has copied the wit of Sir Thomas More. This is rendered possible by the fact that he had married Eliza Rastell, the niece of More. Probably his epigrams are not strictly original,-they are a re-coining of the sayings of many men. Thus the thirty-fifth epigram of the Fifth Hundred, joking on the fact that Gloria patri precedes Sicut erat in principio, resembles somewhat the bonmot of Stephen Gardiner made in 1532.4 Although either might have made the remark independently, the coincidence seems to justify an early date. The early dating is also borne out by the type of humanism represented by these epigrams. As was recognized by Puttenham in 1589, Martial "was the cheife of this skil among the Latines." 5 Early printed editions made him accessible to English readers. That actually he was known is proved by Surrey's translation of 1 These have been reprinted by the Spenser Society, 1867; and by the Early English Drama Society, Vol. ii, 1900, edited by Farmer. The third volume with the announced "terminal essay" has never appeared. 2The reader is referred back to p. 121. 3 Remains concerning Britain by William Camden; J. R. Smith, 1870, p. 314. 4 Camden, ibid, 299. 5 The Arte of English Poesie, Arber Reprint, 1895, p. 68. HUMANISM 257 the forty-seventh epigram of the Tenth Book to Julius Martial,1 beginning Martiall, the thinges that do attayn. The happy life, be these, I finle. It would be natural, therefore, to expect in Heywood imitations and suggestions from the obvious Latin model. TLe actual fact is exactly the contrary. Martial's epigrams are both personal and local. He celebrates events interesting principally to his contemporaries and to antiquarians; his personalities, written for a limited Roman circle, must have been read with attempted guesses at the identity of the persons described. If they were, many of them are so foul that they would justify murdering him. Their brevity, their wit, and in Saintsbury's phrase, a "certain virility and gusto" alone reward the student. In all these points save brevity Heywood is not only not imitative, but is even antithetical. Heywood's epigrams have all the universality of the phrases, which are their foundations. For example, the expression, to turn tippet (i. e. turncoat), has fifteen variants. His verses are apt to be little more than a punning expansion of a colloquialism. Naturally then there can be no personal reference. And this especially he disavows: 2 In all my simple writyng neuer ment I, To touche any priuate person displeasantly. Nor none do I touche here: by name, but onely one, Which is my selfe: whom I may be bolde vpon. Nor does he any more follow the example of Martial in the freedom of his language.3 Than in rough rude termes of homelie honestie (For vnhonest terme ( I trust) there none here soundes) Wherin fine tender eares shal offended bee... 1Warton alludes to this epigram as Martialis ad Seipsum, a blunder that is followed even by Padelford. 2 Preface to the Fifth Hundred. 3 Preface to the First Hundred. It is this attitude that renders incomprehensible Sharman's comment (Proverbs of Heywood, Introduction, xlvii):: "Of his best (epigrams) we will only say that they are as puerile as the worst of Martial's, and nearly as indelicate." 258 EARLY TUDOR POETRY And unless such conscious refusal to follow the precedent set by the great Latin exemplar be considered to argue a familiarity with Martial, there is no allusion to the Latin poet. In fact, Heywood's significance lies exactly in his thoroughly English content. Whenever the allusion becomes temporal or local, the reference is always to English conditions and for the English reader. There is no classical value to the nineteenth of the Fifth Hundred: Whens come great breeches? from little wittam. Whens come great ruffes? from small brainfoorth they cam. Whens come these round verdingales? from square thrift. Whens come deepe copped hattes? from shallow shift. Whens come braudered gardis? from the towne of euill. Whens come vncomde staryng heades? from the deuill. Whens come these womans scarfs? from folly Iohn. Whens come their glitterying spanges? from much wanton. Whens come perfumde gloues? from curiositee. Whens come fyne trapt moyles? from superfluitee. Whens come cornde crooked toes? from short shapen shoone. Whens come wylde hie lookers? from midsomer moone. Whens come fayre painted faces? from peinters tooles. Whens come all these? from the vicar of sainct fooles. In another he plays with the proper names of Huntingdon and Hammersmith and in still another with the quaint names of the streets of old London. In general, it must be confessed, they form rather dreary reading. Puttenham's comment,1 "Iohn Heywood the Epigrammatist who for the myrth and quicknesse of his conceits more then for any good learning was in him, " still holds true. Modern ears are too delicate to enjoy his attack upon the heavy stuffed breeches of the men, or the thick ruffs of the women, made from the standpoint of a louse. The hundred and seventeenth of the Epigrammes vpon proverbes, A cat may looke on a kyng, and what of that. When a cat so lookth: a cat is but a cat. is a fair example of his wit, and one that time has not affected. It illustrates also the great service that he rendered. His homely terms preserved and made fashionable the vast quantity of the 1 Puttenham, ibid, p. 74. HUMANISM 259 mother-wit of his ancestors. Naturally there is no invention here. His work is merely a convenient reservoir, from which Shakespeare and the dramatists drew so much. Thus, while the suggestion must have come from humanism without which such a compilation would have not been made, yet the resultant is pure English, without any apparent intermingling of classical manner or thought. Such a writer as Barclay or Heywood, it may be granted, is connected with the humanistic movement by slight ties. This is not the case with the group of men now to be discussed. In spite of such men as Duke Humphrey and Worcester, humanism may be said to make its appearance in England when Chandler, Warden of New College, Oxford, invited the Italian Vitelli to give lectures there on Greek, at the beginning of the fourth quarter of the fifteenth century. While it is impossible to trace a direct connection between Vitelli and the English humanists, some connection is inferential, since Oxford became the center of the movement and the location of a remarkable group of students. Such groups star the history of English literature, men whose friendships bring out the best in each one, men strongly individual,-and yet who are all so associated in a common group that to mention one brings to mind the others. Their lives are bound together by a fine reticulation of the same hopes and the same aspirations. And the influence they exert is rather communal than individual. In the early sixteenth century, such a nucleus is to be found in the friends of Grocyn, "the friend and protector of us all" as Erasmus calls him; Linacre, the great physician; Latimer, professor of Greek at Oxford; Colet the Dean of Pauls; Lily, the grammarian; More, the Lord Chancellor; and the brilliant visitor, Erasmus. The enthusiasm of Erasmus may be best illustrated in his own words.' But how do you like our England, you will say. Believe me, my Robert, when I answer that I never liked anything so much before. I find the climate both pleasant and wholesome; and I have met with so much kindness, and so much learning, not hacknied and trivial, but deep, accurate, ancient, Latin and Greek, that but for the curiosity of seeing it, I do not now so much care for Italy. When I hear my Colet, I seem to be listening to Plato himself. In Grocin, who does not marvel at such a perfect round of learning? What can be more acute, profound, and delicate than the judgment of Linacre? What has Nature ever created more gentle, more sweet, 1 Epistles of Erasmus, translated by F. M. Nichols, 1901, Vol. i, p. f26. 260 EARLY TUDOR POETRY more happy than the genius of Thomas More? I need not go through the list. It is marvellous how general and abundant is the harvest of ancient learning in this country, to which you ought all the sooner to return. Although Erasmus lived to change his opinion of the climate, the estimate then expressed of his English friends never seriously was altered. This judgment is endorsed also by the great Venetian printer, Aldus, in his preface to Linacre's translation, Proclus De Sphcra.l.. so that from the same Britain whence formerly a barbarous and unlearned literature made its way to us, occupying and still holding our Italian citadel, we who are now learning to speak in Latin, and as becomes men of learning, shall receive a knowledge of true science, and, having with British aid put barbarism to flight, win back our citadel. We shall thus recover it by the use of the very weapons which caused the disaster. Admiring the Latinity and the eloquence of these men, I have thought it well to subjoin a certain learned and elegant letter which William Grocyn, a man of exceeding skill and universal learning, even in Greek, not to say Latin, has sent me. I have inserted it in order that he may shame our philosophers out of their barbarous and unskilful mode of writing, and that in emulation of the Britons, they-I do not say the older men (grandavi) yEpovrtov yap ILTTraKos a/LAXEL OKvraXrqv-but all the rest, may, in Latin, and armed with the requisite learning, deal with philosophy. After such typical eulogies one turns to the work that justified them. At once the student is confronted by one of the startling facts concerning the early Tudor humanists, namely that there is very little work. Aside from More, and of course Erasmus, their contributions to literature are almost nil. Grocyn survives only in his letter referred to by Aldus, and a very doubtful epigram quoted by Bale and Fuller; Linacre's work is largely a translation into Latin of the Greek medical works of Galen; Colet, principally in a convocation sermon given in Knight's Life; 2 Linacre also, and Lily, composed Latin grammars. But so far as either literature or scholarship is concerned, there is very little. One is tempted to explain their present celebrity by the frequent reference to them in the letters of Erasmus. Yet, in spite of the pau1 Quoted by Burrows, Memoir of William Grocyn, Oxford Historical Society, Collectanea, Second Series, p. 350. 2 The Life of Cold, by the Rev. J. H. Lupton, is the standard. At the end of The Influence of Dean Colet upon the Reformation of the English Church, Dr. Lupton gives a list of Colet's works. HUMANISM 261 city of the remains, that they had a significant influence upon the future of English is a fact. To determine exactly what was that influence is a difficult problem with the scarcity of data. There is the inevitable temptation to put too much stress upon the individual detail. The fact remains, however, that in comparison with the genuine humanism of Italy, English humanism seems forced and artificial, rather of the head than of the heart. The Epigrammata (1520) of More and Lily suggest in their frigidity school exercises. The majority of them are commonplaces, translated fron the Greek into the Latin, on mediocrity, the shortness of life, sleep, death, etc. Those by More alone dealing with contemporary subjects, such as the coronation of the king, or the epitaph on a singer Abingdon, have much the same tone. It is all an intellectual pastime that the author plays solemnly with himself. Consequently the poems are compressed and antithetic. They are brilliant and hard. But English humanism, being this artificial intellectual attitude, is moral. There is not only nothing of the fluency of Politian, the fire of Marullus, nor the sensuosity of Pontanus, but in addition the English humanists reacted against them. As Beatus Rhenanus expressly states it in his preface to More's Epigrams.l Indeed among the epigram-writers today in the first rank Italy admires Pontanus and Marullus: but may I perish if in this (book) there is not as much nature, indeed more utility, unless indeed anyone feels himself greatly helped when Marullus celebrates his Neaera, and chants her in many (verses), following a certain Heraclitus, or when John Pontano gives us the vileness of the old epigrammatists, than which nothing may be more unworthy the reading of a good man, I will not say of a Christian. This passage suggests the line of cleavage between the types of humanism developed south and north of the Alps. In Italy, the model accepted was Catullus. He it is that Pontano, Politian, and Marullus aim to follow, rather than Eorace. The reason may I Iam inter epigrammatographos Pontanum & Marullum inprimis hodie miratur Italia: at dispeream, si non tantundem in hoc est nature, utilitatis vero plus, nisi si quis inde magnopere se credi iuvari, dum suam Neaeram celebrat Marullus & in multis aLiV&rTCTct, Heraclitum quendam agens, aut dum Io. Pontanus veterum nobis epigrammatistarum nequitias refert, quibus nihil sit frigidius & boni viri lectione magis indignum, ne dicam christiani. Beatus Rhenanus, Basle, 15O0. M62 EARLY TUDOR POETRY be, as has been suggested to me, that, while Horace was an old story, the comparatively recent finding at Verona of a manuscript of Catullus put an exaggerated value upon his work. It is also due, however, to the nature of that work. The fire and passion of Catullus found a congenial soil in Italy. On the other hand his very freedom of expression tended to alienate him from the northern nations. The cold, restrained, northern nature felt more at ease with the philosophy of Horace. This is shown by the fact that while the first northern edition of Horace appears in 1488, and by 1515 there were at least twenty-three editions, of Catullus, Graesse lists only two before 1518, and those come from the Italianate city of Lyons. In the list of books in Colet's school, there is a Horace 1475, but no Catullus. In 1520 John Dome sold nine copies of various works of Horace and none of Catullus. He sold two copies of Politian's introduction to the Analytics of Aristotle and one of his Opera, but none of either Pontanus, or Marullus. It is significant of this English attitude, that half of the books of Grocyn should deal with theology and philosophy, and that in a library having Cicero, Plautus, Lucretius, Caesar, Livy, Vergil, Tacitus, Suetonius, Juvenal, Persius, Asconius, Apuleius, Valerius, Maximus, and Aulus Gellius, neither Horace, nor Catullus should find a place! In Tudor England, humanism was a serious, moral, reflective force. In considering the humanism of the early Tudors, then, these are the two salient characteristics, their sterility and their morality. The first becomes obvious by a glance at the lists of early printed books. Caxton's books are almost entirely either translations from the French, or issues of early English works, such as Chaucer or Lydgate. It is this that gives him his importance in literature. His press served to bridge the gap of the fifteenth century. In the dawn of the Renaissance, books typical of the Middle Ages were thus brought prominently forward. Caxton's work, therefore, and the weight of his influence, from the standpoint of the humanist, are retrogressive. Wynkyn de Worde and his contemporary Pynson, Caxton's successors, naturally followed Caxton's policy, with the variance that they printed also more contemporary works. Thus Wynkyn de Worde publishes Hawes, and Pynson, Barclay. There is also a number of Latin grammars for English readers. But there also begins the issue of Latin texts. In HUMANISM 263 1497, Pynson brought forth six plays of Terence, and in 1512, Wynkyn de Worde, the Bucolics of Vergil. Slightly earlier, Rood had issued Aristotle's Ethics and an oration of Cicero. Before the first quarter of the century, some of Seneca and the Commentaries of Caesar had appeared. Before the first half of the century had passed, probably as many as fifty editions of Latin writers had been published by English printers. But when this is contrasted with the publications of the single Venetian house of Aldus, the result seems meagre in the extreme. This is the paradox confronting the student of English humanism. Here is a group of men, celebrated for their learning, that neither produced much themselves, nor apparently stirred others to produce. The first obvious explanation is that, so far as the creation of a new or an authoritative text of any classic author is concerned, the materials were largely absent, because the majority of early manuscripts were not in England. Almost necessarily such work could be better done by European scholars and their editions would be accessible in the English markets. Somewhat the same is true of scholarly commentary. Linacre's translation of Galen stands as an exception, yet Linacre's residence abroad must be remembered. After all, with this group, English scholarship was of the first generation. As such, it was introductory and, presumably, by word of mouth to college classes. It was as real, although not so obvious, as that of European scholars. And the Englishmen themselves preferred foreign publishers. Linacre sent his manuscript to Venice, More his Utopia to Louvain, and his Epigrammata to Basel. Such a preference is readily understandable without reflecting upon the conditions in England. The book was written in Latin in order that it might have an audience not limited to any one language. Naturally to a European public a book gained in prestige by coming from a great European publishing firm. Moreover, the reasons were not purely commercial. At a time when the author could not correct his proofs, he was greatly at the mercy of the education of the typesetter. Consequently Erasmus went personally to Basel to superintend the publication of his Jerome. In the output of a firm issuing large numbers of similar books, typographical errors would be less frequent, and the variety of fonts of type much greater. A striking illustration of this is that the first words printed in England in Greek 264 EARLY TUDOR POETRY characters appear as late as 1519.1 An English writer, by chance using a Greek expression,-and this was by no means uncommon,from that very fact was forced to depend upon foreign publishers. Yet, whatever deductions may be made for books written by Englishmen and printed abroad, the contribution of the early humanists to European scholarship remains singularly small. The real explanation of the apparent sterility of the English humanists however, lies rather in the nature of their humanism. As has been said, in contrast with Italian humanism, in England it was moral, Christian rather than pagan. Greek to them was rather the language of the New Testament, than the language of Plato. Colet lectures on the Pauline Epistles and urges Erasmus to the publication of his New Testament.2 But by that very fact they became involved with the great movement that we call the Reformation. Fortunately the history of the Reformation does not come within the scope of these studies. For the sake of its effect upon literature, the general outline of it may be given, and given as presented to Charles V in a dumb play at Ausburg.3 "A man in a doctor's dress brought in a bundle of sticks, some straight, some crooked, laid them on the hearth, and retired. On his back was written 'Reuchlin.' Another followed who tried to arrange the sticks side by side, could not do it, grew impatient, and retired also. He was called Erasmus. An Augustinian monk came next with a burning chafing-dish, flung the crooked sticks into the fire, and blew into it to make it blaze. This was Luther. A fourth came robed as an emperor; he, seeing the fire spreading, tried to put it out with his sword, and made it flame the faster. He, too, went off, and then appeared a figure in pontifical robe and with triple crown, who started at the sight of the fire, looked about, saw two cans in the room, one full of water and the other of oil, snatched the oil by mistake, poured it on, and raised such a blaze that he fled in terror. This was Leo X." In this contemporary by-play, it is to be noticed that Erasmus, after trying to reconcile the parties, gives up the task in disgust. It was just 1 Typographical Antiquities, Dibdin, Vol. ii, p. 181. 2 Colet's Enarratio in Epistolum S. Pauli ad Romanos was edited by the Rev. J. H. Lupton, 1873; the following year the same editor brought out the Enarratio in Puinam Epistolam S. Pauli ad Corinthos. 3 Life and Letters of Erasmus, Froude, p. 380. HUMANISM 265 here that the English humanists were unable to follow his example. In England the crisis was so acute that they could not give it up. In spite of themselves they were involved and the intellectual interest in scholarship was exchanged for a vital interest in politics. While the movement was still young and while it was still gaining headway, it was fated that persons whose station, interests, and philosophy were as far separated as the poles from the station, interests, and philosophy of the Oxford men should arise to deflect the current and turn it into an entirely unexpected direction. And it is impossible to believe that the protagonists of the political drama had any conception of the momentous consequences of their action, or for a moment looked beyond their own petty interests. Katherine was nearly six years older than Henry. But the disparity between them was greater than is shown by their ages. "Katherine's health had never been robust; and at the age of thirty-three, after four confinements, she had lost her bloom. Disappointment and suffering, added to her constitutional weakness, was telling upon her, and her influence grew daily smaller. The gorgeous shows and frivolous amusements in which her husband so much delighted palled upon her, and she now took little pains to feign enjoyment in them, giving up much of her time to religious exercises, fasting rigidly twice a week and saints' days throughout the year, in addition to the Lenten observances, and wearing beneath her silks and satins a rough Franciscan nun's gown of serge. As in the case of so many of her kindred, mystical devotion was weaving its grey web about her, and saintliness of the peculiar Spanish type was covering her as with a garment. Henry, on the contrary, was a full-blooded young man of twentyeight, with a physique like that of a butcher, held by no earthly control or check upon his appetites, overflowing with vitality and the joy of life; and it is not to be wondered at that he found his disillusioned and consciously saintly wife a somewhat uncomfortable companion." 1 The torch was applied to the pile when three or four years later the King became infatuated with Anne Boleyn, sixteen years younger than his wife. There was nothing of course in the easy morality either of the time or of the lady to prevent his making her his mistress. In fact, Lady Tailebois was the mother of the boy whom he recognized as Duke of Richmond, 1 Wives of Henry the Eighth, Martin Hume, pp. 89-90. 266 EARLY TUDOR POETRY the title borne by his own father. Still more it is highly probable that Anne's sister Mary Boleyn had already enjoyed the dubious honor of having been the King's mistress. What complicated the situation was the King's desire for a legitimate male heir. Katherine was the mother of a daughter only, Mary Tudor, and, with the questionable exception of Matilda, no queen had ever held the English throne in her own right. It may well have seemed to Henry, conscious of the recent origin of his own dynasty and mindful of the horrors of civil war, that a male heir was imperative. Divorce was not uncommon upon such grounds. The Pope had granted dispensation to Louis XII of France for much the same reasons, and Henry's own brother-in-law, Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, had set aside two previous marriages before he married the King's sister. On the other hand, by 1527, Rome had been sacked by the Spanish troops, the Pope, Clement VII, was terrorized by Charles V, and Charles was Katherine's nephew. The result was long procrastination and debate, and a long public trial that aroused all England, until Henry's passion finally forced him to break with the Papacy. In the welter and confusion of this transition, appeal must be made to the people, not of Europe, but of England. For this the Latin language was thrown aside in favor of vigorous homely English, and the subtilties of intellectual conceptions in favor of sledge-hammer invective. It cannot have been cheering to the humanists to realize that they themselves had been, to a measure, the agents of their own downfall. Such a change in religious conception as is involved in the denial of papal supremacy, such a change in religious form as that involved in the substitution of English for Latin, and such a change in the social structure as that involved in the suppression of the monasteries and the religious orders, could not be made in the face of the united opposition of a whole people. Henry may have been a "tyrant", but he was a tyrant without a standing army, and with no force to overawe the nation except that derived from the nation itself. He could be despotic only so far as such despotism did not long run counter to the will of the nation.1 In modern phrasing, although by no means to the extent of the meaning today, Henry was governed by public opinion. Public opinion, in turn, had been affected by the humanistic criticisms and 1 This is the position most ably, if partially, supported by Froude. HUMANISM 967 theories carried broadcast by the newly invented press. An analogy may be found in the relations of Rousseau to the French Revolution. That Marat would have guillotined Rousseau, and Rousseau repudiated Marat, does not alter the fact that Rousseau's theories are precursors to the Reign of Terror. In like case, to call these men "Oxford Reformers" 1 is misleading. That they wished reform is undoubted; that their point of view prepared the way for reform is certain; but that they in any way anticipated or approved the cataclysmic upheaval that actually took place is impossible to believe.2 The effect of humanism upon English literature, then, is double; it may be divided into its effect upon the poetry and upon the prose, and cross-divided by its effect upon the form and the content of each. As the importance of the subject is more clearly shown by the content of the prose, that question Bill be first discussed.3 But the effect of one civilization upon an individual belonging to another civilization is rather difficult to analyze, although not to appreciate. To an American, the value of a European sojourn is not that, on his return, he has seen Europe, but rather that he sees America from a fresh point of view. His visit has given him a basis for comparison. Intellectually, it has stimulated him to more careful consideration of familiar conditions. For such a consideration of Christian civilization the value of an intimate acquaintance with the literatures and life of Greece and Rome is at once obvious. To the sixteenth century reader they presented the spectacle of civilizations more advanced than his own, yet antithetical in almost every particular. He returned, therefore, from his mental journey with a consciousness of the advantages and the disadvantages of his own epoch. In the little group of humanists that we are discussing you find the intellect burning at white heat. Of them by far the best known,-in fact the only one known to -the modern reader,-is Sir Thomas More. For this condition many reasons combine. His life, so rarely beautiful that in 1886 he was beatified by Roman 1 The Oxford Reformers of 1498 by Frederic Seebohm, 1867, is a standard study of Colet, Erasmus, and More. 2 The Eve of the Reformation, F. A. Gasquet, p. 7. a The effect of humanism upon the form of prose is reserved for a later study. 268 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Curia, quickly passed into a legend. The contemporary belief in his justice as Chancellor is preserved in the rhyme: When More sometime has Chancellor been No more suits did remain; The like will never more be seen Till More be there again. It was largely upon his reputation that Rastell later popularized the traditional hump-back of Richard the Third. With Skelton, he is one of the figures to bolster up the tale of Long Meg of Westminster. The tragedy of his death, personified in his daughter Margaret Roper, still haunted Tennyson: Morn broaden'd on the borders of the dark, Ere I saw her, who clasp'd in her last trance Her murder'd father's head.1 In truth, as one sees him through the eyes of his son-in-law, his life was so perfect and his death so pitiful, that all men of all creeds must rise up to call him "blessed ". What such a man wrote should theoretically have a wide appeal! Then another reason for his renown is the comparative lack of work of the other members of the group. The result is that, while the rest are known to scholars, Sir Thomas More is known to the world. The previous remarks on the effect of the Reformation on English humanism find illustration in the literary work of More. That may be divided sharply into two classes; that written under the humanistic impulse in Latin, and that written in English. As a humanist, he was brilliant, broad-minded, and tolerant; writing in the vernacular the same man shows himself retrogressive, and almost insensible to the new forces raging around him, a vigorous and scurrilous opponent of Luther and Tyndale, a determined partisan anxious only to preserve that status quo. The tracts, containing acute reasoning and clever invective, are yet without form, hopelessly voluble and digressive. The Utopia on the other hand is brilliantly compressed, with the parts definitely related to the whole, and to each other. The execution, as well as the conception, is masterly. It may well be with the works of More in mind that in the next generation Ascham wrote: 2 1 Dream of Fair Women. 2 The English Works of Roger Ascham, by James Bennet, p. 57. HUMANISM 269 And as for the Latine or Greeke tongue, everye thinge is so excellentlye done in them, that none can do better: In the Englishe tongue, contrary, everye thinge in a maner so meanlye both for the matter and the handelinge, that no man can do worse. The natural result, which yet seems contradictory, is that, whereas the English works in English are unknown, that in Latin is familiar to the entire English speaking race. This statement is so paradoxical that figures are needed to justify it. Although two volumes of selections from the English works were published during the nineteenth century and, since 1800 there have been seven separate pieces, usually published for learned societies, the first edition of the completed works, that of 1557, is yet the last. Of the Utopia within the twenty years 1890-1910, twenty issues have been made in the Latin and the various English versions.1 In fairness it must be added that in some editions of the Utopia the Dialogue of Comfort against Tribulation is included. With all deductions made, however, the fact remains sufficiently striking. As a writer of English, More may be ignored; it is only as a humanist that he is a world-figure. It is on the humanistic side that More's work needs here to be considered.2 The origin of Utopia is definitely known. While More was on an embassy in Antwerp, staying at the home of Peter Giles, a friend of Erasmus, he amused himself by planning an ideal community. The Second Book, the one describing the conditions in Utopia was written first. On his return to England he wrote the First Book, dealing with English conditions, to lead up to and prepare for the Second. The reader, therefore, reverses the order in which the ideas were conceived. The Second Book is primarily creative, and the First Book primarily critical. The whole is set in the framework of an imaginary conversation held in the garden of Peter Giles. By this means the author, dispensing with any formal arrangement, is at liberty to treat the various topics in any order he chooses, without connection between them. The Second Book consists of a number of essays dealing with conditions in an ideal community, each clearly marked by a separate title, De Magistratibus, De Artificiis, etc. The ideas contained 1 For these figures I have used the Bibliography in the Utopia, edited by George Sampson, 1910. 2 More as a writer of English prose will be discussed later. 270 EARLY TUDOR POETRY in these essays are not always consistent. For example, the point is made that, because there is no parasitic class, the total work of the commonwealth is accomplished with the minimum amount of labor of six hours per day per man. Later on, however, the reader finds two classes of bondsmen who are forced to labor much in excess of this amount.1 More himself never co-ordinated these separate conceptions. His aim is not to present a carefully thoughtout social system; it is rather a series of reflections on the various component parts of a state. The fundamental, and (to the sixteenth century) revolutionary conception is that the state is the creation of the individuals and exists for their benefit. And the individuals are all equal. In a modern state, the ideal of equality is destroyed by the universal desire for property and the consequent respect paid to those possessing it. According to More, the solution for the present problem is to strike at the root of the matter, the love of money.2 Thus I doe fullye persuade me selfe, that no equall and juste distribution of thinges can be made, nor that perfecte wealthe shall ever be among men, onles this propriety (private ownership) be exiled and bannished. But so long as it shal continew, so long shal remaine among the most and best part of men the hevy, and inevitable burden of poverty and wretchednes. Whiche, as I graunte that it maye be sumwhat eased, so I utterly denye that it can wholy be taken away. For if there were a statute made, that no man should possesse above a certeine measure of grounde, and that no man shoulde have in his stocke above a prescripte and appointed some of money: if it were by certein lawes decreed, that neither the King shoulde be of to greate power, neither the people to haute and wealthy, and that offices shoulde not be obt'eined by inordinate suite, or by brybes and gyftes: that they shoulde neither be bought nor sold, nor that it shoulde be nedeful for the officers, to be at any cost or charge in their offices: for so occasion is geven to theym by fraude and ravin to gather up their money againe, and by reason of giftes and bribes the offices be geven to rich men, which shoulde rather have bene executed of wise men: by such lawes I say, like as sicke bodies that be desperat and past cure, be wont with continual good cherissing te be kept and botched up for a time: so these evels also might be lightened and mitigated. But that thei may be perfectly cured, and brought to a good and upryght state, it is not to be hoped for, whiles every man is maister of his owne to him selfe. 1 The stringency of the laws in the sixteenth century and the social conditions, which are discussed in the First Book of the Utopia, made a large criminal class. Cf. Chapter I. 2 The quotation is taken from Ralph Robison's translation (1551), since it is the version familiar to the modern public. Yet I do so somewhat unwillingly because the quaintness of the phrase and the individuality of the spelling by no means render to the modem ear the effect of More's Latin. HUMANISM 271 Consequently in the ideal republic there are no property rights; the houses are all owned in common; the food is stored in common storehouses, and served in common dining-halls; and even the children, who in the sixteenth century were regarded as property, are brought up by the state. The Utopians have literally no use for money. Their clothes, taken from the common stock, are chosen simply with regard to convenience. Gold and jewels, the insignia of wealth and station elsewhere, are there treated with contempt. To confirm the public in this opinion, golden chains are associated with marks of degradation and jewels are the playthings of children. They are used, however, to hire mercenaries for war, since the Utopians do not fight their own battles. In their philosophy they are hedonists, but, as each member of a community can enjoy the highest pleasure only when every other member of that community is equally satisfied, the result is the practice of the golden rule. As the working day is only six hours, the great amount of leisure is used in attending lectures and is devoted to general cultivation, although curiously enough, aside from music, there is no appreciation for art in Utopia. Thus the abstraction, the state, called into being by the individuals, assumes a paternal attitude, regulates their working and their leisure hours, controls their marriages and their offspring, and directs each detail, not only of public but also of private life. Such in brief outline are the main positions of More's famous book. Numberless volumes have been written discussing it from the point of view of the philosophy of the state. From this point of view criticism is easy. It is also irrelevant in the present discussion. The value of the book does not lie in those schemes which have bred the adjective "Utopian", but rather in the still larger number of ideas that in the progress of the years have been realized. To say "There is hardly a scheme of social or political reform that has been enunciated in later epochs of which there is no definite adumbration in More's pages" 1 is expressing it too broadly. Yet it is true that in very many ways More has anticipated modern movements by years and by centuries. The description of Amaurote, suggestively paralleled to London in the marginal note, is curiously modern. The provision for wide streets, careful sanitation, public 1 Great Englishmen of the Sixteenth Century, Sidney Lee, 1904, p. 33. EARLY TUDOR POETRY hospitals, slaughter-houses, without the city limits, the stressing of gardens both for light and air, and also for fruit, the glass in the windows, the fire-proofing of the roofs, etc. etc. had little reality in the London of 1516.1 Nor is the modernity confined to the merely physical. Social conceptions, unrealized for centuries appear in these pages. More argues that criminality is usually the effect of environment, and that, therefore, the boy should be carefully guarded; that capital punishment for theft is illogical, that the prisoner should be reformed, not killed,2 and advocates a "trusty" plan; and that marriages should be conducted upon eugenic principles. The most famous anticipation of present conceptions is, however, the passage wherein is advocated religious toleration. There be divers kindes of religion not only in sondrie partes of the Ilande, but also in divers places of every citie.... He as soone as he was baptised, began against our willes, with more earneste affection, then wisedome, to reason of Christes religion: and began to waxe so hote in his matter, that he did not onlye preferre our religion before al other, but also did utterly despise and condempne all other, calling the prophanc, and the folowers of them wicked and develish, and the children of everlastinge dampnation. When he had thus longe reasoned the matter, they laide holde on him, accused him and condempned him into exile, not as a despiser of religion, but as a sedicious person and a raiser up of dissention amonge the people. For this is one of the auncientest lawes amonge them: that no man shall be blamed for resoninge in the maintenaunce of his owne religion. Today such a passage is read without comment. To understand even vaguely the astounding fact that it was published in 1516, it must be remembered that only twenty-four years before the Jews had been expelled from Spain. The results of that expulsion can be best given in Symonds' words:3 Vainly did the persecuted race endeavour to purchase a remission of the sentence by the payment of an exorbitant ransom. Torquemada appeared before Ferdinand and his consort, raising the crucifix, and crying: "Judas sold Christ for 30 pieces of silver; sell ye him for a larger sum, and account for the same to God!" The exodus began. Eight hundred thousand Jews left Spain-some for the coast of Africa, where the Arabs ripped their bodies up in the search for gems or gold they might have swallowed, and deflowered their women-some for Portugal, where they bought the right to exist for a large head-tax, and where they saw their sons and 1For comparison the reader is referred to p. 25 of the present work. 2 Until 1827 certain forms of theft in England were punished by death. 3 Renaissance in Italy, J. A. Symonds, Vol. 1 (Age of Despots) 313-314. HUMANISM 273 daughters dragged away to baptism before their eyes. Others were sold as slaves, or had to satisfy the rapacity of their persecutors with the bodies of their children. Many flung themselves into the wells, and sought to bury despair in suicide. The Mediterranean was covered with famine-stricken and plague-breeding fleets of exiles. Putting into the port of Genoa, they were refused leave to reside in the city, and died by hundreds in the harbour. Their festering bodies bred a pestilence along the whole Italian sea-board, of which at Naples alone 20,000 persons died. Flitting from shore to shore, these forlorn spectres, the victims of bigotry and avarice, everywhere pillaged and everywhere rejected, dwindled away and disappeared. Meanwhile the orthodox rejoiced. Pico della Mirandola, who spent his life in reconciling Plato with the Cabala, finds nothing more to say than this: "The sufferings of the Jews, in which the glory of the Divine justice delighted, were so extreme as to fill us Christians with commiseration." With these words we may compare the following passage from Senarega: "The matter at first sight seemed praiseworthy, as regarding the honour done to our religion; yet it involved some amount of cruelty, if we look upon them, not as beasts, but as men, the handiwork of God." A critic of this century can only exclaim with stupefaction: Tantum religio potuit suadere maloruml And fifty-six years after More had written this passage occurred the Massacre of St. Bartholomew; the Spanish Inquisition; the fires of Smithfield; the German wars;-and this passage was printed in 1516! In trying to explain the mere fact of the existence of such a book as the Utopia at such a time, there is one tendency to be guarded against. We, with the accumulated experience of the past four hundred years, read into the sentences vastly more than the author intended. Ideas that to More's mind were very nebulous and undefined, to us are perfectly clear cut. This may be most conveniently illustrated by a trifling detail. To show the advanced state among the Utopians we are told: They brynge up a greate multitude of pulleyne, and that by a mervaylouse policye. For the hennes dooe not sytte upon the egges: but by keepynge theym in a certayne equall heate they brynge lyfe into them, and hatche theym. The chykens, as sone as they be come oute of the shel, follow men and women in steade of the hennes. But incubators were not made practical until 1870! On the other hand artificial incubation was practised by the ancient Egyptians, and preserved as a secret. More, reading an account of their results in some classic author, merely adopted it for the benefit of his Utopians, without, however, having a clear conception of how it was done. But to the modern reader, perfectly familiar with all 274 EARLY TUDOR POETRY the mechanical details of artificial incubation, More's words seem to imply an equal familiarity. In the same way, the assumption that in many cases of his uncanny fore-knowledge he either knew how to bring about the desired conditions, or what would be the result if brought about, is incredible. Yet, granting that we today read more than the author wrote, the essential modernity, the very possibility that we can read more than was intended, is remarkable. The reason for it, however, is obvious. The Utopia is the result of wide reading in classic authors. The whole conception was suggested by the Republic of Plato, and by occasional marginal notes the reader is referred back to him. Yet it is by no means copied from Plato. The various opinions are gathered from almost the whole range of classic literature. It is not of much value to endeavor to trace back any detail to its peculiar source.1 Usually the idea expressed is a modification of, and sometimes a reaction from, the possible original. This is but another way of saying that More's mind had assimilated and made its own the product of the past. And that, also, is the condition of modern culture. The similarity between many of More's ideas and those of the man of today is due to the fact that the roots of both reach down into the same past. The Utopia is a striking example of the advantages of a classical education as expounded by Newman. The unique position of the early Tudor humanists is due to the fact that they put into practice Newman's arguments four hundred years ago. But if the Second Book of the Utopia be remarkable for its creative ability, the First is no less so for its analysis of the economic conditions of sixteenth century England. This is introduced to prepare by contrast for the Second Book. It purports to be an abstract of a discussion held at the palace of Cardinal Morton, Archbishop of Canterbury, and Lord Chancellor of Henry VII. The question was propounded why, in spite of the severity of the laws, there are so many thieves. The answer is; first, that there is a portion of the population whose means of livelihood are so uncertain that in self-defense they may become beggars, namely old retainers and soldiers; secondly, that there is a desire for illicit pleasures; and thirdly, that, because farms have been turned 1 In Platonismus in der englischen Renaissance (Berlin, 1907) Kurt Schroeder tries to define the exact influence of Plato upon More. HUMANISM 275 into pasturage on account of the profit to be made in wool, many of the farm-laborers have been turned adrift. The result of this last is an increase in price of food-stuffs, on account of the lessened production although, owing to a corner in wool, the price on that has not decreased. For these, by implication, the king is not responsible, but his councillors. Those, who advise debasing the coinage, the revival of obsolete laws for taxation, and the selling of privileges in order to enable the king to accumulate treasure,' are harmful since his "honoure and safetye is more and rather supported and upholden by the wealth and ryches of his people, then by his owne treasures." For the good king is the shepherd of his people. Let him lyve of hys owne, hurtinge no man... Let him restreyne wyckednes. Let him prevente vices, and take awaye the occasions of offenses by well orderynge hys subjectes, and not by sufferynge wickednes to increase afterward to be punyshed. Let hym not be to hastie in callynge agayne lawes, whyche a custome hathe abrogated: specially suche as have bene longe forgotten, and never lacked nor neaded. And let hym never under the cloke and pretence of transgression take suche fynes and forfaytes, as no Judge wyll suffre a private persone to take, as unjuste and ful of gile. This conception of a limited monarchy and of the responsibility of the king, "that the comminaltie chueseth their king for their owne sake and not for his," would have kept the head of Charles I upon his shoulders, and, in the person of James II, have preserved the throne to the Stuarts. To one interested in the condition of England in the early sixteenth century the First Book of the Utopia may be recommended for careful study. That humanism by sheer effort of the intellect lifted itself out of the sixteenth century is its greatest triumph; it is also its greatest failure. The trouble is that it is nothing but sheer intellectualism. Apparently the thoughts and the lives of these men moved on separate planes. As humanists they were willing to follow any position to its logical sequence. The anecdote, preserved by Froude as a "Chelsea tradition," 2 will illustrate this, 1 By More's contemporaries this must have been interpreted as a criticism of the well-known avarice of Henry VII. P. 52 of this work. 2 Froude, ibid, p. 109. This " tradition " must consist only in applying the tale to More and Erasmus since the tale itself is to be found in the Jests of Scogin, Shakespeare Jest-Books, ed. W. Carew Hazlitt, 95. Here the anecdote is in English prose. 276 EARLY TUDOR POETRY According to the tale, Erasmus having borrowed a horse of More, instead of returning it sent the following lines. Quod mihi dixisti De corpore Christi Crede quod edas et edis; Sic tibi rescribo De tuo palfrido Crede quod habeas et habes. If there be any truth in the tradition, it shows to what extent both the love of a joke and intellectual toleration could be carried! Even the mysteries of the Mass were subjects for discussion. It was not objective truth, so much as mental exercise that More sought. It is this that Erasmus emphasizes:1 The history of his connection with me was this. In his early life he was a versifier, and he came to me to improve his style. Since that time he has written a good deal. He has written a dialogue defending Plato's community of wives. He has answered Lucian's "Tyrannicida." He wanted me to take the other side, that he might better test his skill. His "Utopia" was written to indicate the dangers which threatened the English commonwealth. The second part was written first. The other was added afterwards. You can trace a difference in the style. He has a fine intellect and an excellent memory; information all arranged and pigeon-holed to be ready for use. tIe is so ready in argument that he can puzzle the best divines on their own subjects. Colet, a good judge on such points, says More has more genius than any man in England. That More personally believed in a "community of wives" is grotesque; his defense of it was valued as an example of mental agility. So the Utopia is a collection of conceptions, some positive and some negative. For example, he tells us of Utopian education: But as they in all thinges be almoste equal to oure olde auncyente clerkes, so oure newe Logiciens in subtyl inventions have farre passed and gone beyonde them. For they have not devysed one of all those rules of restrictions, amplifications, and suppositions verye wittelye invented in the small Logicalles, whyche heare oure children in every place do learne. Furtheremore they were never yet hable to fynde out the seconde intentions: insomuche that none of them all coulde ever see man himselfe in commen, as they cal him, thoughe he be (as you knowe) bygger than ever was annye gyaunte, yea and poynted to of us even wyth our finger. Here he is obviously merely laughing at medieval logic with its infinite refinements, and at the doctrine of the realists. But there 1 Erasmus to Hutten.; abridged by Froude, p. 107. HUMANISM 277 is no attack here. If it were written to " indicate the dangers which threatened the English commonwealth," that was a bye-product. Its aim was to afford the opportunity for pleasant speculation. It is a dream, and considering it as a dream he thus comments upon its success in a letter to Erasmus: 1 Master Tunstall has lately sent me a letter full of the most friendly feeling; his judgment about our Republic, so frank, so complimentary, has given me more pleasure than an Attic talent! You have no idea how I jump for joy, how tall I have grown, how I hold up my head, when a vision comes before my eyes, that my Utopians have made me their perpetual sovereign. I seem already to be marching along, crowned with a diadem of wheat, conspicuous in a Greyfriar's cloak, and carrying for a sceptre a few ears of corn, surrounded by a noble company of Amaurotians; and with this numerous attendance meeting the ambassadors and princes of other nations,-poor creatures in comparison with us, inasmuch as they pride themselves on coming out, loaded with puerile ornaments and womanish finery, bound with chains of that hateful gold, and ridiculous with purple and gems and other bubbly trifles. But I would not have either you or Tunstall form an estimate of me from the character of others, whose behaviour changes with their fortune. Even though it has pleased Heaven to raise our humility to that sublime elevation, with which no kingdom can in my judgment be compared, you shall never find me unmindful of that old familiarity, which has subsisted between us while I have been in a private station; and if you take the trouble to make so small a journey as to visit me in Utopia, I will effectually provide, that all the mortals who are subject to our clemency, shall show you that honour, which they owe to those whom they know to be dearest to their sovereign. I was proceeding further with this most delightful dream, when the break of day dispersed the vision, deposing poor me from my sovereignty, and recalling me to prison, that is, to my legal work. Nevertheless I console myself with the reflection, that real kingdoms are not much more lasting. It is with this idea of game that the book is furnished with the elaborate epistles; the request of the Vicar of Croydon to be allowed to be appointed first bishop to Utopia; the imaginary alphabet; and the "windy" verses of the Anemolius poet laureate. That, in such an era of discovery, when Columbus' voyages were still remembered, and the Cabots were still sailing, it may have fooled some, would but lend spice to the jest. To the learned, the Greek names would be intelligible, and it was for the learned that it was written. To More and to them all it was clever fooling. 1 The Epistles of Erasmus, Francis Morgan Nichols, Vol. 2, p. 442 —443. The same point of view is also given in Erasmus' letter to Whitford, Vol. 1, p. 406. But from Erasmus' correspondence innumerable examples might be cited to show that, to gain suppleness of mind, the humanists resorted to such mental exercise. 278 EARLY TUDOR POETRY That some of his jests struck near the truth cannot be denied, yet to insist upon reading his theories into his life is illogical. It is to accuse him of inconsistency, because, in the letter quoted above, he speaks of "chains of that hateful gold," whereas Holbein paints him wearing a heavy chain of that same abominable metal. Consequently the intellectual conceptions expounded in the Utopia apparently did not affect More's practical workaday life. In that, he argues for religious toleration; actually he hated heretics. In his epitaph, written by himself, he tells us so. Whether this hatred took the form of actual torture, and to what extent, are questions beside the mark. The apparent paradox remains. The man that argues for perfect equality and abstract justice was in life content to accept the status quo. Still more, he that pleads for sweetness and light narrowly escaped the extremes of asceticism, and actually wore the penitential haircloth shirt. Between these two aspects of More's character there is this apparently irreconcilable antagonism. On one side he is dominantly medieval; on the other he is a protagonist of the Renaissance. In More, the two currents of the sixteenth century are clearly visible; influenced by humanism, he conceives a Utopia; influenced by medieval tradition, he sacrifices himself for papal supremacy, and his life closes with the tragedy of Tower Hill. But of the two it is the mystical, medieval, conservative element that dominates. Considered from the point of view of the Utopia, the indignation that thrilled Europe at the news of his death is comprehensible to every modern reader; considered from the point of view of the English works, equally comprehensible is the logical necessity for that sacrifice. The essential unreality of Tudor humanism, veneering rather than showing the grain, however lovely in itself, is the explanation of the paradox.l From such reasoning as this it follows that the chief figure of English humanism is not an Englishman. The center of the stage 1 That the same paradox was felt even by his contemporaries is witnessed by Hall in his comment upon his execution; (Henry VIII by Edward Hall, edited by Charles Whibley, Vol. ii, p. 265) "I cannot tell whether I shoulde call him a foolishe wyseman, or a wise foolishman, for undoubtedly he beside his learnyng, had a great witte, but it was so myngled with tauntyng and mockyng, that it seemed to them that best knew him, that he thought nothing to be wel spoken except he had ministred some mocke in the communicacion." HUMANISM 279 is occupied by the cosmopolitan Erasmus.1 And no man ever better deserved the adjective. Although born in Holland, his patriotism is nil. When it was suggested by his friend, the Abbot of Steyn, that he live there, he emphatically refused; 2 You wish me to fix upon a permanent residence; a course also suggested by advancing age. And yet the wanderings of Solon and Pythagoras and Plato are commended. The Apostles were wanderers, especially Paul. St. Jerome, monk as he was, is now found at Rome, now in Syria, now in Africa or elsewhere, and in old age is still pursuing sacred Letters. I am not to be compared with him, I admit; but I have never changed my place, unless either forced by plague, or for the sake of study or health; and wherever I have lived (perhaps I shall speak too arrogantly of myself, but I will say the truth), I have been approved by those most approved and praised by those most praised. And there is no country, whether Spain, or Italy, or England, or Scotland, which has not invited me to its hospitality.... I have explained to you the whole scheme of my life, and what my ideas are. I am quite ready to change even this mode of life, if I see anything better. But I do not see what I can do in Holland. I know I shall not find either the climate or the food agree with me; and I shall draw all eyes upon me. I shall return old and grey to the place I left when young; I shall return an invalid. I shall be exposed to the contempt of the lowest people after being accustomed to be honoured by the greatest. I shall exchange my studies for drinking parties. And whereas you promise your assistance in finding me a place where I may live, as you say, with a good income, I cannot think what that can be, unless you would quarter me upon some convent of nuns, where I should be a servant to women, after having declined to serve Archbishops and Kings. But just as he refused to be bound by the ties of place, so did he refuse to be bound by the ties of service. The wearisome complaints that fill his letters arise from the fact that he was unwilling to perform any definite labor from which he might expect a regular income, and yet he did expect the income. He insisted upon being absolutely free. Nor would he be limited by the confines of 1 The two most modern lives of Erasmus are those of Froude and Professor Emerton of Harvard. And the idealism of the first is corrected by the caustic quality of the second. Froude's Life is irritating through its inaccuracy and carelessness for detail,-so irritating that scholars are apt to disregard its wonderfully vivid portraiture. One value, at least, of its author is shown by the fact that the two most notable recent additions to Erasmiana, The Epistles by Nichols, and the Epistole by Allen, both acknowledge his inspiration. 2 This is accepted as genuine by Alien, and somewhat reluctantly by Nichols. The translation is taken from Nichols, Vol. ii, pp. 144, 149. 280 EARLY TUDOR POETRY language. Notwithstanding his various residences in England, in one case of five years, and in spite of the fact that he was given the benefice of Aldington, he never learned to speak English. "He could not preach the word of God to his parishioners in English or hold any communication with them in their own tongue, of which he is entirely ignorant" is Warham's confession.1 Nor is there much reason to assume that he knew any other modern language better. His sole means of communication was the Latin language. Nor did he wish it otherwise. The knowledge of English, French, Dutch, German, Spanish, or even Italian was local. Latin, on the contrary, was familiar to every cultivated man in Europe. With Latin, Erasmus was a denizen, not of one country, but of the world. As Professor Saintsbury exclaims, what a misfortune had Erasmus written in Dutch! Actually, Latin saved him from the limitations of any one nationality. As Erasmus was by profession a writer to the universe, so was his appeal universal. The tales of his incredible popularity, (tales that, it must be confessed, Erasmus himself circulated with true Renaissance modesty), seem founded upon fact. At least, the sale of his books was enormous.2 With all selections and all undated editions omitted from the list, the following compilation gives the number of editions of his more important works from the respective dates of the first edition through the year 1550. The Adagia (1500) has ninety-eight editions; Enchiridion Militis Christiani (1503), seventy-seven; Encomion Morice (1511), forty-nine; De Copia ((1511), ninety; De Constructione (1514), seventy-two; Novum Testamentum (1516), one hundred and forty; and Colloquia (1516), one hundred and two. Even although the number of copies in any edition was probably not large, yet the number of readers must have been very great. The immediate problem here, however, is not the effect upon Europe, so much as the result of his writing upon English thought. England had a peculiar claim upon him. His first regular income was a pension of 20~ from Lord Mountjoy, and to the end of his life he received help from England. Warham proved a generous patron, and apparently he was aided by Colet and the rest. While 1Emerton's Erasmus, p. 185. 2 These figures are taken from the Bibliotheca Erasmiana, compiled by the Direction de la Bibliotheque de l'Universite de l'Etat, a Gand, 1893. HUMANISM 281 still at an impressionable age, he studied Greek at Oxford, and may have taught it at Cambridge, where he held an endowment. Still more important are the mental and spiritual aids he received. His friendships with the Oxford group have already been mentioned. His admiration for them, especially More, was unbounded. It is possible that Colet by his precepts and by his example gave the determining impulse to his whole life. Erasmus, by his devotion to the cause of morality, belongs definitely to the English group. It is no cause to wonder that his popularity, in England, was great. How great it was is shown by the Day-book of John Dorne.1 John Dorne was an Oxford book-seller, and in 1520 he listed each day the books sold with their prices. It is an unemotional record of the literary demands of the Oxford public for that year. During that period, he sold 2383 books. The books in English are manuals, ballads, etc. English literature is practically unrepresented. There are three ballads of Robin Hood, Lydgate's Stans Puer ad Mensam 2, and probably Caxton's translation of the IEneid; 3 yet Chaucer, Gower, Occleve, Hawes, Malory, and Skelton are unrepresented.4 On the other hand, classical literature appears in thirty-seven copies of various works of Cicero, thirty-seven of Terence, thirty of Aristotle, twenty-nine of Vergil, twenty-three of Ovid, fourteen of Lucan, twelve of Aristophanes, nine of Lucian, eight of Horace, eight of Pliny, six of Sallust, three of Aulus Gellius, one of Tacitus, and one of Persius. The English humanists are represented by one copy of Linacre's Galen and three of More's Epistolce ad Eduardum Lei. There is no copy of the Utopia. Of Italian humanism,-twenty-nine copies of Sulpitius were sold, twenty-two of Valla, and three of Politian. French humanism is indicated by twenty-nine copies of various works of Jacobus Faber, the friend of Budaeus and the antagonist of Erasmus, and for the German there were two copies of the Epistole Obscurorum Virorum. But the startling feature of the list is that of Erasmus one hundred and fifty-four copies were sold, without counting 1 Part iii of the First Series of Collectanea, edited by C. R. L. Fletcher, and printed for the Oxford Historical Society. 2 Although in the last line of the poem Lydgate is stated to have been the author, his authorship has yet been doubted. It is accepted by MacCracken. 3 Caxton's Eneydos is medieval, not classical. 4 Barclay appears in a work incapable of identification. 282 EARLY TUDOR POETRY twenty-six copies of works of which he was the general editor.1 Unless, therefore, it be shown either that Oxford, on account of its academic atmosphere, was very unusual as a book-market, or that the year 1520 was very unusual, it necessarily follows that more Englishmen then wished to read the works of Erasmus than the works of any other author, living or dead! It is impossible to ignore his influence upon English literature. The works of Erasmus most in favor with John Dorne's patrons in 1520 are the following, arranged in-the order of their sales: Colloquia; De Constructione; Copia Verborum et Rerum; Enchiridion Militis Christiana; Adagia; Novum Testamentum; Paraphrasis on various parts of the New Testament; Encomion Moriwe (The Praise of Folly); and the dialogue, usually attributed to Faustus Andrelinus, Julius Exclusus.2 Since obviously the sale of any particular work would depend on the length of time it has been before the reading public, and also upon the fluctuations of local interest, little value can be gained from an analysis of the number of copies sold of any work. In general it may be said that the popularity of the second and the third needs no explanation. The De Constructione is a good Latin grammar; the Copia a good rhetoric; as such, the sale of them is interesting only as showing a natural interest in Latin as a medium of expression. Somewhat the same may be argued for the Adagia, a collection of quotations from classic authors, and, perhaps, with the early editions of the Colloquia, the appeal may have been to the study of conversational Latin. But just as the Colloquies are vastly more than merely model conversations, so is Erasmus himself quite other than a mere grammarian. To understand the significance of his immense popularity requires a careful analysis of his work. Unless the readers of his day differed radically from the readers of today, to re-state his popularity in other terms is to say that 1 My counting seems to differ from that of the Rev. Dr. Lindsay, Cambridge History of Literature, iii, 1l-QZ; my figures, although smaller, are yet sufficiently surprising. 2 The much debated authorship of this dialogue is given to Erasmus by Froude, Nichols and Allen (Vol. II, p. 418). In 1516 More writes him: "Lupsetus restituit mihi aliquot quaterniones tuas quas olim apudse tennerat. In his est Iulii Genius..., tua manu omnia." Although Erasmus may have made a manuscript copy of another's work, his subsequent equivocal denials are so obviously motivated that the probability seems strong that he was the author. HUMANISM 283 they found him interesting. And the interest of so many readers is due to the wideness of his appeal. Thus the Adagia, a collection of proverbs from the classics, was bought as a handy vademecum; while the Morice was enjoyed by those that liked intellectual play. The Colloquies, on the other hand, in an age when light reading was rarely obtainable, would in a measure represent both our drama and our novel. The realism of the Naufragium or the humor of the Diversoria had no real competition except in the Italian novelle. Fiction was represented in English and French, either by cumbrous allegorical poems or collections of anecdotes like the Hundred Mery Talys. Here Erasmus may be regarded as the sixteenth century prototype of the novelist. His sense for dramatic situation, his handling of the dialogue form, his wit, and his daring, (illustrated in such a doubtful situation as that in the Adulescens et Scortum), go far to explain the number of his readers. Yet the significance of Erasmus does not lie here. In English literature neither the drama, nor the novel, owe any great debt to Erasmus. What might perhaps have been the literary development was stopped by the Reformation, leaving Erasmus with Lucian on the far side of the gulf. The effect of Erasmus on his own generation was due, not to his form, but to his content; not to the manner in which he delivered his message, but to the message itself; not to his objective creations, but to his own personality.' As a scholar he was perhaps the best known of his generation. With his collaboration the printing house of Froben at Basel ranked as the leading publishers of Europe. He has the scholarly conscience, the desire to find the ipsissima verba of his author. It was this desire that caused the sensation of his edition of the New Testament. The fact that he had neither the critical apparatus, nor the critical training, to enable him to make a text that approximates modern standards is of little importance; the important factor is that he had the desire. While the Church admitted the value of tradition and of historic dicta, of course the basis of all dogma was the New Testament itself. The text, authorized by the Church, was that of the Vulgate, a version prepared by St. Jerome about 400 A. D. And in the lapse of centuries this version had become accepted as the actual Word of God. Upon its phrasing the schoolmen had constructed their elaborate theses. To The effect of Erasmus on form will be discussed later. 284 EARLY TUDOR POETRY question its phrasing seemed sacrilege. This position is illustrated by a letter of Martinuls Dorpius to Erasmus 1 But I also understand, that you have corrected the New Testament, and written notes on more than a thousand passages, not without profit to Theologians. This is another matter, upon which in all friendship I have longed to convey a warning to a friend.... You are proposing to correct the Latin copies by the Greek. But if I show that the Latin version has no mixture of falsehood or mistake, will you not admit that such a work is unnecessary? But this is what I claim for the Vulgate, since it is unreasonable to suppose, that the Universal Church has been in error for so many generations in her use of this edition, nor is it probable that so many holy Fathers have been mistaken, who in reliance upon it have defined the most arduous questions in General Councils, which, it is admitted by most theologians as well as lawyers, are not subject to error in matters of faith. Consequently the cry of heresy arose. And yet Erasmus had dedicated his work by permission to the Pope. It is with surprised irritation that Erasmus justifies himself to Henry Bullock.2 He has been told that the book has been forbidden in one of the Cambridge colleges. What kind of man is it, he exclaims, that is so exceedingly irritable that he is angered by works that would tame even wild beasts! No work can be approved by the General Councils, until it has been placed before them. Nor is it proved that the Vulgate may not have been changed by some scribe. Again, let them clear up, if they can, this dilemma. Do they allow any change to be made in the sacred text, or absolutely none at all? If any, why not first examine whether a change is rightly made or not? If none, what will they do with those passages where the existence of an error is too manifest to be concealed? Nor is that any reason why a method applied to profane learning should not be employed upon the sacred Text. What is it then, that these people find deficient in me? I have not been the first to take this matter in hand; I have not done it without consideration; and I have followed the rule of the Synod. If anyone is influenced by learning, my work is approved by the most learned; if by virtue, it is approved by the most upright; if by authority, it is approved by Bishops, by Archbishops, by the Pope himself. Nevertheless I do not desire to obtain any advantage from their support, if it be found that I have solicited the favour of any of them. Whatever support is given, has been given to the cause, and not to the man. 1 The Epistles by Nichols, ii, 169. 2 Nichols, ii, S24-532, gives extracts; the whole letter is in Allen ii, 321. HUMANISM 285 Read in the light of future events this letter is amusing. Of course those that wished to keep matters exactly as they were were right in protesting! By thus throwing the matter open to individual judgment Erasmus was undermining the authority of the Church. The situation is somewhat analogous to that created by Darwin with his evolutionary theory, and is paralleled by the amount of theological invective it evoked. Erasmus had no desire to attack the dogmas of the Church; merely as a scholar he wished to lay before the world the actual Scriptures. His motive in doing so, however, was that he wished a moral reform. Here we see most clearly the English influence. The novelty of Colet's lectures on the Pauline Epistles lay in interpreting them as human documents and in applying them to the conditions of his own day. That is exactly the position of Erasmus. His annotations to the New Testament drive home the scriptural truths by modern applications. The same attitude appears in the Enchiridion sixteen years earlier. Obviously with the parable of the ten talents in mind he thus comments: 1 The more is committed and lent to thee, the more art thou bound to thy brother. Thou art rich, remember thou art the dispenser, not the lord: take heed circumspectly how thou entreatest the common good. Believest thou that property or impropriation was prohibited and voluntary poverty enjoined to monks only? Thou art deceived, both pertain indifferently to all christian men.... So greatly Christ is coming into contempt to the world, that they think it a goodly and excellent thing to have nothing to do with him: and that so much the more every man should be despised, the more he were to him. Hearest thou not daily of the lay persons in their fury, the names of a clerk, of a priest, of a monk, to be cast in our teeth, instead of a sharp and cruel rebuke, saying, that clerk, thou priest, thou monk, that thou art: and it is done, utterly with none other mind, with none other voice or pronouncing, than if they should cast in our teeth incest or sacrilege. I verily marvel why they also cast not in our teeth baptism, why also object they not against us with the sarazyns the name of Christ as an opprobrious thing. If they said, an evil clerk, an unworthy priest, or an unreligious monk, in that they might be suffered as men which note the manners of the persons, and not despise the profession of virtue. But whosoever counteth praise in themselves the deflowering of virgins, goods taken away in war, money either won or lost at dice, or other chance, and have nothing to lay against another man more spiteful or opprobrious or more to be ashamed of, than the names of a monk or a priest. Certainly it is easy to conjecture what these, in name only christian men, judge of Christ. 1The Enchiridion translated 1533, republished 1905 by Methuen & Co., 215-17. 286 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Throughout his work his aim is to put his scholarly attainments to the service of right living. It is this moral standpoint that is stressed in the letter to Servatius.1 I will now say something about my books. I think you have read the Enchiridion, by which not a few confess themselves to have been inflamed to a love of piety. I claim no merit of my own, but rejoice with Christ, if by his gift through my means any good has been done. I do not know whether you have seen the Book of Adages, as it has been printed by Aldus. It is not a theological work, but one that is useful for every branch of learning, and cost me incalculable nights of toil. I have published a book on Copiousness of matter and language, which I dedicated to my friend Colet, a useful work for persons preparing to preach, though such studies are scorned by those who despise all good Letters. During the last two years, beside other employments, I have corrected the Epistles of Jerome, distinguishing with dagger-marks the spurious additions, and illustrating the obscure passages with notes. I have also corrected the New Testament from the collation of ancient Greek manuscripts, and annotated more than a thousand places, not without profit to theologians. I have begun a commentary on the Epistles of St. Paul, which I shall finish, when I have published what I have already mentioned. For I have resolved to give up my life to Sacred Literature. It is only fair to state that this letter is apologetic, that he carefully avoids mentioning the Moria, and yet there is no reason to suppose that it does not truly reflect his philosophy. And it is the point of view of his English friends, morality rather than literature.2 This very English emphasis upon the moral aspect of literature, joined with the discipline derived from his scholarly pursuits, led him to stress only the essentials. But not satisfied with this, he attacks what he considers the non-essentials, which yet confuse mankind. To discriminate between what is essential and what non-essential, he applies commonsense, thereby becoming an apostle of rationalism. In the Encomion Moric, folly is all that is not dictated by the intellect. All emotional states are therefore foolish. Love, patriotism, war,-all that has inspired the bards of all ages,-is foolish. That this, like the Utopia is only a jeu d'esprit, and that it should not be taken seriously, is of course obvious. All Erasmus means is, that tested by pure intellect life is a divine comedy. And it is impossible to believe that, finished in More's house and dedicated to him, it does not reflect the views of that 1 Nichols, ii, 146-7. 2 This is expanded in Knight's Life of Colet and Seebohm's Oxford Reformers. HUMANISM 287 group. Erasmus, in this work, humorously develops even the modern sceptical spirit.' The next to be placed among the regiment of fools are such as make a trade of telling or inquiring after incredible stories of miracles and prodigies: never doubting that a lie will choke them, they will muster up a thousand several strange relations of spirits, ghosts, apparitions, raising of the devil, and such like bugbears of superstition, which the farther they are from being probably true, the more greedily they are swallowed, and the more devoutly believed. And these absurdities do not only bring an empty pleasure, and cheap divertisement, but they are a good trade, and procure a comfortable income to such priests and friars as by this craft get their gain. To these again are nearly related such others as attribute strange virtues to the shrines and images of saints and martyrs, and so would make their credulous proselytes believe, that if they pay their devotion to St. Christopher in the morning, they shall be guarded and secured the day following from all dangers and misfortunes: if soldiers, when they first take arms, shall come and mumble over such a set prayer before the picture of St. Barbara, they shall return safe from all engagements: or if any pray to Erasmus on such particular holidays, with the ceremony of wax-candles, and other fopperies, he shall in a short time be rewarded with a plentiful increase of wealth and riches. The Christians have now their gigantic St. George, as well as the pagans had their Hercules:, they paint the saint on horseback, and drawing the horse in splendid trappings, very gloriously accoutred, they scarce refrain in a literal sense from worshipping the very beast. There is no argument here. It is assumed that the absurdity becomes evident by the mere statement. To a mind familiar with pagan gods and pagan superstitions,-and to pagan objections to both, —certain aspects of Christian civilization presented evident analogies. Human nature is human nature, and whether the particular manifestation of its aberration is worship directed to St. George or to Hercules is accidental. This rational point of view when turned upon revealed religion which by hypothesis is irrational because beyond the human reason, led Erasmus into attacks upon the abuses of the Church. This natural sequence is shown in the paragraphs immediately following the one just quoted: What shall I say of such as cry up and maintain the cheat of pardons and indulgences? that by these compute the time of each soul's residence in purgatory, and assign them a longer or shorter continuance, according as they purchase more or fewer of these paltry pardons, and saleable exemptions? Or what can be said bad enough of others, as pretend that by the force of such magical charms, or by the 1I am using the anonymous translation issued by Reeves, 1876 and re-issued by Gibbing & Co., 1900. 288 EARLY TUDOR POETRY fumbling over their beads in the rehearsal of such and such petitions (which some religious impostors invented, either for diversion, or what is more likely for advantage), they shall procure riches, honour, pleasure, health, long life, a lusty old age, nay, after death a sitting at the right hand of our Saviour in His kingdom; though as to this last part of their happiness, they care not how long it be deferred, having scarce any appetite toward a-tasting the joys of heaven, till they are surfeited, glutted with, and can no longer relish their enjoyments on earth. By this easy way of purchasing pardon, any notorious highwayman, any plundering soldier, or any bribe-taking judge, shall disburse some part of their unjust gains, and so think all their grossest impieties sufficiently atoned for; so many perjuries, lusts, drunkenness, quarrels, bloodsheds, cheats, treacheries, and all sorts of debaucheries, shall all be, as it were, struck a bargain for, and such a contract made, as if they had paid off all arrears, and might now begin upon new score. And what can be more ridiculous, than for some others to be confident of going to heaven by repeating daily those seven verses out of the Psalms, which the devil taught St. Bernard, thinking thereby to have put a trick upon him, but that he was over-reached in his cunning... From the same principles of folly proceeds the custom of each country's challenging their particular guardian-saint; nay, each saint has his distinct office allotted to him, and is accordingly addressed to upon the respective occasions: as one for the toothache, a second to grant an easy delivery in child-birth, a third to help persons to lost goods, another to protect seamen in a long voyage, another to guard the farmer's cows and sheep, and so on; for to rehearse all instances would be extremely tedious. There are some more catholic saints petitioned to upon all occasions, as more especially the Virgin Mary, whose blind devotees think it manners now to place the mother before the Son. And of all the prayers and intercessions that are made to these respective saints the substance of them is no more than down-right Folly.... Such frankness of discussion may be explained, as in the analogous case of the Utopia, by stressing the undoubted fact that the aim here is to amuse. The Moria, an intellectual pastime, is more interesting as an example of the writer's agility than as a record of his personal opinions. To call him to account for paradoxes uttered in the name of Folly is doubtless foolish. The same condition, however, scarcely holds with his most popular work, the Colloquia. In origin it was a series of model conversations in Latin, a Latin Ollendorf. What quickly differentiates it from any other book of this type is both the dramatic nature of the conversations and the extraordinary subjects of them. It is really a series of discussions, in the form of dialogue, of the vital questions of the sixteenth century. Inevitably the authority of the Church over the individual is argued. This, at a time when HUMANISM 289 the Reformation was developing in Germany, the Huguenots were forming in France, and England was trembling in the balance, was above all the most difficult and the most interesting question before Europe. In the celebrated 'IXOvobaTya a fishmonger and a butcher open the discussion by questioning the papal prohibition of flesh on certain days in favor of fish. As, of course, there was no refrigeration in the sixteenth century, the question was not an academic one, nor are the terms used in discussing it academic. But it quickly passed into the distinction between the commands of God and the laws of the Church, and then into the typical Erasmian position of emphasis upon the essential in contrast to the mere observance.1 But. What a mighty Crime is it accounted for any one to receive the Sacrament, not having first wash'd his Mouth! when, at the same Time, they do not stick to take it with an unpurified Mind, defiled with vile Affections. Fish. How many Priests are there, that would die before they would participate the Sacrament in a Chalice and Charger, that has not been consecrated by a Bishop, or in their every-Day Clothes? But among them all that are thus nice, how many do we see that are not at all afraid to come to the Lord's Table, drunk with the last Night's Debauch? How fearful are they, lest they touch the Wafer with that Part of the Hand that has not been dipp'd in consecrated Oil? Why are they not as religious in taking Care that an unhallow'd Mind does not offend the Lord himself? But. We won't so much as touch a consecrated Vessel, and think we have been guilty of a heinous Offense, if we shall chance so to do; and yet in the mean Time, how unconcern'd are we, while we violate the living Temples of the Holy Spirit? Fish. Human Constitutions require that no Bastard, lame, or one that hath but one Eye, be admitted to any sacred Function; how nice are we as to this Point. But in the mean Time, Unlearned, Gamesters, Drunkards, Soldiers, and Murderers, are admitted every where. They tell us, that the Diseases of the Mind lie not open to our View; I don't speak of those Things that are hidden, but of such as are more plain to be seen than the Deformity of the Body. Here Erasmus' objection is not to the forms and ceremonies in themselves, but to the fact that they have superseded the substance. Exactly similar is his attitude toward confession. In the following passage between Erasmus and Gaspar, the latter is a stalking horse for Erasmus' own opinions.2 Er. I am of your Mind; but how do you stand affected as to Confession? Ga. Very well; for I confess daily. Er. Every Day? I use Bailey's translation of 1725. 2 The Child's Piety. 290 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Ga. Yes. Er. Then you ought to keep a Priest to yourself. Ga. But I confess to him who only truly remits Sins, to whom all the Power is given. Er. To whom? Ga. To Christ. Er. And do you think that's sufficient? Ga. It would be enough for me, if it were enough for the Rulers of the Church, and receiv'd Custom. Er. Who do you call the Rulers of the Church? Ga. The Popes, Bishops and Apostles. Er. And do you put Christ into this Number? Ga. He is without Controversy the chief Head of 'em all. Er. And was he the Author of this Confession in use? Ga. He is indeed the Author of all good; but whether he appointed Confession as it is now us'd in the Church, I leave to be disputed by Divines. The Authority of my Betters is enough for me that am but a Lad and a private Person. This is certainly the principal Confession; nor is it an easy Matter to confess to Christ; no Body confesses to him, but he that is angry with his Sin. If I have committed any great Offence, I lay it open, and bewail it to him, and implore his Mercy; I cry out, weep and lament, nor do I give over before I feel the Love of Sin throughly purged from the Bottom of my Heart, and some Tranquility and Chearfulness of Mind follow upon it, which is an Argument of the Sin being pardoned. And when the Time requires to go to the holy Communion of the Body and Blood of Christ; then I make Confession to a Priest too, but in few Words, and nothing but what I am well satisfy'd are Faults, or such that carry in them a very great Suspicion that they are such; neither do I always take it to be a capital or enormous Crime, every Thing that is done contrary to human Constitutions, unless a wicked Contemptuousness shall go along with it: Nay, I scarce believe any Crime to be Capital, that has not Malice join'd with it, that is, a perverse Will. Confession is merely a form, useful only as it follows the true confession to the Christ; absolution also is merely a form, useful only as it represents the true absolution given alone by God. One more illustration of this new rationalism, born of humanistic study, must be given. In 1513-14 Erasmus went on a pilgrimage to the shrines of Our Lady of Walsingham in Norfolk and of St. Thomas A Becket at Canterbury. In the relics shown, there and elsewhere, Erasmus expresses complete unbelief and in his Peregrinatio religionis ergo ridicules the whole system mercilessly. He is shown the middle joint of the finger of St. Peter. I then took Notice of the Bigness of the Joint, which was large enough to be taken for that of a Giant. Upon which, said I, Peter must Needs have been a very lusty Man. At this one of the Company fell a-laughing. HUMANISM 291 The Virgin's house transported in the air, like the Holy House at Loretto, the fragments of the True Cross, which if gathered together "would seem to be sufficient Loading for a good large Ship;" the Virgin's Milk, authenticated by the statement of an unknown nun to Matthew of Paris, on account of which indulgences are given, and the treasures of the place are each in turn held up to scorn. In the second pilgrimage they are shown the immensely valuable possessions of the shrine of St. Thomas.' His friend "Gratian Pullus, " "a Man of Learning and Piety, but not so well affected to this Part of Religion as I could wish he were," interrupted the performance: My Friend Gratian lost himself here extremely. After a short Prayer, he says to the Assistant of him that shew'd us the Reliques, Good Father, is it true, as I have heard, that Thomas, while he liv'd, was very charitable to the Poor? Very true, replies he, and began to relate a great many Instances of his Charity. Then, answers Gratian, I don't believe that good Inclination in him is changed, unless it be for the better. The Officer assented. Then, says he again, if this holy Man was so liberal to the Poor, when he was a poor Man himself, and stood in Need of Charity for the Support of his own Body, don't you think he would take it well now, when he is grown so rich, and wants nothing, if some poor Woman having a Family of Children at Home ready to starve, or Daughters in Danger of being under a necessity to prostitute themselves for want of Portions, or a Husband sick in Bed, and destitute of all Comforts; if such a Woman should ask him Leave to make bold with some small Portion of these vast Riches, for the Relief of her Family, taking it either as by Consent, or by Gift, or by Way of Borrowing? The Assistant making no Answer to this, Gratian being a warm Man, I am fully persuaded, says he, that the good Man would be glad at his Heart, that when he is dead he could be able to relieve the Necessities of the Poor with his Wealth. Upon this the Shewer of the Relicks began to frown, and to pout out his Lips, and to look upon us as if he would have eaten us up; and I don't doubt but he would have spit in our Faces, and have turn'd us out of the Church by the Neck and Shoulders, but that we had the Archbishop's Recommendation. From such passages and others like them, the easy inference is that Erasmus is an out-and-out reformer, that he but waited for the flag to be unfurled to join the ranks. Actually nothing is farther from the truth. He lived a good Romanist, and at the end of his life received 600 ducats from the Papacy with the intimation that he was to be made a cardinal. The usual ex1 Compare Chapter 1, p. 17. A modern analogue to this is the shrine of San Carlo Borromeo at Milan, and Gratian's disgust is duplicated by that of the modern Protestant visitor. 292 EARLY TUDOR POETRY planation of this anomalous situation is expressed in Pope's antithesis, "the glory of the priesthood and the shame." At the worst, he is represented as, although a reformer at heart, afraid to join the ranks, lest he lose the flesh-pots of the Papacy; at the best, that he was by nature a "trimmer." Neither extreme of these opinions does justice to the bias of his mind, trained by humanism. Exactly the same faculties, which made him a critic of the abuses of the Church, exposed to him the dangers of the new movement. His attitude is shown in a letter of 1529: 1 In such times as ours it is better to call on the Lord than to trust in princes and armies. We must pray to Him to shorten these days. Alas! Christianity has sunk so low that scarce a man knows now what calling on the Lord means. One looks to cardinals and bishops, another to kings, another to the black battalions of monks and divines. What do they want? What do they expect from protectors, who care nothing for Catholic piety, and care only to recover their old power and enjoyments? We were drunk or asleep, and God has sent these stern schoolmasters to wake us up. The rope has been overstrained. It might have stood if they had slackened it a little, but they would rather have it break than save it by concession. The Pope is head of the Church, and as such deserves to be honoured. He stretched his authority too far, and so the first strand of the rope parted. Pardons and indulgences were tolerable within limits. Monks and commissaries filled the world with them to line their own pockets. In every Church were the red boxes and the crosses and the papal arms, and the people were forced to buy. So the second strand went. Then there was the invocation of saints. The images in churches at first served for ornaments and examples. By-and-by the walls were covered with scandalous pictures. The cult ran to idolatry; so parted a third. The singing of hymns was an ancient and pious custom, but when music was introduced fitter for weddings and banquets than for God's service, and the sacred words were lost in affected intonations, so that no word in the Liturgy was spoken plainly, away went another. What is more solemn than the mass? But when stupid vagabond priests learn up two or three masses and repeat them over and over as a cobbler makes shoes; when notorious profligates officiate at the Lord's table, and the sacredest of mysteries is sold for money-well, this strand is almost gone too. Secret confession may be useful; but when it is employed to extort money out of the terrors of fools, when an institution designed as medicine for the soul is made an instrument of priestly villany, this part of the cord will not last much longer either. Priests who are loose in their lives and yet demand to be honoured as superior 1 The Collected Works of Erasmus, Froben (1540) Tomus 3, 935-40. Froude's abridgement (op. cit. 363) which I here cite, taken from the Leiden edition seems to me, by slight turns in language, to overemphasize Erasmus' position. The Leiden Edition, 1703-1709, contains matter not written by Erasmus, according to the title-page, but such matter is not differentiated in the body of the work. This fact misled Froude into quoting passages that are at best only doubtful. HUMANISM 293 beings have brought their order into contempt. Careless of purity, careless what they do or how they live, the monks have trusted to their wealth and numbers to crush those whom they can no longer deceive. They pretended that their clothes would work miracles, that they could bring good luck into houses and keep the devil out. How is it at present? They used to be thought gods. They are now scarcely thought honest men. I do not say that practices good in themselves should be condemned because they are abused. But I do say that we have ourselves given the occasion. We have no right to be surprised or angry, and we ought to consider quietly how best to meet the storm. As things go now there will be no improvement, let the dice fall which way they will. The Gospellers go for anarchy; the Catholics, instead of repenting of their sins, pile superstition on superstition; while Luther's disciples, if such they be, neglect prayers, neglect the fasts of the Church, and eat more on fast days than on common days. Papal constitutions, clerical privileges, are scorned and trampled on; and our wonderful champions of the Church do more than anyone to bring the Holy See into contempt. There are rumors of peace. God grant they prove true. If the Emperor, the Pope, and the Kings of France and England can compose their differences and agree on some common course of action, evangelical religion may be restored. But we must deserve our blessings if we are to enjoy them. When princes go mad, the fault is often in ourselves. This letter defines the position of the humanists. Of course the Church had abuses. But that, on account of them, one should go to the other extreme of the anarchy of private judgment or the fatalism of Luther's Augustinianism was to jump from the frying pan into the fire. Therefore he was exactly as much an opponent of the dogmatism of Luther, of the Protestant excesses, of the bibliolatry of the reformers, and of the religious debauches carried on in the name of the Spirit, as he was of the abuse of the confession, of pilgrimages and relic-worshipping, etc. The result was that Erasmus pleased neither party. In the time of conflict the golden mean has no friends. Erasmus called loudly for reform but insisted that reform should come from within the Church. The Catholics denied the first half of the proposition and the Protestants the latter. Consequently the term Erasmian has become one of reproach, of Laodicean indifference. Yet surely it is conceivable that, if Erasmus might have had his way, if the Church might have sloughed off the undoubted evils without the world paying the penalty of the English schism, of the German wars, of the Massacre of St. Bartholomew, we might have arrived at the present state of grace without the inherited scars. That it was not possible, that the golden mean is static and not dynamic, is a confession of human weakness. Therefore it is Luther, not Erasmus, 294 EARLY TUDOR POETRY that is the protagonist of the Reformation. Erasmus was too "academic." With the same clearness of vision that he saw the errors of the present Church, he foresaw the difficulties of the future. Hamlet-like, the native hue of resolution Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought; And enterprises of great pith and moment, With this regard, their currents turn awry, And lose the name of action. The value of this analysis of Erasmus' position lies in the fact that to a large extent he is the mouth-piece of English humanism. As has been said, John Dome's day-book shows the immense popularity of his works. Wynkyn de Worde issued three editions of the Colloquia and by 1549 Challoner translated them into English. The heretical attitude toward relics, as shown in the extract quoted above, apparently is that of Colet himself, who actually was the Gratian Pullus of the dialogue. Even the Moria with its brilliant irreverence was defended by More, and Erasmus calls More his "twin spirit." And if this be so, the apparent failure of the English humanists is explained. Their intellectual perception certainly opened the way for the man of action in Cromwell. But when their academic speculations became metamorphosed into facts, in terror they threw themselves back upon the sure authority of the Church,1 repudiated their idle thoughts, and endeavored to counteract the harm already done. For this reason, aside from their immediate friends, they left no school and no inheritors. This is the explanation of the apparent anomaly that, between 1500 and 1530, such a group of writers existed, writers like beacons of modern thought washed on all sides by the waves of bigotry, superstition, and ignorance. The total effect upon English thought, cumulative through the centuries, is incalculable. Although in its immediate effect humanism was primarily destructive and, as such, played its part in the separation of England from the Papacy, today only the specialist knows or cares for the temporal issues, and the works are read for their serenity and their poise. Somewhat the same paradox exists in the relation of humanists toward the great educational questions of the age. Here there is More in his Dialogue of Images explicitly accepts the dogmatic authority of the Church. HUMANISM 295 the same mingling of destruction and of construction, and the same problem of the effect of the Reformation. Consequently, there is the same difficulty in arriving at an impartial estimation of the relative proportion of the various factors, especially since the chief witnesses were also the chief actors, and therefore biassed. In general it may be stated that the old scholastic system was deductive. From a combination of Biblical and Aristotelian precepts it was held that all truth may be deduced, even that of the greatest problems, the existence of God, the personality of the Trinity, and the relation of the Divine to humanity. Thus the system of St. Thomas Aquinas implies the harmony of faith and reason. But very early the age-long conflict between reason and faith showed itself. Already in St. Thomas certain tenets are removed from the domain of reason to be placed with those belonging to the province of faith. Still others were added by Duns Scotus, and in his pupil Occam the separation of theology and philosophy is practically completed. But, just as education is now controlled and regulated by the State, so then education was controlled and regulated by the Church. The effect, therefore, of removing from education the theological speculations that gave it vitality, was to deaden the whole system. The method of deductive reasoning that had stimulated creative thought in the great schoolmen, during the closing years of the fifteenth century, was utilized only in discovering the non-essential, and the emphasis was laid upon the form, not upon the results. In the revered syllogism it was the correctness of the deduction rather than the truth of the premises that was stressed. It is this mental attitude that is ridiculed in the Epistolce Obscurorum Virorum.1 Our host, therefore, who is a humanist of parts, fell to some discourse on Poetry, and greatly belauded Julius Caesar, as touching both his writings and his valorous deeds. So soon as I heard this, I perceived my opportunity, for I had studied much, and learned much under you in the matter of Poetry, when I was at Cologne, and I said, "Forasmuch as you have begun to speak concerning Poetry, I can therefore no longer hide my light under a bushel, and I roundly aver that I believe not that Ccesar wrote those Commentaries, and I will prove my position with argument following, which runneth thus: Whosoever hath business with arms and is occupied in labour unceasing cannot learn Latin; but Caesar was ever at War and in labours Epistolce Obscurorum Virorum, The Latin Text with an English Rendering, Notes, and an Historical Introduction by Francis Griffin Stokes, London, Chatto & Windus, 1909, p. 371. 296 EARLY TUDOR POETRY manifold; therefore he could not become lettered and get Latin. In truth, therefore, I believe that it was none other than Suetonius who wrote those Commentaries, for I have met with none who hath a style liker to Coesar's than Suetonius." After I had thus spoken, and much else which here, for brevity's sake, I set not down —since, as you know from the ancient saw, "The moderns delight in brevity"-Erasmus laughed, but said nothing, for I had overthrown him by the subtilty of my argument. The significance of the burlesque here lies in the attack upon the syllogism; the fact that the book was by some accepted at its face value shows that this attack was in a measure deserved. At least in the opinion of the humanists, the end achieved by the educational methods was in itself undesirable. As Von Hutten here uses Erasmus as the contrasting figure to scholasticism, it may be interesting to quote his attack in the Encomion Moria, where he pays his equivocal respects to the theologians, the finest flower of the educational system.1 It is true, no men own a less dependence on me (Folly), yet have they reason to confess themselves indebted for no small obligations. For it is by one of my properties, self-love, that they fancy themselves, with their elder brother, Paul, caught up into the third heaven, from whence, like shepherds indeed, they look down upon their flock, the laity, grazing as it were, in the vales of the world below. They fence themselves in with so many surrounders of magisterial definitions, conclusions, corollaries, propositions explicit and implicit, that there is no falling in with them; or if they do chance to be urged to a seeming non-plus, yet they find out so many evasions, that all the art of man can never bind them so fast, but that an easy distinction shall give them a starting-hole to escape the scandal of being baffled. They will cut asunder the toughest argument with as much ease as Alexander did the gordian knot; they will thunder out so many rattling terms as shall fright an adversary into conviction. They are exquisitely dexterous in unfolding the most intricate mysteries; they will tell you to a tittle all the successive proceedings of Omnipotence in the creation of the universe; they will explain the precise manner of original sin being derived from our first parents; they will satisfy you in what manner, by what degrees, and in how long a time, our Saviour was conceived in the Virgin's womb, and demonstrate in the consecrated wafer how accidents may subsist without a subject. Nay, these are accounted trivial, easy questions; they have yet far greater difficulties behind, which notwithstanding they solve with as much expedition as the former; as namely, whether supernatural generation requires any instant of time for its acting? whether Christ, as a son, bears a double specifically distinct relation to God the Father, and his virgin mother? whether this proposition is possible to be true, the first person of the Trinity hated the second? whether God, who took our nature upon him in the form of a man, 1 Erasmus in Praise of Folly, London, 1876, pp. 121-129. HUMANISM 297 could as well have become a woman, a devil, a beast, a herb, or a stone? and were it so possible that the Godhead had appeared in any shape of an inanimate substance, how he should then have preached his gospel? or how have been nailed to the cross? whether if St. Peter had celebrated the eucharist at the same time our Saviour was hanging on the cross, the consecrated bread would have been transubstantiated into the same body that remained on the tree? whether in Christ's corporal presence in the sacramental wafer, his humanity be not abstracted from his Godhead? whether after the resurrection we shall carnally eat and drink as we do in this life? There are a thousand other more sublimated and refined niceties of notions, relations, quantities, formalities, quiddities, haecceities, and such like abstrusities, as one would think no one could pry into,, except he had not only such cat's eyes as to see best in the dark, but even such a piercing faculty as to see through an inch-board, and spy out what really never had any being. Add to these some of their tenets and opinions, which are so absurd and extravagant, that the wildest fancies of the Stoicks which they so much disdain and decry as paradoxes, seem in comparison just and rational; as their maintaining, that it is a less aggravating fault to kill a hundred men, than for a poor cobbler to set a stitch on the sabbathday; or, that it is more justifiable to do the greatest injury imaginable to others, than to tell the least lie ourselves. And these subtilties are alchymized to a more refined sublimate by the abstracting brains of their several schoolmen; the Realists, the Nominalists, the Thomists, the Albertists, the Occamists, the Scotists; and these are not all, but the rehearsal of a few only, as a specimen of their divided sects; in each of which there is so much of deep learning, so much of unfathomable difficulty, that I believe the apostles themselves would stand in need of a new illuminating spirit, if they were to engage in any controversy with these new divines. St. Paul, no question, had a full measure of faith; yet when he lays down faith to be the substance of things not seen, these men carp at it for an imperfect definition, and would undertake to teach the apostles better logic. Thus the same holy author wanted for nothing of the grace of charity, yet (say they) he describes and defines it but very inaccurately, when he treats of it in the thirteenth chapter of his first epistle to the Corinthians. The primitive disciples were very frequent in administering the holy sacrament, breaking bread from house to house; yet should they be asked of the Terminus a quo and the Terminus ad quem, the nature of transubstantiation? the manner how one body can be in several places at the same time? the difference betwixt the several attributes of Christ in heaven, on the cross, and in the consecrated bread? what time is required for the transubstantiating the bread into flesh? how it can be done by a short sentence pronounced by the priest, which sentence is a species of discreet quantity, that has no permanent punctum? Were they asked (I say) these, and several other confused queries, I do not believe they could answer so readily as our mincing school-men now-a-days take a pride to do. They were well acquainted with the Virgin Mary, yet none of them undertook to prove that she was preserved immaculate from original sin, as some of our divines very hotly contend for. St. Peter had the keys given to him, and that by our Saviour himself, who had never entrusted him except he had known him capable of their manage and custody; and yet it is much to be questioned whether Peter was sensible of that subtilty broached by Scotus, that he may have the key of knowledge effectually for others, who has no knowledge actually in himself. Again, they baptized all 298 EARLY TUDOR POETRY nations, and yet never taught what was the formal, material, efficient, and final cause of baptism, and certainly never dreamt of distinguishing between a delible and an indelible character in this sacrament. They worshipped in the spirit, following their master's injunction, God is a spirit, and they which worship him, must worship him in spirit, and in truth; yet it does not appear that it was ever revealed to them how divine adoration should be paid at the same time to our blessed Saviour in heaven, and to his picture here below on a wall, drawn with two fingers held out, a bald crown, and a circle round his head. To reconcile these intricacies to an appearance of reason requires three-score year's experience in metaphysics. Farther, the apostles often mention Grace, yet never distinguish between gratia, gratis data, and gratia gratificans. They earnestly exhort us likewise to good works, yet never explain the difference between Opus operans, and Opus operatum. They very frequently press and invite us to seek after charity, without dividing it into infused and acquired, or determining whether it be a substance or an accident, a created or an uncreated being. They detested sin themselves, and warned others from the commission of it; and yet I am sure they could never have defined so dogmatically, as the Scotists have since done. St. Paul, who in other's judgment is no less the chief of the apostles, than he was in his own the chief of sinners, who being bred at the feet of Gamaliel, was certainly more eminently a scholar than any of the rest, yet he often exclaims against vain philosophy, warns us from doting about questions and strifes of words, and charges us to avoid profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of science falsely so called; which he would not have done, if he had thought it worth his while to have become acquainted with them, which he might soon have been, the disputes of that age being but small, and more intelligible sophisms, in reference to the vastly greater intricacies they are now improved to. But yet, however, our scholastic divines are so modest, that if they meet with any passage in St. Paul, or any other penman of holy writ, which is not so well modelled, or critically disposed of, as they could wish, they will not roughly condemn it, but bend it rather to a favorable interpretation, out of reverence to antiquity, and respect to the holy scriptures; though indeed it were unreasonable to expect anything of this nature from the apostles, whose lord and master had given unto them to know the mysteries of God, but not those of philosophy. If the same divines meet with anything of like nature unpalatable in St. Chrysostom, St. Basil, St. Hierom, or others of the fathers, they will not stick to appeal from their authority, and very fairly resolve that they lay under a mistake. Yet these ancient fathers were they who confuted both the Jews and Heathens, though they both obstinately adhered to their respective prejudices; they confuted them (I say), yet by their lives and miracles, rather than by words and syllogisms; and the persons they thus proselyted were downright honest, well meaning people, such as understood plain sense better than any artificial pomp of reasoning: whereas if our divines should now set about the gaining converts from paganism by their metaphysical subtilties, they would find that most of the persons they applied themselves to were either so ignorant as not at all to apprehend them, or so impudent as to scoff and deride them; or finally, so well skilled at the same weapons, that they would be able to keep their pass, and fence off all assaults of conviction: and this last way the victory would be altogether as hopeless, as if two persons were engaged of so equal strength, that it were impossible any one should overpower the other. HUMANISM 299 And Folly ends by recommending that all such divines should be sent on a crusade against the Turk. In so far as Folly here speaks with the voice of Erasmus and his humanist brethren, the conclusion is inevitable that they were in complete reaction against the products of the medieval system of education. Disliking the results achieved, the humanists also disliked the methods by which those results were produced. The whole system of medieval education, founded upon the " dispute " as a means to promote intellectual subtlety, seemed to them an abomination. Since the object was not truth but mental agility, the result was wrangling over the non-essential. As Vives expresses it: 1 Even the youngest scholars (tyrones) are accustomed never to keep silence; they are always asserting vigourously whatever comes uppermost in their minds, lest they should seem to be giving up the dispute. Nor does one disputation or even two each day prove sufficient, as for instance at dinner. They wrangle at breakfast; they wrangle after breakfast; before supper they wrangle, and they wrangle after supper.... At home they dispute over their food, in the bath, in the sweatingroom, in the church, in the town, in the country, in public, in private; at all times they are wrangling. And this training was carried on even into the advanced stages of education. In the following passage, it is no longer the voice of Folly, it is Erasmus speaking.2...the principal part of this evil seems to me to arise from the public schools, which they now ambitiously term universities, as tho nothing pertaining to good discipline were wanting; then from the monasteries, especially those in which they are taught evangelical doctrine, such as are the Dominicans', the Franciscans', and the Augustinian monasteries. For in these the students, after scarcely three months had been given to a study of grammar, are incontinently hurried away to sophistry, dialectics, suppositions, amplifications, restrictions, expositions, and solutions of unsolvable questions, such as concerning griffins and the Labyrinth; from thence immediately into the mysteries of divinity. Such students, when they have come to those authors who excell in the eloquence of both classic languages, how blind they were, how ignorant, how they thought. themselves in another world. That such statements are extreme is clear at a glance from the authors read by the scholastic Skelton, whose knowledge of classical literature is curiously comprehensive 3; yet it is significant that 1 J. L. Vives, Dialogues of a Tudor Schoolboy (Lingua Latinoe Exercitatio) translated by Foster Watson, Preface. 2 Erasmus, Dialogus de Pronuntiatione. 3 Chapter iii, pp. 156-7. 300 EARLY TUDOR POETRY a man of Erasmus' position in a serious work should dare make them at all, in that it shows to what a depth the scholastic system has sunk in popular estimation. But whatever may have been the actual condition, so long as the humanists professed such an estimate of scholastic education, clearly one of their chief aims would be to replace that system by one more in accordance with their ideals, and to provide schools in which it might be practiced. It is, therefore, perfectly normal that the end of the first decade of the sixteenth century should see the establishment of the first of the new type of school, Dean Colet's celebrated foundation of St. Paul's. The most authoritative description of this is given us by Erasmus.1 Upon the death of his father, when by right of inheritance he was possessed of a good sum of money; lest the keeping of it should corrupt his mind, and turn it too much toward the world, he laid out a great part of it in building a new school in the churchyard of St. Paul's, dedicated to the child Jesus: a magnificent fabric; to which he added two dwelling-houses for the two several masters: and to them he allotted ample salaries, that they might teach a certain number of boys, free, and for the sake of charity. He divided the school into four apartments. The first, viz. the porch and entrance, is for catechumens, or the children to be instructed in the principles of religion; where no child is to be admitted, but what can read and write. The second apartment is for the lower boys, to be taught by the second master, or usher: the third for the upper forms, under the headmaster: which two parts of the school are divided by a curtain, to be drawn at pleasure. Over the master's chair is an image of the child Jesus, of admirable work, in the gesture of teaching; whom all the boys, going and coming, salute with a short hymn: and there is a representation of God the Father, saying, Hear ye him; these words being written at my suggestion. The fourth or last apartment is a little chapel for divine service. The school has no corners or hiding places; nothing like a cell or closet. The boys have their distinct forms, or benches, one above another. Every form holds sixteen; and he that is head or captain of each form has a little kind of desk by way of preieminence. They are not to admit all boys of course, but to choose them in according to their parts and capacities. The wise and sagacious founder saw that the greatest hopes and happiness of the commonwealth were in the training up of children to good letters and true religion: for which noble purpose he laid out an immense sum of money: and yet he would admit no one to bear a share in this expense. Some person having left a legacy of one hundred pounds sterling toward the fabric of the school, dean Colet perceived a design in it, and, by leave of the Bishop, got that money to be laid out upon the vestments of the church of St. Paul. After he had finished all, he left the perpetual care and oversight of the estate, and government of it, not to the clergy, not to the bishop, not to the chapter, nor to any great minister at court; but amongst the married laymen, to the company of mercers, Quoted in Knight's Lfe of Colet, pp. 98-101. HUMANISM 801 men of probity and reputation. And when he was asked the reason of so committing this trust, he answered to this effect: That there was no absolute certainty in human affairs; but for his part, he found less corruption in such a body of citizens, than in any other order or degree of mankind. Following Colet's example, during the reign of Henry VIII fortyeight grammar schools were founded, and, before Elizabeth's, many of the colleges of Oxford and Cambridge came into being.t In Oxford, Corpus Christi was founded in 1516; Christ Church, in 1526; Trinity, in 1554; St. John's, in 1555; and in Cambridge, Christi, in 1506; St. John's, in 1511; Magdalen, in 1542; Trinity, in 1546; Gonville and Caius, in 1557. Such facts as these just quoted are impressive, but it should be remembered that in veiy many cases with the transference of the educational burden from the Church to the state, they represent merely a transformation. Nor is the inference justified that they show an increase in learning. As Benson shows,2 exactly the reverse was true, because while in 1535 in Oxford one hundred and eight men graduated, in 1536 the number had fallen to forty-four, and up to the end of Henry's reign the average was but fifty-seven. At Cambridge Fuller quaintly confesses: 3 There was now a generall decay of students, no IColledge having more scholars therein then hardly those of the foundation, no Volunteers at all, and only persons pressed in a manner by their places to reside. Indeed on the fall of Abbeys fell the hearts of all Scholars, fearing the ruin of learning. Such a condition seems comprehensible. The destructive force of humanism, combined with the destructive force of the Reformation was greater than the constructive. While the old had been swept aside, the new conceptions were more than the country could assimilate. It is what would be naturally expected from so complete a reversal of educational ideals. The whole program of the humanists is expressed in the phrase in Erasmus' account of Colet, that Knight renders "good letters These figures are quoted from Cornelie Benndorf., Die Englische Pddagogik im 16. Jahrhundert, Wien, 1905. 2 The Rev. R. H. Benson, Chapter iii, Vol. iii of the Cambridge History of English Literature. 3 The History of the University of Cambridge, 1655; this appears as a sort of an appendix to his Church History. Page 121. 302 EARLY TUDOR POETRY and true religion," bonis rationibus.1 Clearly Knight has read into the indefinite ratio of Erasmus what were to be the two fundamentals of English education. If the phrase be extended to classical literature and the Protestant religion,-a zeugma foreign to Colet's intentions,-the development of the schools will be indicated. For here, also, as in so many other places, the humanists unconsciously paved the way for the Reformation. Back of the whole Renaissance movement there was a subtle shifting of emphasis from the claims of the next world to those of this, and a development of the rationalistic point of view.2 With the greater claims of the world upon the human faculties the educational ideals in which the study of theology was paramount gave place to an education both more broad and less intense. More attention was given to holy living than to holy dying. Partly in reaction from the former ages, and partly from necessity, the humanists preached the paradox that the ideal training for a Christian life is given by an intimate knowledge of pagan authors. As a result, in the first half of the sixteenth century the English race threw aside the accumulated experience of a millenium, the methods of the schoolmen were discarded as futile, and their language branded as barbarous. The wind whirled the leaves of Duns Scotus through the courts of Oxford, and gothic became a term of reproach. Latin was the gateway of learning, a knowledge of Horace the stamp of the educated gentleman, and familiarity with classical literature the aim of the scholar. Of the three great northern scholars at the beginning of the sixteenth century, Erasmus, Budaeus, and Vives,3 it was the last that formulated the coming pedagogy. Erasmus' Institutio Principis Christiani (1527) gives rather general advice and rules of conduct,4 and Budaeus' De l'Institution du Prince (1547) comes The entire sentence in Latin is Vidit illud vir perspicacissimuz, in hoc esse prccipuam reipublicce spem, si prima cetas bonis rationibus institueretur. 2This is statea, certainly as strongly as I have, by Pontanus, Opera, Basel, 1566, T. 1, pp. 981-982. a The sequence, humanism producing rationalism and rationalism producing the Reformation, is illustrated by these three men. To each, although a good Romanist, was imputed heretical opinions, and some of the works of each at some time were placed on the Index. 4 The difference between Erasmus and Vives is best illustrated by a comparison of the Colloquia with the Linguae Latine Exercitatio. Although the advowed aim of HUMANISM 303 too late to have much effect upon the first half century. It is curious that of the three, two should have been connected with England. In 1523 the young Spaniard Juan Luis Vives (1492-1540) came to England, was made D.C.L. at Oxford, lectured there, and was appointed to superintend the education of the Princess Mary. In 1528, apparently on account of the partisanship with which he espoused the cause of Queen Katherine, he was imprisoned for six weeks, and finally banished from the country. During these five years his published works, De ratione studii puerilis (Oxford 1523), consisting of two outlines of study, the first written for the Princess Mary giving the studies for girls and the second written for Charles Montjoy giving the studies for boys, and the Introductio ad sapientiam (Bruges 1524), a series of aphorisms, practically gave the foundations of his educational theories. These he elaborated into the great De disciplinis (1531), in which the system is explained and defended. Consequently in 1523, at Oxford, the theory of humanistic education was first enunciated. In general, Vives' aim is the attainment of both the heavenly and the earthly ideal.l Thus the central doctrine of his pedagogical theory is based upon virtue and upon practical excellence gained by Christian education and by logical development. Whatever does not serve this end is worthless; nothing should be striven for except the paths of wisdom. Harmonious upbuilding of soul and body, in theory and in practice, in developing the mentality and in imparting material knowledge, is the way by which this end is to be attained. He therefore substitutes for the scholastic deductive method practically an inductive method, in which both teacher and pupil work together. Consequently there is a similarity between his theories and those of Bacon..2 The materials to be used in this soul development are to be found in the Latin writers. Necessarily therefore the ability to read each is to teach Latin, Erasmus develops a dramatic dialogue; Vives remains only a school book. Although the CoUoquia is, therefore, perpetually interesting, as a school book the Exercitatis is more successful. I am here practically quoting from Franz Kuypers, Vives in seiner pddagogik, Kiel, 1897. 2 Cf. Rudolf Gtlnther, Inweiweit hat Ludwig Vives die Ideen Bacons von Verulam vorbereitet? Leipzig, 1912. 304 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Latin fluently is to be attained as early as possible. To accomplish this, Latin should be used both in speaking and in original composition, correctness being gained by hearing it correctly spoken and studying it correctly written rather than by memorizing grammatical rules. Thus simultaneously with the acquiring of the language the pupil is learning virtuous precepts, the language being valued only as the medium of imparting moral precepts. At the same time the body should be exercised (mens sana in corpore sano) that both may grow into an harmonious whole. Since Vives belongs to the Oxford group and was a friend of Erasmus, Sir Thomas More, Linacre, and others, the revolutionary theories which he put forward even as early as 1523 may be considered as representing their views. In any case the next publication of this type belongs to this group. This is the Governour of Sir Thomas Elyot.' The son of a barrister, he was apparently educated at home, for in the proheme to the Castell of Helth he gives the following accounts of his studies: 2 For before that I was twentie yeres olde, a woorshipfull physicion, and one of the moste renoumed at that time in England, preceyuing me by nature enclyned to knowledge, radde vnto me the workes of Galene of temperamentes, naturall faculties, the introduction of Johanncicius, with some of the Aphorismes of Hippocrates. And afterwards by mine owne studi, I radde ouer in order the more parte of the workes ot Hippocrates, Galenus, Oribasius, Paulus Celius, Alexander Trallianus Celsus, Plinius the one and the other, with Dioscorides. Nor I dyd omitte to read the long canones of Auicenna, the commentaries of Auerroys, the practises of Isake, Haliabbas, Rasis, Mesue, and also the more parte of them whiche were their aggregatours and followers. And although I haue neuer bene at Mountpillier, Padua, nor Salern, yet haue I found some thing in physicke, wherby I haue taken no littell profite concerninge myne owne helth. Not only is this passage interesting as showing the breadth and amount of reading of a young man of twenty, it is also the basis 1 The definitive edition of The Boke named the Gouernour, is that edited by Henry Herbert Stephen Croft, 1883. Mr. Croft has not only given the authoritative text, he has included so many parallel passages from other authors that his edition is almost a compendium of the entire movement. 2 The Castell of Helth corrected and in some places augmented, by the first author thereof, sir Thomas Elyot knight the yere of our lord 1541. This title, in the copy in the Yale Library, is in a frame on which is the date 1534. For the explanation of this curious discrepancy, cf. Croft, Vol. I, p. cvi. It is to be noted, however, that the text differs from that quoted by him, p. xxxix. HUMANISM 305 for the assumption that he studied with Linacre.1 Fortunately we have more definite information concerning his relationship with another of the group, Sir Thomas More. Aside from Stapleton's statement that both Elyot and his wife attended the school of More for literary studies,-a statement that represents probably the literary tradition of a half century 2 rather than a fact,- in Elyot's letter to Cromwell, to be dated probably in 1536, we have the following sentence.3 I therefor beseche your goode lordship now to lay apart the remembraunce of the amity betwene me and sir Thomas More, which was but usque ad aras, as is the proverb, consydering that I was never so moche addict unto hym as I was unto truthe and fidelity toward my soveraigne lorde as godd is my juge. Without attempting to define the exact meaning of the phrase "but usque ad aras, " we may at the least infer that his friendship with More was sufficient to call into question his loyalty to his king.4 Another inference may be made, namely, that English humanism has now identified itself with the "true religion." This is the transitional stage to the third, to be found in Ascham, where such identification has become both complete and passionate. The rapidity of the growth of the movement is indicated by the fact that, although there is an interval of eight years between the appearance of Vives' work (1523) and the Gouernour (1531), actually the authors were contemporaries, while Ascham (b. 1515) published his Toxophilus only thirteen years after the Gouernour; again, although the Scholemaster is ostensibly due to a conversation held in 1563, and confessedly modified by the views of John Sturm, the precepts in it are based upon the teachings of Cheke and 1 To me this seems improbable. The passage was written to justify Elyot's right to authorship of a book on medicine. As Linacre had been appointed royal physician, and as his reputation was very great, surely, had Elyot studied with him, he would have emphasized that fact here. Since he does not, certainly the assumption is contrary to the usual statement. 2 Stapleton's Tres Thomse was published in 1588. 3 Croft, op. cit., p. cxxx et seq., where a discussion of this point may be found. 4 In the Chiliadis Tertioe Centuria, Erasmus's comment on the phrase is: Admonet prouerbium, nonnunque, quo consulamus amicorum commodis, eorumque uoluntati morem geramus, fas uideri paululum i recto deflectere, uerum eatenus, ne propter hominem amicum numinis reuerentiam uiolemus. 306 EARLY TUDOR POETRY the Cambridge men, and reflect the educational theories of the second half of the reign of Henry VIII. As More was executed while Ascham was still studying at Cambridge, the personal relation between these two was practically nil. Yet, as it was he that was chosen by More's daughter, Margaret Roper, to be the instructor of her children, the inference is allowable that she regarded Ascham as the one that best continued her father's theories. Not a matter of inference is his acquaintanceship with Elyot, since he himself tells us that "I was ones in companye wyth syr Thomas Eliot Knight, which surelie for his lerning in all kynde of knowlege bringeth much worshyp to all the nobilitie of Englande.... "1 The continuity is thus unbroken, and it is possible to deal with the collective results. It is possible to deal with the collective results because in a certain sense the humanists did not pretend to originality. In fact, as they conceived it, their mission lay in transmitting to England the culture that had been lost. Their work was in building fresh constructions from bricks mellowed by time. The numerous citations from classic authors were not primarily due to intellectual honesty, but rather to intellectual pride. Thisis the attitude shown in the passage already quoted from Elyot's Castell of Helth. His justification for having written such a book was not that by careful experiment he had arrived at the conclusions given, but that he had studied the matter in a number of authorities. His books are the result of his reading exactly as his Latin-English dictionary is the result of his reading,-and for the same purpose of helping others. His attitude and his method is most clearly seen in the preface to The Image of Gouernaunce: 2 As I late was serchinge amonge my boks, to fynde some argument, in the readynge whereof I mought recreate my spyrytes, beynge almost fatigate with the longe studye aboute the correctynge and ampliatyng of my Dictionarie, of Latin and Englyshe, I happened to fynde certeyne quayres of paper, whiche I had wrytten about nine yeres passed: wherein were conteigned the actes and sentences notable, of the moste noble Emperour Alexander, for his wysedome and grauitie called 1 Toxophilus, Arber's Reprints, p. 86. 2 The Image of Gouernaunce compiled of the actes and sentences notable, of the most noble emperour Alexander Seuerus, late translated out of Greke into Englyshe, by Sir Thomas Elyote knyght, in the fauour of Nobilitee. Anno. M. D. LVI. By William Seres. HUMANISM 307 Seuerus, whiche boke was fyrst wrytten in the Greke tonge by his secretarie named Eucolpius, and by good chaunce was lente unto me by a gentill man of Naples called Pudericus. In readinge whereof I was maruailouselie rauysshed, and as it hath been euer mine appetye, I wysshed that it hadde been publyshed in suche a toungue, as moe men mought understande it. Wherefore with all diligence I endeuoured myselfe whiles I had leysour, to translate it into englyshe: all be it I coulde not so exactly performe mine enterprise, as I mought haue done, if the owner had not importunately called for his boke, whereby I was constreigned to leaue some part of the worke untranslated: whiche I made up, as well. as I coulde, with some other Auctours, as well latines as greekes....1 He does not in any way feel the necessity of indicating the difference between the translation of the original Greek manuscript and the additions gathered indiscriminately from classical literature. The same is true of the more celebrated Gouernour. Upon a basis taken from De Regno et Regis Institutione of Francesco Patrizi he grafted what he thought appropriate from Erasmus and Pontanus.2 In the same way, although not perhaps to the same degree, Ascham's Scholemaster is a compendium of educational theory drawn from Cheke, Sturm, and the Italian humanists.3 Surely, there is nothing surprising in this! The modern writer is supposed to know "the literature of his subject." Scholarship consists in first ascertaining the facts and then in re-combining them. As now, so then,-with the sole difference that they did not feel it essential, as we, to indicate the derivation of every detail. In a new age the stress was laid, not upon the component parts, but upon the completed work. In discussing the theory of the northern humanists, it must be remembered that the goal was right living. Whereas in Italy the pedants had claimed a personal freedom, lives exempt from the traditional Christian prejudice, in the north the whole educational superstructure was based upon morality. Their mission was to bring the world to a better, higher, more moral state. To the attainment of this ideal they bent all their energies; this is the 1 The truth of this statement of the origin and composition of the book was questioned by Wotton and Hoby, unjustly as is shown by Croft, cxlv-clxi. 21 make this statement wholly upon the authority of Croft, as I have never seen the Patrizi. 3 In his letter to Sturm xcix, in The Whole Works of Roger Ascham by the Rev. Dr. Giles, 1864, Vol. 1, p. 181, Ascham elaborately justifies himself by citing precedents. 308 EARLY TUDOR POETRY motive for writing their books; and this is the reason for their insistence on certain types of educational training. Thus Vives writes: 1 A man of himself is neither good nor evil, but yet through the first fault he is more inclined and prone to evil, and cometh unto it by example of many, the which have conspired together to sin and to do much mischief, for a man can turn his eye to no place but he shall see the evil that he may ensue and follow. First, he is provoked by their exhortations that seem to counsel him well, as Poets, for such things as they indite and make, are received and sung without respect of things. And schoolmasters the which do teach and instruct youth, are not far from the opinion of the common people; for with them they praise nobility, riches, honour, vengeance, and to these things they exhort and instruct youth. Fathers and other parents esteem the name of virtue as vain, and accustom their children to those things that flatter and delight the senses, and not to rigorous and hard honesty, as men that look to creep no hig er, but to live with the vulgar and rude sort, and yet would be an example of living to all other. There are in like manner, parents, which are grave men and well learned, and yet abhor that virtue should associate and accompany their children, the which persuade them to follow pleasure, love and solace, inasmuch that Quintillian, seeing that honesty and virtue is so convenient and meet for our nature, doth marvel that there are so few good men, but he should rather have marvelled that there are any good at all, considering their institution and bringing up to be so evil. But if by actual inclination, and by the comfort and authority of great and learned men, we be enforced to evil, not drawn from it by some good doctrine, what hope is there of any goodness? All shall come to mischief, and through the custom of sin, we shall hate all honesty, and learn to contemn the goodness of the mind, and to hate virtue. We should stir up by the figure and strength of reason, and receive the love of virtue, and give the precepts of wisdom against the corruption of false opinions, and by assuefaction and use, resist our natural proneness and inclination to vice, continually to the utmost of our power, striving with the same. It is exactly for the reasons given in the last sentence that Elyot became an author, as he himself confesses: 2 Yet am I not ignorant, that dyuers there be, whiche doe not thankfully esteme my labours, dispraysyng my studies as vayne and unprofitable, saying in derision, that I haue nothyng wonne therby, but the name onely of a maker of bokes, and that I set the trees, but the Printer eateth the fruites. In deede although disdeigne and enuie dooe cause them to speake it, yet will I not denie, but that they saie 1 De Officio Mariti, Chapter 111. Quoted from Foster Watson, Vives and the Renascence Education of Women, p. 197. The translation is that of Thomas Paynell, 1550. Since Vives has become so little known, Professor Watson has rendered very real service in thus making accessible English versions of his various writings. 2 Image of Gouernaunce, op. cit., Aiii. HUMANISM 309 truely: for if I wolde haue emploied my studie aboute the increase of my priuate commoditie, whiche I haue spent in wrytynge of bokes for others necessitee, fewe men doubte (I suppose) that dooe knowe me, but that I shulde haue atteygned ere this tyme to haue byn muche more welthy, and in respecte of the worlde in a more estimation. But to excuse me of follie, I wyll proFesse without arrogaunce, that when I consydered, that cunnynge continueth when fortune flytteth, hauing also ringynge alwaye in mine eare, the terrible checke that the good maister in the gospell gaue to his idell seruant, for hyding his money in a cloute, and not dysposynge it for his maisters aduantage, those twoo wordes, Serue nequam so steerred my spyrites, that it caused me to take more regarde to my laste reckenynge, then to anye rychesse or wordely promocion. And althoughe I dooe neyther dyspute nor expounde holy scrypture, yet in suche woorkes as I haue and entende to sette foorth, my poore talent shall be, Godde wyllinge, in suche yse bestowed, that noe mans conscyence shall be therewyth offended, my boke called the Gouernour, instructynge men in suche vertues as shall be expedyente for theym, whiche shal haue auctoritie in a weale publike. The Doctrinall of Prynces, whiche are but the counsayles of wyse Isocrates, inducynge into noble mennes wyttes honest opinions. The Edcacion of childrene, whiche also I translated out of the wyse Plutarche, makynge men and women, whiche wyll folowe those rules, to be well worthy to be fathers and mothers. The lyttle Pasquill, althoughe he be mery and playne, teachyage as well seruantes howe to be faythfull unto theyr maysters, as also maisters howe to be cyrcumspecte in espying of flatterers. Semblablie the office of a good counsaylour with magnanimitie or good courage in tyme of aduersitie, maye bee apparauntly founded in my boke called, Of the knoweledge belongynge to a wyse man. In readynge the sermon of sainct Cyprian by me translated, the deuout reader shall finde no lyttle comforte in plagues or calamities. The Bankette of Sapience is not fastidiouse, and in lyttle roume sheweth out of holie scryture many wyse sentences. The Castell of health beynge truely read, shall longe preserue men (beyng some phisicions neuer so angrie) from peryllouse syckenesse. My lyttle boke called the defence of good women, not onely confoundeth vyllairnous reporte, but also teacheth good wyves to knowe wll theyr duitees. My Dictionarie declarying Latine by Englyshe, by that tyme that I haue performed it, it shall not onely serue for children, as men haue excepted it, but also shall be commodious for them, which perchaunce be well learned. And this persent boke, whiche I haue named the Image of Gouernaunce, shall be to all theim whiche wyll reade it sincerely, a veraie true paterne, wherby they maye shape all theyr procedynges. And in none of these woorkes I dare undertake, a man shall fynde any sentence against the commaundementes of God, the true catholike faieth, or occasion to steere men to wanton deuises. Wherfore I trust unto God, mine accompt shall of hym bee fauourable accepted:... Thus in both method and motive Elyot suggests a comparison with Barclay. The medievalism of the latter is due to a reliance upon the traditions of the Church, which he illustrates by examples from contemporary experience; the Renaissance appears in Elyot's rationalism, which he, likewise, illustrates by examples drawn 310 EARLY TUDOR POETRY from classical literature. Both are actuated, however, by the same moral enthusiasm. That the same is true of Ascham, no one at all familiar with the Scholemaster needs to be told. There his insistence upon the ways of righteousness is the keynote: 1 Learning therefore, ye wise fathers, and good bringing vp, and not blinde and dangerous experience, is the next and readiest waie, that must leede your Children, first, to wisdom, and than to worthinesse, if euer ye purpose they shall cum there. And to saie all in shorte, though I lacke Authoritie to giue counsell, yet I lacke not good will to wisshe, that the youthe in England, speciallie Ientlemen, and namelie nobilitie, shold be by good bringing vp, so grounded in iudgement of learninge, so founded in loue of honestie, as whan they shold be called forthe to the execution of great affaires, in service of their Prince and contrie, they might be hable, to vse and to order, all experiences, were they good were they bad, and that, according to the square, rule, and line, of wisdom, learning, and vertue. Clearly in the minds of these men, the development of both body and mind was subservient to the one great aim of moral well-being. For this was first stressed the care of the body, not for its own sake but for the sake of the soul. But such recognition of the claims of the body constitute an educational innovation of far-reaching importance. While naturally in the sixteenth century the ascetic ideals of the fourth were no longer in men's minds, there was yet left the feeling that there was something akin to virtue in selfdenial. The paunch-proud prelate, however common a figure, was never the ideal type. It, therefore, behoved the student to live laborious days, uncontaminated by soul-destroying luxuries. Conversely, the lean and scrawny youth, pale and emaciated, was presumably he that profited much from his studies. With all allowances made for the personal equation of Erasmus, for his tendency to feel abused and for his delicate health, his description of the College Montaigu 2 suggests the wide divergence between the scholastic and humanistic point of view. In the dialogue the Fishmonger, like Erasmus, has been to Montaigu College, where, 1 The most scholarly edition of the Scholemaster is that of John E. B. Mayor, London, 1863. As, however, that in Arber's Reprints is probably more accessible to American readers, my references will refer to that. This passage is taken from p. 63. 2The famous passage in the Colloquium LXO6vo<fvyCa. Professor Emerton suggests Rabelais's attack is merely an echo of this of Erasmus. Cf. op. cit. p. 289. HUMANISM 311 according to report, the very walls teach divinity. He thus describes the conditions.1 You say very right; but as for me, I brought nothing out of it but my Body full of gross Humours, and my Clothes full of Lice. But to go on as I began: At that Time one John Standoneus was President, a Man whose Temper you would not mislike, and whose Qualifications you would covet; for as I remember, in his Youth, when he was very poor himself, he was very charitable, and that is much to be commended; and if he had still supply'd the Necessities of young Persons, as he found them Materials for going on with their studies, he would not have had so much Money to have spent lavishly, but would have done Praise-worthily: But what with lying hard, by bad and spare Diet, late and hard Studies, within one Year's Space, of many young Men of a good Genius, and very hopeful, some he kill'd, others he blinded, others he made run distracted, and others he brought into the Leprosy, some of whom I know very well; and in short, not one of them but was in danger by him.... Neither did this Cruelty only destroy mean Persons, but many Gentlemens Sons too, and spoil'd many a hopeful Genius. It is, indeed, the Part of a Father, to hold in Youth that is apt to grow lascivious, by Restraint. But in the very Depth of Winter, here's a Morsel of Bread given them when they ask for their Commons; and as for their Drink, they must draw that out of a Well that gives bad Water, unwholesome of itself, if it were not made the worse by the Coldness of the Morning: I have known many that were brought to such an ill state of Health, that they have never got over it to this Day. There were Chambers on a Ground-Floor, and rotten Plaister, they stood near a stinking House of Office, in which none ever dwelt, but he either got his Death, or some grievous Distemper. I shall say nothing of the unmerciful Whippings, even of innocent Persons. This they say is to break their Fierceness, for so they call a sprightly Genius; and therefore, they thus cow their Spirits, to make them more humble in the Monasteries: Nor shall I take Notice how many rotten Eggs were eaten; nor how much sour Wine was drank. Perhaps these Things may be mended now; but however, 'tis too late for those that are dead already, or carry about an infected Carcass. Nor do I mention these Things because I have any ill Will to the College, but I thought it worth While to give this Monition, lest human Severity should mar inexperienc'd and tender Age, under the Pretence of Religion. This is the extreme statement for the plaintiff; and to generalize from a single particular creates a most dangerous logical fallacy. Yet Erasmus here is speaking for the humanists, and in his mind such neglect of the body was associated with the medieval method. From this angle, clearly it is the final sentence that deserves notice; it is Erasmus' motive for introducing the foregoing disgusting details. These are not due primarily to poverty, but to a belief that by disregarding the body the soul was held in higher 1 Bailey's Translation of the CoUoquies, ii, 304-305. 312 EARLY TUDOR POETRY regard. It is unnecessary to point out how diametrically opposed is such a theory to that held in classical times. The anthropomorphism that embodied the gods in beautiful human forms reacted in the feeling that corporeal beauty is itself godlike. This, in its extreme form is thus expressed by Spenser: 1 Thereof it comes, that these faire soules, which haue The most resemblance of that heauenly light, Frame to themselues most beautifull and braue Their fleshly bowre, most fit for their delight, And the grosse matter by a soueraine might Tempers so trim, that it may well be seene, A pallace fit for such a virgin Queene. So euery spirit, as it is most pure, And hath in it the more of heauenly light, So it the fairer bodie doth procure To habit in, and it more fairely dight With chearefull grace and amiable sight. For of the soule the bodie forme doth take: For soule is forme, and doth the bodie make. Therefore where-euer that thou doest behold A comely corpse, with beautie faire endewed, Know this for certaine, that the same doth hold A beauteous soule, with faire conditions thewed, Fit to receiue the seede of vertue strewed. For all that faire is, is by nature good; That is a signe to know the gentle blood. But with this Platonic conception of the identity of beauty and truth, clearly the corporeal half of the human duality receives an emphasis that was theoretically denied it in the scholastic system. Thus following the lead of the Italian Platonists, English humanists advocated an educational theory diametrically opposed to the older conception. As in the other cases, although it is an error to assume that this theory is original with any one writer, the first propagandist is Vives. But just as the care for the body is rather implicit than explicit in Plato, since to the Greek there was no necessity of urging so obvious a duty, so in Vives it is more assumed than definitely 1 I have used the text, Foure Hymnes, London, 1617. Of course the same position may be illustrated from Sidney, etc. HUMANISMI 313 stated in any given passage. Yet the impression gained from reading his works, a sentence here and a sentence there, grows into a definite belief.' He discusses what one should eat and what one should drink, and especially advocates frequent bathing. This should be done primarily for health, not for pleasure.2 For this reason he also advocates sports as a relaxation for the weary mind as well as to develop the growing body.3 Consequently in his Exercitatio Lingua? Latincu he discusses when, to what extent, with whom, how, and what sports the lad shall pursue, and advocates those in which both honor and enjoyment are united. In modern phrase, he believes in a 'gentleman's game.' As Vives' works not only circulated but were translated into English for the benefit of the unlearned, and as the Exercitatio itself was the medium by which so many learned their Latin, the importance of his opinion on the value of exercise is clear. Naturally, then, it is no matter for surprise to find Elyot with this same conception.4 All thoughe I haue hitherto aduanced the commendation of lernyng, specially in gentil men, yet it is to be considered that continuall studie without some maner of exercise, shortly exhausteth the spirites vitall, and hyndereth naturall decoction and digestion, whereby mannes body is the soner corrupted and brought in to diuers sickeness-is, and finallye the life is therby made shorter: where contrayrye wise by exercise, whiche is a vehement motion (as Galene prince of phisitions defineth) the helthe of man is preserued, and his strength increased: for as moche the members by meuyng and mutuall touching, do waxe more harde, and naturall heate in all the body is thereby augmented. More ouer it maketh the spirites of a man more stronge and valiant, so that, by the hardnesse of the membres, all labours be more tollerable; by naturall hete the appetite is the more quicke; the chaunge of the substance receiued is the more redy; the nourisshinge of all partes of the body is the more sufficient and sure. By valiaunt motion of the spirites all thinges superfluous be expelled, and the condutis of the body dersed. Wherfore this parte of phisike is nat to be contemned or neglected in the education of children, and specially from the age of Xiiii yeres upwarde, in whiche tyme strength with courage increaseth. 1 Kuypers, op. cit., p. 25, has collected a number of these scattered references and from them made his generalizations. 2 Intr. Sap. 4, 86. Tota corporis curatio ad sanitatem referenda est non ad voluptatern. 3 Exercitatio, dial. Leges Ludi: homo propter res serias est conditus, non propter nugas et lusus; lusus autem reperti ad reficiendum animum lassum a seriis... simul animum reficiat, et corpus exerceat. 4 The Gouernour, Chapter XVI. $14 EARLY TUDOR POETRY As this passage ends with eulogy of Linacre's translation of Galen, and is itself merely a composite of several extracts from Galen, both the agreement with Vives and the omission of his name is comprehensible. Vives had only transmitted the general humanistic theory; Elyot here is passing it on to England. Naturally, under these circumstances we expect to find Ascham presenting the same point of view. And, I do not meene, by all this my taulke, that young Ientlemen, should alwaies be poring on a booke, and by vsing good studies, shold lease honest pleasure, and haunt no good pastime, I meene nothing lesse: For it is well knowne, that I both like and loue, and haue alwaies, and do yet still vse, all exercises and pastimes, that be fitte for my nature and habilitie.... Therefore, I wold wishe, that, beside some good time, fitlie appointed, and constantlie kepte, to encrease by readunge, the knowledge of the tonges and learning, yong ientlemen shold vse, and delite in all Courtelie exercises, and Ientlemanlike pastimes.' It is possible, I think, in these extracts to see a certain progression. Whereas Vives recommends only such exercise as may be necessary to enable the mind to perform its functions, Elyot argues in favor of good health for its own sake, and Ascham for sport for sport's sake. As he says: For the Muses, besides learning, were also Ladies of dauncinge, mirthe and ministrelsie: Apollo, was god of shooting, and Author of cunning playing vpon Instrumentes: Pallas also was Laidie mistres in warres. Wherbie was nothing else ment, but that learninge shold be alwaise mingled, with honest mirthe, and cumlie exercises: and that warre also shold be gouerned by learning, and moderated by wisdom...2 In the interval of time between Vives and Ascham athletics has become a definite part of the educational system. Much the same progression can be indicated in the forms of exercise enumerated by the several writers. Vives mentions almost casually ball playing or running races, merely as a fitting interlude to serious work. Elyot feels it necessary to discuss quite elaborately wrestling, running, swimming, fencing, riding, and the various forms of hunting. To him the best exercise, beyond compare, is to be found in archery, in shooting with the long bow. In comparison with that, football 3 The Scholemaster, Arber's Reprints, pp. 68-64. 2 Ibid., p. 64. 3 The Governour, Everyman's Library, p. 113. HUMANISM 315 wherin is nothinge but beastly furie and exstreme violence; wherof precedeth hurte, and consequently rancour and malice do remaine with them that be wounded; is " to be put in perpetual silence." Ascham also gives much the same list.' Therefore, to ride cumlie: to run faire at the tilte or ring: to plaie at all weaponss: to shote faire in bow, or surelie in gon: to vaut lustely: to runne: to leape: to wrestle: to swimme: To daunce cumlie: to sing, and playe of instrumentes cunnyngly: to Hawke: to hunte: to playe at tennes, and all pastimes generally, which be ioyned with labor, vsed in open place, and on the day light, conteining either some fitte exercise for warre, or some pleasant pastime for peace, be not onelie cumlie and decent, but also verie necessarie, for a Courtlie Ientleman to vse. But, equally with Elyot, these are not ideal for scholars.2 Therfore to loke on all pastymes and exercises holsome for the bodye, pleasaunt for the mynde, comlye for euery man to do, honest for all other to loke on, profitable to be sette by of euerye man, worthie to be rebuked of no man, fit for al ages persons and places, onely shoting shal appeare, wherein all these commodities maye be founde. And he writes a whole book to prove it, in which the arguments used by Elyot are expanded and enforced by multitudes of classical examples. There is something very English in the stress on sport; one feels that however much the continental humanists may have fathered the idea, the development of it in England would have startled a thinker such as Erasmus. The general theory has been adapted to local conditions. Certainly is this true in regard to dancing. To Vives, it was exceedingly illogical.3 What good doth all that dancing of young women, holden up on men's arms, that they may hop the higher? What meaneth that shaking unto midnight, and never weary, which if they were desired to go but to the next church, they were not able, except they were carried on horse back, or in a chariot? Who would not think them out of their wits? I remember that I heard upon a time said, that there were certain men brought out of a far country into our parts of the world, which when they saw women dance, they ran away, wonderfully afraid, crying out that they thought the women were taken with a strange kind of frenzy. And to say good sooth, who would not reckon women frantic when they dance, if he had never seen women dance before? 1 The Scholemaster, Arber's Reprints, p. 64. 2 Toxophilus, ibid., p. 47. 3 Hyrde's translation of Vives' Instruction of a Christian Woman, edited by Foster Watson, p. 103. 316 EARLY TUDOR POETRY But when Henry's love of masking and dancing is remembered, such a preachment, however convincing in theory, was not acceptable in fact. Consequently Elyot is placed in a most unpleasant position. He extricates himself by showing with a vast parade of learning that while idolatrous and lascivious dancing was undoubtedly correctly reproved by the Church, not only in itself is it excellent exercise, but in addition symbolizes the moral virtue, Prudence. Consequently dancing 1 whiche diligently beholden shall appiere to be as well a necessary studie as a noble and vertuouse pastyme, used and continued in suche forme as I hiderto haue declared. After that "to daunce cumlie" is accepted by Ascham without comment as an essential accomplishment of the courtier, for even dancing has its moral value. Just as the humanists believed that all the powers of the body should be trained to a moral end, so they felt that all the powers of the mind should be so cultivated. Neither the one nor the other should be prostituted to mere pleasure. Consequently the growing pupil was to be familiarized as soon as possible with the wisdom of the ages. At first it was to be administered in tabloid form. Vives, in 1524, prepared a Satellitium for the Princess Mary in which the Latin proverbs were expanded and explained. Thus generositas virtus, non sanguis is paraphrased: 2 We shall see how this works out if we make use of an induction in this matter. Which horse is noble? which dog? Is it not the best (optimus) and so in other animals and stocks: therefore also the noble man is none other than the best man morally. For this purpose the Copia of Erasmus is recommended. In all countries works appeared under the titles of precepts, aphorisms, sentences, and the like.3 But with this desire to inculcate morality, the humanists in their recoil from scholastic tradition consciously referred back to classic civilization. From their illustrations the reader might make the deduction that since the coming of Chris1 The Gouernour, ibid., p. 107. 2 Watson, Vives and the Renascence Education of Women, 155. 3 The same principle is sometimes used today in teaching writing, where the pupil laboriously copies a moral platitude. HUMANISM 817 tianity there have been no good men! In every respect, apparently, the human race has degenerated. Ascham makes this plain: Athens, by this discipline and good ordering of yougthe, did breede vp, within the circute of that one Citie, within the compas of one hondred yeare, within the memorie of one mans life, so manie notable Capitaines in warre, for worthinesse, wisdome and learning, as be scarce matchable no not in the state of Rome, in the compas of those seauen hondred yeares, whan it florished moste. And bicause, I will not onelie saie it, but also proue it, the names of them be these. Miltiades, Themistocles, Xantippus, Pericles, Cymon, Alcybiades, Thrasybulus, Conon, Iphicrates, Xenophon, Timotheus, Theopompus, Demetrius, and diuers other mo: of which euerie one, maie iustelie be spoken that worthie praise, which was geuen to Scipio Africanus, who, Cicero douteth,, whether he were, raore noble Capitaine in warre, or more eloquent and wise councelor in peace. This point of view has caused the pages of English literature to be sprinkled with classical allusion, so that the heroes of antiquity are known by us all. But to be inspired properly to emulation of the great classical heroes, so to live our lives that we may risk comparison with Alcibiades or Conon, or merit the praise given Scipio Africanus, clearly a firsthand knowledge of the literatures of Rome and Greece is essential. Consequently in the humanists we find long lists of authors, whose works are the portals to a good life. Here also it is possible to see the progression. Vives is willing to give credit to the early Christian writers.2 Also the poets of our religion should be read, Prudentius, Prosper, Paulinus, Servilius, Juvencus, and Aratus, who, whilst they discuss matters of the highest kind, for the salvation of the human race, are neither crude nor contemptible in speech. They have many passages in which, by their eloquence and charm of verse, they vie with the ancients. Some even think they surpass them. These authors, however, are omitted in Elyot, although he occasionally cites the church fathers as authoritative. He advocates reading the Italian humanists, such as Pontanus and Politian, and Erasmus. In turn, these are much less stressed by Ascham, who urges the student to go back to the originals. The same trend may be seen in the attitude toward Greek. To Vives:, Greek seems almost a luxury; Latin a necessity.3 1 Scholemaster, ibid., 59. 2Watson, op. cit., 246. a Watson, op. cit., 250. 318 EARLY TUDOR POETRY To the one who has acquired the knowledge of the Greek tongue, the fountains of all branches of learning stand open, for these have issued from the Greeks. He is admitted to the knowledge of the greatest minds in which Greece was always so prolific. Moreover, his copiousness of Latin speech is deeper founded, both because the Latin people sought from Greece the schemes and figures of speech and colours of subject-matter, and also because, when the Latin vocabulary is not at hand for signifying a thing, a term can be borrowed from the Greek, which is so full of words. Nay, also, the Latin authors after the time of Cicero were so studious of Greek, or such displayers of their knowledge, that a great part of their idioms were poured across into Latin. Elyot holds the balance much more equally, enjoining a careful study of the authors in each language, Homer as well as Vergil.' But aboue all other, the warkes of Plato wolde be most studiously radde whan the iugement of a man is come to perfection, and by the other studies is instructed in the fourme of speakynge that philosophers used. Lorde god, what incomparable swetnesse of wordes and mater shall he finde in the saide warkes of Plato and Cicero; wherin is ioyned grauitie with dilectation, excellent wysedome with diuine eloquence, absolute vertue with pleasure incredible, and euery place is so infarced with profitable counsaile, ioyned with honestie, that those thre bokes be almoste sufficient to make a perfecte and excellent gouernour. In Ascham the "perfect Grecians" have come to their own. In a letter to Brandesby, dated from Cambridge 1542-53, he thus gives the condition: 2 Aristotle and Plato are now read by the boys in the original language, but that has been done among us at St. John's for the last five years. Sophocles and Euripides are now more familiar to us than Plautus was when you were here. Herodotus, Thucydides, and Xenophon are more read now than Livy was then. They talk now as much of Demosthenes, as they did of Cicero at that time. There are more copies of Isocrates to be met with now than there were of Terence then. Yet we do not treat the Latin writers with contempt, but we cherish the best of them who flourished in the golden age of their literature. This change, the shifting of emphasis from the Latin to the Greek, Ascham attributes definitely to the influence of Sir John Cheke. That any one individual can be held directly responsible for it, is probably untrue, but the situation as given by Ascham is surprising. The former generation had known Plato, but they saw him through the eyes of Pico della Mirandola and Ficino, Benivieni and the Italian humanists, who believed that their function lay in 1 The Gouernour, 417. 2 Giles' Edition of the Works of Ascham, i, xxxvii. HUMANISM 319 reconciling Platonism with Christianity. This conception, certainly, tinged the early English writers. But by 1540, evidently humanism had passed into its second stage, Latin was but a step on the road to Greek, and the Greek authors were read in the original and for their own sake. This method of teaching morality by means of the classical authors is open to the obvious objection that their morals were not our morals, and that a sympathetic study of Juvenal, Martial, Petronius, etc., whatever cultural value it might have, would scarcely be helpful from the purely moral point of view. Quite naturally some pages of almost every classical author have references and allusions to customs and manners that in English dress would be considered abominable. Even Vergil and Horace are among the number, while Catullus is distinctly frank. Moreover the Italian humanists, in openly copying the classical lack of restraint, had confounded culture with indecency to such an extent that the northern humanist was appalled. In England the logical solution for the dilemma was found in selection. The pupil was to be urged and encouraged to read Latin and Greek, the classical literatures were to be held up before the eyes as the most precious of possessions, but there were to be certain parts he was not to touch, certain works he was not to know. This position, although it is to be said that he is writing for women here, Vives clearly states: 1 But whereto should I speak of foolish and ignorant writers, seeing that Ovid would not, that he that intendeth to fly unchaste manners should once touch the most witty and well learned poets of the Greeks and Latins that write of love? What can be told more pleasant, more sweet, more quick, more profitable, with all manner of learning than these poets, Callimachus, Phileta, Anacreon, Sappho, Tibullus, Propertius, and Gallus? Which poets all Greece, all Italy, yea, and all the world setteth great price by, and yet Ovid biddeth chaste folks let them alone, saying in the second book of the Remedies of Love: Though I be loath, yet will I say, With wanton poets thou do not mell. Ah! mine own virtues now I cast away. Beware Callimachus, for he teacheth well To love and Cous also well as he. And old Anacreon writeth full wantonly, And Sappho eke often hath caused me To deal with my lady more liberally. Watson, Vives, op. cit., 60-61. 320 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Who can escape free, that readeth Tibullus, Or Propertius, when he doth sing Unto his lady Cynthia? Or else Gallus? And my books also sound such lik.thing. They sound so indeed, and therefore was he banished, nothing without a cause of that good prince. Wherefore I praise greatly the sad manners either of that time, or else of that prince. But we live now in a Christian country, and who is he that is anything displeased with makers of such books now-a-days? Plato casteth out of the commonwealth of wise men which he made, Homer and Hesiod the poets, and yet have they none ill thing in comparison unto Ovid's books of Love, which we read and carry them in our hands, and learn them by heart, yea, and some schoolmasters teach them to their scholars, and some make expositions and expound the vices. Augustus banished Ovid himself, and think you then that he would have kept these expositors in the country? Except a man would reckon it a worse deed to write vice than to expound it, and inform the tender minds of young folk therewith. We banish him that maketh false weights and measures, and [him] that counterfeiteth coin, or an instrument, and what a work is made in these things for small matters! But he is had in honour, and [ac] counted a master of wisdom, that corrupteth the young people. Vives here condemns whole works as beyond the pale. The logical step was, however, not to condemn the entire work, but to select only portions of it to be read. This step is taken by Elyot.1 But they whiche be ignoraunt in poetes wyll perchaunce obiecte, as is their maner, agayne these verses, sayeng that in Therence and other that were writers of comedies, also Ouide, Catullus, Martialis, and all that route of lasciuious poetes that wrate epistles and ditties of loue, some called in latine Elegiae and some Epigrammata, is nothyng contayned but incitation to lechery. First, comedies, whiche they suppose to be a doctrinall of rybaudrie, they be undoubtedly a picture or as it were a mirrour of man's life, wherin iuell is nat taught but discouered; to the intent that men beholdynge the promptnes of youth unto vice, the snares of harlotts and baudes laide for yonge myndes, the disceipte of seruantes, the chaunces of fortune contrary to mennes expectation, they beinge therof warned may prepare them selfe to resist or preuente occasion. Semblably remembring the wisedomes, aduertisements, counsailes, dissuasion from vice, and other profitable sentences, most eloquently and familiarely shewed in those comedies, undoubtedly there shall be no litle frute out of them gathered. And if the vices in them expressed shulde be cause that myndes of the reders shulde be corrupted: than by the same argumente nat onely enterludes in englisshe, but also sermones, wherin some vice is declared, shulde be to the beholders and herers like occasion to encreace sinners.... Also Ouidius, that semeth to be moste of all poetes lasciuious, in his mooste wanton bokes hath righte commendable and noble sentences;... 1 The Gouernour, op. cit., 58-60. HUMANISM 3$1 Martialis, whiche, for his dissolute wrytynge, is mooste seldome radde of men of moche grauitie, hath nat withstandynge many commendable sentences and right wise counsailes.... I coulde recite a great nombre of semblable good sentences out of these and other wanton poets, who in the latine do expresse them incomparably with more grace and delectation to the reder than our englisshe tonge may yet comprehende. Wherfore sens good and wise mater may be picked out of these poetes, it were no reason, for some lite mater that is in their verses, to abandone therefore al their warkes, no more than it were to forbeare or prohibite a man to come into a faire gardein, leste the redolent sauours of swete herbes and floures shall meue him to wanton courage, or leste in gadringe good and holsorae herbes he may happen to be stunge with a nettle. No wyse man entreth in to a gardein but he sone espiethe good herbes from nettiles, and treadeth the nettiles under his feete whiles he gadreth good herbes. Wherby he taketh no damage, or if he be stungen he maketh lite of it and shortly forgetteth it. Semblablye if he do rede wanton mater mixte with wisedome, he putteth the warst under foote and sorteth out the beste, or, if his courage be stered or prouoked, he remembreth the litel pleasure and gret detriment that shulde ensue of it, and withdrawynge his minde to some other studie or exercise shortly forgetteth it.... So all thoughe I do nat approue the lesson of wanton poetes to be taughte unto all children, yet thynke I conuenient and necessary that, whan the mynde is become constante and courage is asswaged, or that children of their naturall disposition be shamfaste and continent, none auncient poete wolde be excluded from the leesson of suche one as desireth to come to the perfection of wysedome. However justifiable from the point of view of the morality of the student, no course could be more safely recommended to insure a false estimation of classical culture. To select such traits as seem admirable, to suppress other traits, of which you cannot conscientiously approve,-in each case avowedly being guided by the standard of morality of the present, —seems the ideal method to produce a distorted impression both of the author and his age. By such a method, however, a world may be constructed of valiant men and of noble women, more valiant men and more noble women than do exist,-or did exist. So, the "glory that was Greece and the grandeur that was Rome" is apt to be denominated, appropriately, as the "golden" age. While thus positively the humanists aimed at presenting an imaginary classical past as the ideal, negatively they wished to remove all traces of native influence. The term gothic became synonymous with barbarous, and was liberally applied to the history, art, and letters of all Christian nations.' Whatever was 1 This use of gothic, according to the N. E. D. begins with Dryden; actually 399 EARLY TUDOR POETRY classical was, by hypothesis, good; whatever was Christian was, conversely by hypothesis, bad. Even God was mythologized. The ideal of the Christian church became a pagan temple, Leon Battista Alberti remodelled the Tempio of the Malatesta at Rimini, and Palladio hid catholicism behind a classical pediment. In England, the destruction of ecclesiastical architecture went on at an appalling rate. Of the great monastic establishments on the Thames, Westminster alone survives through the accident that it had been chosen for royal burial; Chertsey, Reading, Abingdon, Osney, remain only as names, and are today located by the careful antiquary by an occasional arch or a bit of stone wall. And this happened all over England; to the south Battle Abbey survives in a gate-house, to the north Fountains, exquisitely lovely, is a mass of broken arches, to the east Lindisferne and Whitby are piles of crumbling masonry, to the west Glastonbury, Tintern, and Furness are pathetic fragments. Here, again, is the interrelation between the humanistic movement and the Reformation. The latter was political, it aimed to destroy the power of the abbots, to sequester their property, but it had no animus against the buildings themselves. There was none of the fanatic hatred that was shown later by Cromwell's soldiers against all "rags of popery." Therefore, so far as the Reformation is concerned, the great abbeys of England might well have come down to us as has Westminster.1 That they have not is due rather to the change in taste. It was not that they were destroyed; they were merely not preserved. Humanism had so thoroughly done its work that Tudor England never conceived the possibility that to future generations such buildings might seem lovely in form, or valuable through association. They were only disregarded. The materials were carted away, when they were needed for other constructions; otherwise they were left. It was a process of disintegration through the ages, not a single act of vandalism. Reading Abbey was still a habitation until the Civil Wars. From this point of Ascham implies it by his opprobrious epithets, whenever he mentions the Hunnes and Gothians. 'I am trying here to differentiate between fanaticism and the purely mercenary motive. Naturally this last, when the king determined to suppress the monasteries, was a fearfully destructive agent. Cf. F. A. Gasquet's very able Henry VIII. and the English Monasteries, ii, Chap. X. HUMANISM 323 view the monastic ruins scattered over England cry aloud the triumph of humanism. Architectural ruins, since the contrast is poignant between what they were and what they are, afford a striking illustration of this change. But the same force was operating in literature. In favor of the writings of Greece and Rome all work referring to a Christian past was to be contemned. Vives here is quite clear.1 What a custom is this, that a song shall not be regarded, unless it be full of filthiness! And this the laws ought to take heed of, and of those ungracious books, such as be in my country in Spain, the Amadis, Florisand, Tristan and Celestina the bawd, mother of naughtiness; in France, Lancelot du Lac, Paris and Vienne, Ponthus and Sidonia, and Melusine; and here in Flanders, the histories of Flor and Blanchefleur, Leonella and Canamorus, Pyramis and Thisbe. In England, Parthenope, Genarides, Hippomadon, William and Melyour, Libius and Arthur, Guy, Bevis, and many other.... As for learning, none is to be looked for in those men, which saw never so much as a shadow of learning themselves. And when they tell aught, what delight can be in those things that be so plain and foolish lies! One killeth twenty himself alone, another killeth thirty, another wounded with a hundred wounds, and left dead, riseth up again, and on the next day made whole and strong overcometh two giants, and then goeth away loaden with gold and silver, and precious stones, mo than a galley would carry away' What madness is it of folks to have pleasure in these books? Also there is no wit in them, but a few words of wanton lust, which be spoken to move her mind with whom they love, if it chance she be steadfast. I never heard man say that he liked these books, but those that never touched good books. Elyot, to be sure is not so scornful, and even alludes to the romance of Bevis without expletives, but in Ascham we find the same moral indignation. In 1545 he felt that the old romances promulgated an evil combination of lust and Catholicism, and that they were a barbarous product of a benighted age.2 Englysh writers by diuersitie of tyme, haue taken diuerse matters in hande. In our fathers tyme nothing was red, but bookes of fayned cheualrie, wherein a man by redinge, shuld be led to none other ende, but onely to man-slaughter and baudrye. Yf any man suppose they were good ynough to passe the time with al, he is deceyued. For surelye vayne woordes doo woorke no smal thinge in vayne, ignoraunt, and younge mindes, specially yf they be gyuen any thynge thervnto of theyr owne 1 Watson, Vives, op. cit., 58-9. The English books mentioned in this quotation are not in the Vives; they were added by Hyrde. 2 Toxophilus, op. cit., 19. 324 EARLY TUDOR POETRY nature. These bokes (as I haue heard say) were made the moste parte in Abbayes, and Monasteries, a very lickely and fit fruite of suche an ydle and blynde kinde of lyuynge. But here in the Toxophilus he not only quotes Chaucer, he even recommends the reading of the Pardoner's Tale, for its side-lights on the perils of popery.1 In the Scholemaster, even Chaucer is bracketed with Petrarch as pernicious, while his opinion of the romances has altered only for the worse.2 In our forefathers tyme, whan Papistrie, as a standyng poole, couered and ouerflowed all England, fewe bookes were read in our tong, sauyng certaine bookes Cheualrie, as they sayd, for pastime and pleasure, which, as some say, were made in Monasteries, by idle Monkes, or wanton Canons: as one for example, Morte Arthure: the whole pleasure of which booke standeth in two speciall poyntes, in open mans slaughter, and bold bawdrye: In which booke those be counted the noblest Knightes, that do kill most men without any quarrell, and commit fowlest aduoulteres by sutlest shiftes: as Sir Launcelote, with the wife of king Arthure his master: Syr Tristram with the wife of king Marke his vncle; Syr Lamerocke with the wife of king Lote, that was his own aunte. This is good stuffe, for wise men to laughe at, or honest men to take pleasure at. Yet I know, when Gods Bible was banished the Court, and Morte Arthure receiued into the Princes chamber. What toyes, the dayly readyng of such a booke, may worke in the will of a yong ientleman, or a yong mayde, that liueth welthelie and idlelie, wise men can iudge, and honest men do pitie.3 The whole weight of the humanistic movement was directed, constructively in favor of the classical literatures and destructively against the survivals of the vernacular literatures. Through the centuries, in proportion as this theory became more firmly established, the effect was cumulative. Originally, as we have seen, it was applied to the old romances; later it condemned Shakespeare. Addison supports his admiration for Paradise Lost by careful parallelism with Vergil. And, when Gray substitutes English names for the classical examples in the celebrated stanza in his Elegy, it marks a new literary epoch. On this 1 Cf. Chapter II, pp. 116-119. 2 Scholemaster, op. cit., 80. 3 Professor Crane, Mod. Lang. Pub. XXX No. 2, regrets that there has been no systematic study of the history of the romance during the sixteenth century. One of the reasons for the change in taste by which they suffered is shown in such a passage as this by Ascham. The pupil was taught to regard them as both childish and immoral. HUMANISM 325 subject, there are two comments to be made that seem antithetical. First, that the result was to make the English nation, like Vanity Fair, without a hero. Today the English army marches to a tune the words of which are Some talk of Alexander, And some of Hercules, Of Hector, and Lysander, And such great names as these. At least it may be said of Guy of Warwick, or Bevis of Hampton that they were Englishmen! The second is that the old heroes persisted, and in spite of the critics, the literature was read. Arthur is the hero of the Faerie Queene, Chevy Chase thrilled Sidney, Milton meditated a poem on the Arthurian legend, Dryden modernized the Flower and the Leaf, and Addison saw pathos in the old ballads. The explanation of this apparent anomaly reveals the most unhappy result of humanism. The tendency of the revival of learning was to divide the nation into two separate camps, the learned and the unlearned. For the learned, there grew up an esoteric, exotic literature, whose roots never reached down into the national life. Of this, the extreme example is the pastoral. However beautiful to the trained ear, and however delightful to the cultivated taste, is the Lycidas, its appeal is definitely limited. To go a step farther,-to expect Windsor Forest to be read with enjoyment by the shepherd,-it is the reductio ad absurdum. The answer is that neither Milton nor Pope expected the poems to be read by the shepherd! They were consciously writing for highlytrained audiences; and in so far as they were doing so, they were consciously limiting their appeal. Such poems are literature of the clique, not of the country. Neither in their own age, nor in any subsequent time have they been truly national. But by this fact nine tenths of the nation were deprived of trained writers. Naturally they also had their poems and their poets, who equally lacked the ability to appeal to the cultivated. The humanistic theory thus clove the nation in twain. Not until the reaction against the whole idea became dominant was it possible to have a single writer, such as had been Chaucer, that could epitomize his epoch.' For two centuries and a half English literature is the Of course this is not true of the drama, which by the necessity of box receipts had to cater to, and thereby represent, the groundlings. Imagine the immense loss 326 EARLY TUDOR POETRY record of curiously local writers, with the occasional emergence of a book such as Pilgrim's Progress, or of a man, such as Burns, who makes a wide appeal.' Literature is essentially democratic, and the sin of humanism was pride of the intellect. That this most unhappy condition was begun by the humanists with the best of motives is quite clear. They are nothing if not moral. Believing as they did that the true exemplars for right living were to be found in classical times, they naturally stressed the knowledge of reading Latin and Greek. But their Latin was quite different in principle from that of the scholastics. As they wished to approximate the classical living, they also aimed to approximate classical expression. Therefore the vital, expressive Latin of the Middle Ages was exchanged for a speech that was frigidly correct. So Vives instructs Mountjoy in the art of conversation: 2 Speak yourself as you hear the instructed speak, or as you read in Latin writers. Shun the words which you consider of doubtful value both in speech and in writing, unless first you have got to know from your teacher that they are Latin. With those who speak Latin imperfectly, whose conversation may corrupt your own, rather speak English or any other language in which there is not the same danger. Much the same position is that taken by Elyot: 3 Lorde god, howe many good and clene wittes of children be nowe a dayes perisshed by ignorant schole maisters. Howe litle substancial doctrine is apprehended by the fewenesse of good gramariens?... I call nat them gramariens, whiche onely can teach or make rules, wherby a childe shall onely lerne to speake congrue latine, or to make sixe versis standyng in one fote, wherin perchance shal be neither sentence nor eloquence. But I name hym a gramarien, by the autoritie of Quintilian, that speakyng latine elegantly, can expounde good autours, expressynge the inuention and disposition of the mater, their stile or fourme of eloquence, explicating the figures as well of sentences as wordes, leuyng nothyng, persone, or place named by the autour, undeclared or hidde from his scholars. Wherfore Quintilian saith, it is nat inough for hym to haue rad poetes, but all kyndes of writyng must also be sought for; nat for the histories only, but also for the propretie of wordes, whiche communely do receiue theyr autoritie of noble autours. More ouer without musike gramer may nat be perfecte; for as moche as therin muste be spoken of metres and to literature, if the whole of Shakespeare's productivity had been forced to flow in the channels of the poems and the sonnets! 1 The sceptic may be safely referred to the authors entombed in Johnson's Poets. 2 Watson, Vives, op. cit., 244. 3 The Gouernour, op. cit., 69-71. HUMANISM 327 harmonies, called rythmi in greke. Neither if he haue nat the knowlege of sterres, he may understande poetes, which in description of times (I omitte other things) they traicte of the risinge and goinge downe of planettes. Also he may nat be ignorant in philosophie, for many places that be almooste in euerye poete fetched out of the most subtile parte of naturall questions. These be well nighe the wordes of Quintilian. After this, one is not surprised at his remark that there are few grammarians of this sort in England, nor at his attack upon the contemporary state of learning. Then he continues with another summary from Quintilian, to the effect that such education should be gained when young. Naturally we find Ascham following the tradition:1 All this while, by mine aduise, the childe shall vse to speake no latine; For, as Cicero saith in like matter, with like wordes, loquendo, male loqui discunt. And, that excellent learned man, G. Budaeus, in his Greeke Commentaries, sore complaineth, that whan he began to learne the latin tonge, vse of speaking latin at the table, and elsewhere, vnaduisedlie, did bring him to soch an eui [ choice of wordes, to soch a crooked framing of sentences, that no one thing did hurt or hinder him more, all the daies of his life afterward, both for redinesse in speaking, and also good iudgement in writinge. In very deede, if children were brought vp, in soch a house, or soch a Schole, where the latin tonge were properlie and perfitlie spoken, as Tib. and Ca. Gracci were brought vp, in their mother Cornelias house, surelie, than the dailie vse of speaking, were the best and readiest waie, to learne the latin tong. But now, commonlie, in the best Scholes in England, for wordes, the right choice is smallie regarded, true proprietrie whollie neglected, confusion is brought in, barbariousnesse is bred up so in yong wittse, as afterward they be, not onelie marde for speaking, but also corrupted in iudgement: as with moch adoe, or neuer at all, they be brought to right frame againe. Yet all men couet to haue their children speake latin: and so do I veric earnestlie too. We bothe, haue one purpose: we agree in desire, we wish one end: but we differ somewhat in order and waie, that leadeth rightlie to that end. Other would haue them speake at all aduentures: and, so they be speakinge, to speake, the Master careth not, the Scholer knoweth not, what. This is, to seeme, and not to bee: except it be, to be bolde without shame, rashe without skill, full of wordes without witte.... For, good vnderstanding must first be bred in the childe, which, being nurished with skill, and vse of writing (as I will teach more largelie hereafter) is the onelie waie to bring him to iudgement and readinesse in speakinge: and that in farre shorter time (if he follow constantlie the trade of this litle lesson) then he shall do, by common teachinge of the common scholes in England. In such passages as these, the reaction against the colloquial Medieval Latin is manifest, and also the change from the vital 1 The Scholemater, op. cit., 2-t9. 328 EARLY TUDOR POETRY spoken language to the point of view that to speak Latin was primarily a polite accomplishment. The appeal is now to the eye rather than to the ear, since the language has become a medium of communication, not with the living, but rather with the mighty dead.1 But partly due to this fact, to the very honest belief that in communion with the classic spirit lay the hope for modern regeneration, and partly due to the personal influence of Erasmus, "the honour of learning of all oure time," 2 little stress was put upon grammar in the narrow sense, and still less upon Ciceronianism. To this extent the Latin of the English humanists, by their insistence upon content rather than upon form, during the sixteenth century was saved from the mummification that speedily overtook it in Europe. As their aim was the perfect life, and as examples of such living were to be found in the Greek, Latin was considered rather as a means to that end, than as valuable for itself. The mechanism of the language, therefore, was merely a means of reaching the moral ideal. With the realization of this guiding principle, two corollaries follow from it logically. The first is the emphasis placed upon having proper teachers, men that shall teach through love, not fear. They must be such that to the pupil they seem the embodiment of the classical ideal. He must be drawn, not driven, to the wells of inspiration, by the practical example of the tutor. Thus Vives explains to young Mountjoy: 3 The teacher is no less to be loved, esteemed, revered than a father. Truly teachers bear a certain image of our fathers to us, for you can receive no greater kindness than that of being made more scholarly (eruditus) and better morallyfor to these two gifts nothing in life can be compared. Add to this, if you love your teacher, you learn more easily. You will then never despise what he says, nor neglect his behests. Always in your mind accord dignity to the teacher, This is of course implied in the emphasis upon Greek. The Scholemaster, 60: "Now, let Italian, and Latin it self, Spanishe, French, Douch, and Englishe bring forth their lerning, and recite their Authors, Cicero onelie excepted, and in one or two moe in Latin, they be all patched cloutes and ragges, in comparison of faire wouen broade cloathes. And trewelie, if there be any good in them, it is either lerned, borowed, or stolne, from some one of those worthie wittes of Athens." But Greek was never generally used as a spoken language. This is Skelton's objection to it. Cf. passage cited Chapter III. 2 The Scholemaster, op. cit., 62. 3 Watson, Vives, op. cit., 242. HUMANISM 329 and treat his words as oracles. Do not merely love him, but strive to be loved in return by him that so he will teach you the more diligently. By obeying his precepts closely and modestly, and by observing, honouring him in all he says or does, or esteems in life or speech, so act that he will feel that you also approve it. If he disapproves anything, then do you also shun it. Listen to him intently-to his words, his forms of speech, note down his opinions, and make yourself as far as possible, like him; take him for example, because when the teacher shall see this he will take pains that you shall not possibly receive from him anything which would be unworthy of imitation. In these extreme statements Vives here has outlined the main contentions of the humanists. After this, it is not surprising to find Elyot lauding the profession of teacher, bemoaning the little respect paid to it, and claiming that avaricious parents select a servant for their horses more carefully than a tutor for their children. The tutor 1... shulde be an auncient and worshipfull man, in whom is aproued to be moche gentilnes, mixte with grauitie, and, as nighe as can be, suche one as the childe by imitation folowynge may growe to be excellent. Such careful selection is essential because there is to be no forcing the pupil to learn.2 Therfore that infelicitie of our tyme and countray compelleth us to encroche some what upon the yeres of children, and specially of noble men, that they may sooner attayne to wisedome and grauitie than priuate persones, consideryng, as I haue saide, their charge and example, whiche, aboue all thynges, is most to be estemed. Nat withstandyng, I wolde nat haue them inforced by violence to lerne, but accordynge to the counsaile of Quintilian, to be swetely allured therto with praises and suche praty gyftes as children delite in. Ascham follows in the same strain with almost the same phrases. The teacher must have "this gentle nature" because the children are to be "allured to learning." Fear must be banished from the school.3 If your scholer do misse sometimes, in marking rightlie these foresaid sixe thinges, chide not hastelie: for that shall, both dull his witte, and discorage his diligence: but monish him gentelie: which shall make him both willing to amende, and glad to go forward in loue and hope of learning. The Gouernour, op. cit., 23. 2 Ibid, 21. 3 The Scholemaster, op. cit., 31. 330 EARLY TUDOR POETRY And the very reason for writing the Scholemaster was due to a conversation starting from the statement that scholars were running away from Eton for fear of beatings, and that Sackville himself felt that the punishments inflicted upon him in his youth had been a detriment to his learning. To avoid such a calamity to his own son, he turned to Ascham. Clearly this position of the humanists represents a reaction from the medieval theory and practice. Nor did it conquer easily. Even in 1563,1 Haddon was fullie of M. Peters opinion, and said, that the best Scholemaster of our time, was the greatest beater, and named the Person. On the other hand, as Watson points out in his preface to the Gouernour, the metaphor of the gardener coaxing his plants as applicable to teaching is afterwards used by Pestalozzi and Froebel. This theory is thus curiously modern, and is but another example of the anticipation on the part of the humanists of the trend of modern thought. The other corollary follows logically from the first. If the pupil is to be so allured to learning, and if Latin is to be kept in the state of pristine purity, clearly some means of communication, beyond dumb-show, must exist between the teacher and the pupil. If Latin may not be used, some other language must be substituted. Therefore the humanists were driven into advocating the study and the use of the vernacular. This was done first by Vives:- 2 Let the teacher know the mother-tongue of his boys, so that by that means he may with the more ease and readiness teach the learned languages. For unless he makes use of the right and proper expressions in the mother-tongue, he will certainly mislead the boys, and the error thus imbibed will accompany them persistently as they grow up, and as men. Nor can boys understand anything sufficiently well in their own language unless the words are said with the utmost clearness. Let the teacher preserve in his memory all the old forms of vernacular words, and let him develop the knowledge not only of modern forms but also of the old words and those which have gone out of use, and let him be as it were the guardian of the treasury of his language. Unless this be so, when any language undergoes numerous changes, books written a hundred years ago will not be understood by succeeding generations. It was for this reason that many things in the Twelve Tables escaped the knowledge of Cicero and many jurisconsults; so, too, many things become unknown in the current speech of living languages. 'Ibid, 18. 2 Quoted, together with the Latin, in the Preface of Watson's edition of the Gouernour, op. cit., XXV and XXVI. HUMANISM 331 Much the same purport is to be found in Elyot: 1 But to retourne to my purpose, hit shall be expedient that a noble mannes sonne, in his infancie, haue with hym continually onely suche as may accustome hym by litle and litle to speake pure and elegant latin. Semblably the nourises and other women about hym, if it be possible, to do the same: or, at the leste way, that they speke none englisshe but that which is cleane, polite, perfectly and articulately pronounced, omittinge no lettre or sillable, as folisshe women often times do of a wantonnesse, whereby diuers noble men and gentilmennes chyldren, (as I do at this daye knowe) haue attained corrupte and foule pronuntiation. It would be hard to overestimate the value of this endorsement of the English language by the humanists. With the more general spread of the humanistic theory through the centuries was bound up a careful respect for the vernacular. Academic prestige and critical approval were hereby bestowed upon the mother-tongue. It may well be considered a factor of no mean importance. On the other hand, eulogies on the subject have usually gone too far. It is to be noticed that the endorsement of tEh humanists was solely of the language; nothing is said or implied of the literature. Nor was the language studied for itself. In the passage quoted, Vives is explicit that he regards a, knowledge of English merely as a helpful pedagogic device for teaching Latin.:2 This is more clearly shown by another passage of the De Tradendis Disciplinis: 3 The scholars should first speak in their homes their mother tongue, which is born with them, and the teacher should correct their mistakes. Then they should, little by little, learn Latin. Next let'them intermingle with the vernacular what they have heard in Latin from the teacher, or what they themselves have learned. Thus, at first, their language should be a mixture of the mother-tongue and Latin. But outside the school they should speak the mother-tongue so that they should not become accustomed to a hotch-potch of languages... Gradually the development advances and the scholars become Latinists in the narrower sense. Now must they seek to express their thoughts in Latin, for nothing serves so much to The Gouernour, op. cit., 22. 2 Kuypers, op. cit., 54 thus summarizes Vives' position: Wenn auch auf pflege und reinhaltung der muttersprache ein sehr groszes gewicht gelegt und vom lehrer verlangt wird, dasz er nicht blosz jeden verstosz gegen dieselbe corrigiere, sondern sogar eine grtindliche kenntnis der entwicklungsgeschichte der muttersprache besitze, so ist sie doch noch nicht selbstindiges unterrichtsfach, sondern nur ein hilfsmittel zur verdeutlichung. The italics are his own. 3De Tradendis Disciplinis, Bk. iii, Cap. 3; the translation is taken from Foster Watson's Dialogues of a Tudor Schoolboy, xlvii. S32 EARLY TUDOR POETRY the learning of a language as continuous practice in it. He who is ashamed to speak a language has no talent for it. He who refuses to speak Latin after he has been learning it for a year must be punished according to his age and circumstances. Elyot is equally definite in his preference for the Latin; since this is scarcely practical in the early years, the best way is to insure good English that later the pupil may not become confused. But in the minds of neither is there any parity between the languages. And this is, of course, the point of view of Ascham in his celebrated apology: 1 If any man woulde blame me, eyther for takynge such a matter in hande, or els for writing it in the Englyshe tongue, this answere I may make hym, that whan the beste of the realme thinke it honest for them to vse, I one of the meanest sorte, ought not to suppose it vile for me to write: And though to haue written it in another tonge, had bene bothe more profitable for my study, and also more honest for my name, yet I can thinke my labour wel bestowed, yf with a little hynderaunce of my profyt and name, maye come any fourtheraunce, to the pleasure or commoditie, of the gentlemen and yeomen of Englande, for whose sake I tooke this matter in hande. The motive here for writing in English is frankly unselfish, and the author claims the merit of sacrifice. This differs in toto from the Lydgatian apology, the lament for lack of cunning implies that such cunning is possible. He does not write English, as did Skelton, because he enjoys it, nor, as does More, because he is driven to it. Much less does he choose English, as Bembo does Italian, because he thinks it the proper medium for artistic expression. On the contrary he feels that what he has to impart is so necessary for the well-being of his readers, that even to his own disadvantage he is willing to stoop to conquer. And again it is hard to estimate the exact result brought about by this view. We have all of us, in England more than in America, inherited a prejudice in favor of classical study and against study in the vernacular. The proof of this statement may be found in the lack of scholars, between 1550 and 1850, that have devoted themselves to the study of English and also have been connected professionally with our universities.2 Coincident with this is the further fact that the great scholarly work on English subjects was considered rather an avo 1 Toxophilus, op. oil., 18. 2 Thomas Warton is, of course, the great exception. HUMANISM 333 cation than a vocation, and was done by men trained for the Church or the bar. One result certainly is that in the academic field the study of English, either of the language or the literature, is a recent entrant, and as such is not yet quite clear as to its function. Historically there is no precedent. Perhaps largely for this reason, there has been a tendency towards the development of extreme individualism. There has been no Della Crusca and no Academy to offset the influence of the single author, so that the history of English literature is truly the record of its great men. And we have the "dictators of literature," Ben Jonson, Dryden, Pope, and Dr. Johnson. Negatively, this attitude has been somewhat responsible for the chaotic orthography and the distorted grammar of the English language; criticism has tended to be merely the expression of personal prejudice, and scholarship the collection of biographic detail. Perhaps it is unfair to throw the whole of this load upon the shoulders of humanism, but it is not doubtful that the theories propounded by the humanists, and eventually accepted by the nation, played no little part in the paradoxical attitude maintained toward the study of English by the Englishspeaking races. One more result of the doctrine of humanism remains to be mentioned, namely its effect upon the education of women. Again one is conscious in the attitude of the humanists of a recoil against the medieval practice. At best the Christian theory of education for women is based on the heart rather than on the head. The Christian ideal woman is a combination of Mary and Martha, of faith and good works. The perfect woman of the Proverbs would seem to have but little time for the cultivation of learning, and the wisdom with which she openeth her mouth is presumably gained only from personal experience. Consequently the Christian saint was distinguished for humility like Santa Clara, for aspiration like Santa Teresa, for acuteness like Santa Caterina of Siena, and for action like Joan of Arc, but learning is not one of her attributes. Vives, when he wishes to cite examples of female erudition, is rather hard put to it: 1 And in St. Jerome's time all holy women were very well learned. Would God that nowadays, many old men were able to be compared unto them in cunning. St. Jerome writeth unto Paula, Laeta, Eustachia, Fabiola, Marcella, Fruia, Demetrias, 1 Watson, Vives, op. cit., p. 52. 334 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Salma, Hierontia. St. Ambrose unto other; St. Augustine unto other: and all marvellous witted, well learned and holy. Valeria Proba, which loved her husband singularly well, made the life of our Lord Christ out of Virgil's verses. Writers of chronicles say that Theodosia, daughter to Theodosius the younger, was as noble by her learning and virtue, as by her empire: and the makings that be taken out of Homer, named Centones be called hers. I have read epistles and cunning works of Hildegarde, a maid of Almaine... Compare with the almost unknown persons of this list the famous women of antiquity, famous alike for their beauty and for their wit, the Sapphos, Aspasias, Cornelias, Zenobias, and the contrast is evident. Equally evident is it also that many of these same women were more blest with learning than with conventional morality. " Phryne, with her beauty bare " is scarcely the ideal of the New Testament. The problem of the humanists was, therefore, here also, to reconcile pagan culture with Christian ideals. This attempt was, for the English public, first made in Vives' De Institutione Faominme Christianw, written for the Princess Mary and dedicated to Katharine of Aragon in 1523.1 The aim of the book advowedly is to preach virtue.2 Moreover, though the precepts for men be innumerable: women yet may be informed with few words. For men must be occupied both at home and abroad, both in their own matters and for the common weal. Therefore it cannot be declared in few books, but in many and long, how they shall handle themselves, in so many and divers things. As for a woman, she hath no charge to see to, but her honesty and chastity. Wherefore when she is informed of that, she is sufficiently appointed. Wherefore their wickedness is the more cursed and detestable, that go about to perish'that one treasure of women: as though a man had but one eye, and another would go about to put it out. A great proportion of the tract consists in passages dealing with daily life, customs, and manners in which the tone differs not at all from that of a sermon. One such will sufficiently illustrate.3 But here some man would say: What, wouldst thou have women to be filthy and sluttish? Nay, verily, I would not have them so, nor my precepts be not 1 Published at Antwerp 1523; Basle, 1538, 1540; Basle, 1541 (circ.); Hanover, 1614. Translated into English by Richard Hyrde, London, Berthelet, probably 1540, republished 1541, 1557, 1592, and represented by extracts of the significant portions in Watson's Vives and the Renascence Education of Women, 1912, from which these facts are taken. 2 These quotations are taken from Hyrde's translation, as modernized by Watson, 34. Vives' Preface. 8 Watson, op. cit., 82-83. HUMANISM 335 so unclean, nor I like not sluttishness. And what manner a ones they should be, St. Peter and St. Paul, two defenders of the Church, teach in two short precepts. St. Peter saith: Let not the outward apparel of women be decked with the braiding of her hair, nor with wrapping of gold about it, or goodly clothing, but the mind and the conscience, that is not seen with eyes, if it be pure and quiet, that is a goodly thing, and excellent afore God. And St. Paul saith: Women in their array should apparel themselves with shamefastness and soberness and not with braids of their hairs, or gold, or pearls, or precious clothing, but as women ought to do, let them show virtue by good works. When the Apostles say these words, they bid not women be sluttish and slubbered, nor foul with dirt and clouts, but they counsel them from superfluous raiment, and will them to use mean clothing, and such as is easy to come by. For measureableness hath his cleanness, and that far more pure than the great excess hath, as it is more easy to keep a little vessel than a great many. Let her not be clothed with velvet, but with woollen; nor with silk but linen, and that coarse. Let not her raiment shine. Let it not be sluttish. Let it not to be wondered on, nor let it be to be loathed. As for the wearing of gold or silver, pearl or precious stones, I see not what it is good for, saving that the virtue of some stones is more set by than the show, as coral or emerald, if at least ways, those little things have so much virtue in them as men say, but now mo seek them for vanity that they may seem more rich, than for the virtue. Nor let her not paint nor anoint her face, but wash it, and make it clean; nor dye her hair, but comb it cleanly, nor suffer her head to be full of scurf. Nor let her not delight to wash it in sweet savours, nor to keep it stinking, nor look in a glass to paint her, or trim her gaily by, but to have away if any foul thing or uncomely be on her head that she could not else see, and then let her array herself thereby, lest anything be in her face to defile her, being else chaste and sober. Such admonitions as the foregoing have been the stock platitudes from the beginning of the Church and have furnished the basis for sumptuary laws throughout history. Both the preacher and the lawyer, although often at odds, are here united in blessed harmony in denouncing feminine extravagance. Age cannot stale its infinite iteration. And here, as always, the aim is plain morality. However much this aim may be common to Christian thinking, the novelty imported by the humanists was that woman should be fortified against temptation by learning. This is the point of the dialogue of Erasmus between the Abbot and the Learned Woman, where the Abbot's conventional objections are ridiculed and overthrown. Vives also states it emphatically.' 1 Vives, De Officio Mariti (1529), translated by Thomas Paynell (1550). Watson, op. cit., 200. 336 EARLY TUDOR POETRY I by experience have seen and known the contrary, and that all lewd and evil women are unlearned and that they which be learned are most desirous of honesty, nor I cannot remember that ever I saw any woman of learning or of knowledge dishonest. Shall not the subtle and crafty lover sooner persuade it pleaseth him the ignorant, than her that is fortified with wit and learning. This is the only cause, why all women for the most part, are hard to please, studious and most diligent to adorn and deck themselves, marvellers of trifles, in prosperity proud and insolent, in adversity abject and feeble, and for lack of good learning, they love and hate that only, the which they learned of their unlearned mothers, and examples of the evil, leaning to that part only, that the ponderous and heavy body is inclined and given unto. Hyrde, also, in his preface to Margaret Roper's translation of one of the tracts of Erasmus gives much the same train of reasoning.1 And the Latin and the Greek tongue I see not but there is as little hurt in them, as in books of English and French, which men both read, themselves, for the proper pastimes that be written in them, and for the witty and crafty conveyance of the makings: And also can bear well enough, that women read them, if they will, never so much, which commodities be far better handled in the Latin and Greek, than in any other language. And in them be many holy doctors' writings, so devout and affectuous, that whosoever regardeth them must needs be either much better or less evil, which every good body, both man and women, will read and follow, rather than other. But as for that, I hear many men say for the greatest jeopardy in this matter, in good faith to be plain, methink it is so foolish that scantly it is worthy, either to be rehearsed or answered unto, that is, where they say, if their wives coulde Latin or Greek, then might they talk more boldly with priests and friars, as who saith, there were no better means (if they were ill disposed) to execute their purposes than by speaking Latin or Greek; other else, that priests and friars were commonly so well learned, or that they can make their bargain so readily, which thing is also for contrary, that I suppose nowadays a man could not devise a better way to keep his wife safe from them, than if he teach her the Latin and Greek tongue, and such good sciences as are written in them: the which now, most part of priests, and specially such as be nought, abhor and fly from: yea, as fast in a manner as they fly from beggars, that ask them alms in the street. And where they find fault with learning, because they say it engendreth wit and craft, then they reprehend it, for that that it is most worthy to be commended for, and the which is one singular cause wherefor learning ought to be desired, for he that had leaver have his wife a fool than a wise woman, I hold him worse than twice frantic. Also reading and studying of books so occupieth the mind that, it can have no leisure to muse or delight in other fantasies, where in all handiworks that men say be more meet for a woman, the body may be busy in one place, and the mind walking in another: and while they sit sewing and spinning with their fingers, may cast and compass many peevish fancies in 1 Watson, op. cit., 165-167. HUMANISM 337 their minds, which must needs be occupied either with good or bad., so long as they be waking. And those that be evil disposed will find the means to be nought, though they can never a letter in the book, and she that will be good, learning shall cause her to be much the better. For it sheweth the image and ways of good living, even right as the mirror sheweth the similitude and proportion of the body. And doubtless the daily experience proveth that such as are nought are those that never knew what learning meant. For I never heard tell, nor read of any woman well learned that ever was (as plenteous as evil tongues be) spotted or infamed as vicious. But on the other side, many by their learning take, such increase of goodness that many may bear them witness of their virtue, of which sort I could rehearse a great number, both of old time and of late. It is obvious here, and in pleas like this, that a knowledge of classical literature is not recommended for its cultural value. However great that may be, it is disregarded; here, as in masculine education, a knowledge of Greek and Latin is desired, because in the books written in those languages are to be found the best examples of good living. When Vives chooses the authors for the girl to study, he quite frankly makes his selection for this reason.1 The authors in whom she should be versed are those who, at the same time, cultivate right language and right living: those who help to inculcate not only knowledge, but living well. The list that follows is a mixture of Latin and Greek authors, classical, Christian, and humanistic, with especial emphasis upon the New Testament. But with the curious exception of Vergil, the list is much the same as that recommended for boys.2 It therefore marks a new conception of the position of woman. The medieval conception that she is the handmaid of the devil and that in her person are embodied the wiles of Satan has given way to the modem point of view, that each sex has its own function. There is an essential parity. So Vives urges that a man's wife is his best friend,3 and Elyot writes in defense of good women.4 It is the modern conception. However modern this idea may be, it is interesting to note that it was derived not merely from theory, but also from life. The 1 Watson, op. cit., 146. 2 A somewhat different list is given in De Officio Mariti, where grammar, logic, history, statesmanship, mathematics, and, apparently, poetry are reserved for men. Watson, op. cit., 204-206. s Watson, op. cit., 210. 4Watson, op. cit., 211. 338 EARLY TUDOR POETRY origin of Vives' conceptions may be traced probably first to his mother. Still more important for the Englishman is it that the actual working out of these ideas he found in the household of Sir Thomas More. He himself was conscious of this.l Now if a man may be suffered among queens to speak of more mean folks, I would reckon among this sort the daughters of S T M Kn M, E, C. and with them their kinswoman Margaret G, whom their father not content onely to have them good and very chaste, would also they should be well learned, supposing that by that mean they should be more truly and surely chaste. Wherein neither that great wise man is deceived, nor none other that are of the same opinion. And Hyrde, the translator of Vives, was himself a member of More's household. He it is that introduces Margaret Roper's translation of Erasmus' treatise on the Lord's Prayer, with a eulogy in favor of learning for women. Like Vives, he draws his most telling argument from More's family, in particular from Margaret.2 Sauyng that I will be content, as for now, with one example of our own country and time that is: this gentlewoman, which translated this little book, hereafter following: whose virtuous conversation, living, and sad demeanour may be proof evident enough what good learning doth, where it is surely rooted: of whom other women may take example of prudent, humble and wifely behaviour, charitable and very Christian virtue, with which she hath, with God's help, endeavoured herself, no less to garnish her soul than it liked his goodness, with lovely beauty and comeliness, to garnish and set out her body: and undoubted is it that to the increase of her virtue, she hath taken and taketh no little occasion of her learning, besides her other manifold and great commodities, taken of the same; among which commodities, this is not the least, that with her virtuous, worshipful, wise and well learned husband, she hath by the occasion of her learning and his delight therein, such especial comfort, pleasure and pastime, as were not well possible for one unlearned couple, either to take together, or to conceive in their minds, what pleasure is therein. In fact, although naturally there were other women equally learned and equally virtuous, More's family seems to have been accepted as a sort of standard since in 1550 we find Ascham writing.3 1 Watson, op. cit., 53. With the names inserted the passage reads "the daughters of Sir Thomas More Knight Margaret, Elizabeth, Cecelia, and with them their kinswoman Margaret Giggs." 2 Watson, op. cit., 167-168. 3 Giles, edition of Ascham, ov. cit., i, lxii. HUMANISM 339 There are many honourable ladies now who surpass Thomas More's daughters in all kinds of learning. Just as More himself by the accidents of his life and his spectacular death became the typical English humanist, so his family also, partly from the fact that it was his family, became the type of English humanism. However cultivated and charming was Margaret Roper,-and More's letters to her show very real love and very real pride,-her claim to fame, then as now, was that she was the daughter of Sir Thomas More. The probability that this feeling that; More's family typified what might be accomplished by humanistic education was due rather to priority of time and accidents of fortune is strengthened by a consideration of the growth of the movement. With the next generation learning had become a fashion among women. To read Latin and Greek was apparently a polite accomplishment; knowledge of the classics was careful and genuine among the highborn ladies of the English court. Ascham's account of finding Lady Jane Grey immersed in Plato, while the rest of the company were out hunting, is too well known for quotation. It is so well known, however, that the implication seems to be that Lady Jane was peculiar. Actually the same condition was true of many of the Court circle. Ballard in his Memoirs of several Ladies of Great Britain who have been celebrated for their writings or skill in the learned languages, arts and sciences gives a curious list of twentyfour noblewomen, from Queen Katharine of Aragon to Queen Elizabeth, that had distinguished themselves in their studies. Four of them, Katharine of Aragon, Lady Jane Grey, Mary Tudor, and Elizabeth were by position the highest in the realm. In an age of caste, when personality is valued according to social position, to have learning in the high places had a direct effect upon literature. Particularly is this true of the last named. As it was Elizabeth's destiny to give her name to a literary epoch, Ascham's letter to Sturm (1550) in which he describes her education becomes a literary document. After the remark just quoted, concerning the daughters of Thomas More, he continues:...but among all of them the brightest star is my illustrious Lady Elizabeth, the king's sister; so that I have no difficulty in finding subject for writing in her praise, but only in setting bounds to what I write. I will write nothing however 340 EARLY TUDOR POETRY which I have not myself witnessed. She had me for her tutor in Greek and Latin two years; but now I am released from the Court and restored to my old literary leisure here, where by her beneficence I hold an honest place in this University. It is difficult to say whether the gifts of nature or of fortune are most to be admired in that illustrious lady. The praise which Aristotle gives wholly centres in herbeauty, stature, prudence, and industry. She has just passed her sixteenth birthday, and shows such dignity and gentleness as are wonderful at her age and in her rank. Her study of true religion and learning is most energetic. Her mind has no womanly weakness, her perseverance is equal to that of a man, and her memory long keeps what it quickly picks up. She talks French and Italian as well as English: she has often talked to me readily and well in Latin, and moderately so in Greek. When she writes Greek and Latin, nothing is more beautiful than her hand-writing.' She is as much delighted with music as she is skilful in the art. In adornment she is elegant rather than showy, and by her contempt of gold and head-dresses, she reminds one of Hippolyte rather than of Phaedra. She read with me almost all Cicero, and great part of Titus Livius; for she drew all her knowledge of Latin from those two authors. She used to give the morning of the day to the Greek Testament, and afterwards read select orations of Isocrates and the tragedies of Sophocles. For I thought that from those sources she might gain purity of style, and her mind derive instruction that would be of value to her to meet every contingency of life. To these I added Saint Cyprian and Melanchthon's Common Places, &c., as best suited, after the Holy Scriptures, to teach her the foundations of religion, together with elegant language and sound doctrine. Whatever she reads she at once perceives any word that has a doubtful or curious meaning. She cannot endure those foolish imitators of Erasmus, who have tied up the Latin tongue in those wretched fetters of proverbs. She likes a style that grows out of the subject; chaste because it is suitable, and beautiful because it is clear. She very much admires modest metaphors, and comparisons of contraries well put together and contrasting felicitously with one another.2 Her ears are so well practised in discriminating all these things, and her judgment is so good, that in all Greek, Latin, and English composition, there is nothing so loose on the one hand or so concise on the other, which she does not immediately attend to, and either reject with disgust or receive with pleasure, as the case may be. I am not inventing anything my dear Sturm; it is all true. It may be granted that it is always easy to see excellence in princes and that Ascham's eyes were peculiarly keen, when the 1 For the American reader the most accessible method of comparing Elizabeth's handwriting with that of her contemporaries is by the holograph facsimiles in the International Manuscripts. The letter of Elizabeth is in English and dated 1603. For Ascham's reputation as a judge of chirography it is to be devoutly hoped that her skill had degenerated in her old age, since the specimen there, compares most unfavorably with that of Lady Jane Grey. 20n reading this, the modern student instinctively remembers the style of Lyly and wonders whether this may not be part explanation of its origin and also of its popularity. HUMANISM 341 princess was also of the true religion, and even that the Queen did not show a particularly Hippolyte-like contempt for head-dresses, yet his facts, as contrasted with his impressions, show that in two years she had done a very fair amount of heavy reading, much more than is required for college entrance today. Although the intellectual productivity of any epoch is governed by forces far beyond the control of any one individual, yet at the time when the human mind was almost at its highest creative point, the character of its literary output was influenced by the preference of Elizabeth. To a degree, the extent of which it is difficult for the modern reader to realize, her favor was synonymous with fortune and reputation. To the public of her day she was the court of last appeal, and the critic whose judgment was final. We are apt to forget that Spenser wrote personally for the Queen, that his phrases were formed for her immediate eye, and that his fortune lay in her approval. That her training, founded upon the great classic tradition, had been such that she could discriminate, made for the glory of English literature. Therefore, not the least of the many results of the humanistic theory was that in Elizabeth and the women of her Court may be found the inspiration of Elizabethan literature. Thus, although it may be granted that, to the casual reader, such writers, as Vives, Elyot, or Ascham, are tiresome, it must also be granted, I think, that they are important. Actually, the very fact that they are tiresome is merely another way of stating their importance, since it is a confession that we have so assimilated their thoughts that we find little new. The quaintness, such as there is, is largely a matter of expression. Usually we find only our own ideas poorly developed and badly phrased. But this is the fate of all great innovators. To borrow an illustration from another field, Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations, I suppose, marks an epoch in the study of economics; yet to the modern economist there 'is little but historic interest in the book. So also with the three writers we have been considering. Vives is scarcely a name even to the specialist. Of Elyot, Hallam remarks 1 He seems worthy, upon the whole, on account of the solidity of his reflections, to hold a higher place than Ascham, to whom, in some respects, he bears a good deal of resemblance. But if the "higher place" is dependent upon interest, no judgment 1 Literature of Europe, 4th ed., i. 400. 342 EARLY TUDOR POETRY could be more unfortunate. The solidity of his reflections is now necessarily commonplace, whereas Ascham by the vivacity of his personality, his diatribes against Italy, his enthusiasm for the Protestant religion is always sure of a certain number of readers. He is so sure of his outrageous opinions that we forgive him for being very often right! Of course, the real reason is that, whereas in Elyot the combination of elements has not yet been perfectly assimilated, in Ascham, the next generation had fused and made those thoughts its own. And consequently the personality of the writer has free play. Ascham is saved both by his likes and his prejudices, and, while the Scholemaster is no longer accepted as a standard of pedagogy, it is read for a vivid and entertaining presentation of certain points of view. As such, it has maintained its position as an exposition of the theory of the humanists. But the effect of humanism was not limited to the production of poems in Latin, intellectual stimulation, or educational theory. In fact, the natural result of all these three combined would be shown in the output of English verse. Contact with the great classical literature would breed emulation, and, in English dress, humanism would appear either in the point of view or in the form of the poem. Here, however, we are confronted by a curious lack of data. Puttenham tells us: "In the latter end of the same kings raigne sprong vp a new company of courtly makers...." but of those courtly makers we have almost no evidence. A priori we might have deduced their existence. In the elaborate court life of a king with the cultivation of Henry VIII, the existence of such a company would be posited. But also, as such pieces would be written for the immediate circle, and as the approval sought would be that of the king and his friends, the author had nothing to gain by publication. Autograph and manuscript copies would suffice for the limited circulation desired. That such was the situation is the complaint of Puttenham. He has been discussing why poetry was at so low an ebb. One of the reasons is that the art is not sufficiently recompensed by princes. Consequently, as there is no reward, even those who write do not publish: 2 "Now also of such among the Nobilitie or gentrie as be very well seene in many laudable sciences, and especially in making or Poesie, it is so come to passe that they 1 Arber's Reprints, The Arte of English Poesie, 74. 2 Puttenham, Arber's Reprints, p. 37. HUMANISM 343 haue no courage to write and if they haue, yet are they loath to be a knowen of their skill. So as I know very many notable Gentlemen in the Court that haue written commendably and suppressed it agayne, or els suffred it to be publisht without their owne names to it: as if it were a discredit for a Gentleman, to seere learned, and to shew him selfe amorous of any good Art." Thus it is only by accident that any of the court poetry has come down to us. That some has come down is due to the custom that, when a man heard or read a poem that pleased him, he copied it into his commonplace book, each person forming, as it were, his own anthology. Two such collections are those published by FlUgel,1 one of which, the Royal MS., was originally in the possession of Henry VIII. Still another is that possessed presumably by Surrey and the Howard family.2 And scattered through the British Museum and manuscript books in private hands there are still in existence a goodly number of unprinted verses of this time. Yet the very fact that they have never been printed, that their circulation must have been limited to from hand to hand, explains the unique importance attaching to the collection about to be considered, commonly known from the name cf the publisher as Tottel's Miscellany. This importance is due, not only to the fact that it is the first published anthology in English,3 nor that the poems contained in it are in themselves excellent, but, from the very fact of its having been the only printed collection, it is the gateway through which the courtly poetry of Henry VIII passed on to the Elizabethans. However faulty may be the text, uncritical the selections, and casual the arrangement, yet necessarily the earlier writers were known almost entirely from its pages. By 1557 Richard Tottel, then in the fourth year of his business, had issued eighteen books. These may be divided into law books, humanistic books, and books dealing with English literature. He had already issued More's Dialogue of Comfort, Lydgate's Fall of Princes, and Hawes' Pastime of Pleasure. It was, therefore, quite in accord with his policy to bring out a collection of the poetry of the last generation. On June 5th, as the eighteenth book from his press, this was issued with the title: Songes and Sonettes, written by the 1 Anglia, 12, 223. 2A. K. Foxwell, Study of Sir Thomas Wyatt, 125-135. 3 It may be objected that the 1532 Chaucer is really an anthology, although that is scarcely its object. 344 EARLY TUDOR POETRY ryght honorable Lorde Henry Haward late Earle of Surrey, and other. There is but one known copy of this. Of the 271 poems included, forty were by Surrey, ninety-six by Wyatt, forty by Nicholas Grimald, and ninety-five by "uncertain auctours." But the very striking feature is that by July 31st, fifty-six days only after he had finished printing the first edition, a second appeared from which thirty of the forty poems by Grimald disappeared, their places being supplied by thirty-nine new poems given to the "uncertain auctours." Of this edition there are but two copies known, and textually they do not agree! Apparently at once after finishing setting the type for the first edition, at full speed he remodelled it, working so rapidly that he changed readings, even as the second edition was passing through the press. And between these two editions, on June 21st, he had published Surrey's translation of the Second and Fourth Books of the Xneid. These are the facts. To explain them, each is at liberty to construct his own hypothesis.1 As we have Wyatt's autograph manuscript,2 we know that Tottel had neither a complete collection of Wyatt's poems, nor a correct text. The presumption is, therefore, that Tottel's authority is one of the commonplace books, and that the second edition is due to another commonplace book, which, for some unknown reason, he preferred. In any case this double-barrelled arrangement gives us 310 poems from which to judge the court poetry of the age. These poems fall into four parts, corresponding to their authors. As Surrey will be discussed later,3 the present concern is with Wyatt. His poems fill the bulk of the collection, being more numerous than the poems of any other two combined. As he was a Cambridge man with two academic degrees, it is natural to look for strong humanistic influence in his work, and, as he imitates very closely, there should be little doubt in determining the amount of it. The amount is unexpectedly small. Of the ninetysix poems, there are but two eight-line epigrams imitated from Ausonius and the Renaissance humanist Pandulpho respectively, 1 Arber reasons that Grimald must have been the editor because he had had Tottel publish his translation from Cicero four years before, and because they are his poems that are dropped. It is a testimony to Professor Arber's estimate of the modesty of the average editor. 2 Egerton MS. 2711 British Museum. s Surrey's use of blank verse is discussed later in this same chapter; his general humanism in Chapter VI. HUMANISM 345 and two satires freely taken from Horace.1 And as in these last he has adopted the Italian verse form, the terza rima, the inference is that even here he is following Italian precedent. If Wyatt's work be at all a fair sample of the court poetry, the possibility of finding humanism there, as an energizing force, may safely be abandoned. That Wyatt's verse is not a fair sample, however, is evident not only from the obvious humanism in Surrey, but also from the work of the "Uncertain Auctours." Under this caption are included one hundred and thirty-four pieces, of all sorts and kinds. From allusions two poems have been attributed to Thomas, Lord Vaux, and one to Heywood. Actually, however, from other allusions, unfortunately less definite, we know that Bryan, Rochford, Churchyard, Cornysshe, and William Grey wrote verses and probably had a share in the miscellany. In spite of Warton's remark," From palpable coincidences of style, subject, and other circumstances, a slender share of critical sagacity is sufficient to point out many others," the identification has never been made; 2 nor does it seem a very hopeful undertaking when so many of the names signed to the pieces in the Royal MS. are of persons otherwise unknown; nor can the question of the dating be more definitely settled. The date of publication is of course no guide, since in 1557 Wyatt had been dead fifteen years and Surrey ten. Still more, the collection includes some of Wyatt's earliest verse. On the other hand, Vaux's poem I lothe that I did love is headed in a manuscript in the British Museum as "in the time of the noble Queen Mary." 3 The assumption is that the hypothetical commonplace book received entries for nearly half a century. If this is true, then, since the possible known contributors are all connected with the court, it may be accepted as a compendium of typical court poetry. If the miscellany is typical, it cannot be said that many of the courtiers were strongly gifted poetically. The level of achievement is low. The only one that has survived to our time is that by Lord Vaux, and by the fact that in a garbled form it is sung by the grave-digger in Hamlet. For the modern reader, the only interest is to be found in the testimony that it bears to the literary This indebtedness was originally pointed out, I think, by Warton and Nott. 2 Warton, 1871, iv, 59. 3 Warton, ed. 1871, iv, 59. 346 EARLY TUDOR POETRY tendencies of the time. Of these it is at once evident that humanism is not the least. Allusions to classical stories, to Troy, to Ulysses, to the various loves of the gods, presuppose an audience familiar with classical learning. Occasionally there is translation. In the Epistle of Penelope to Ulysses Ovid is said to make his first appearance in English verse.1 But the favorite author is Horace. As Nott notes,2 there are three distinct renderings of the Tenth Ode of the Second Book.3 The Seventh Ode of the Fourth Book appears under the caption, All worldly pleasures fade.4 As an illustration of the sea-change in Horace the comparison between the Latin and the English is valuable. Diffugere nives, redeunt iam gramina campis arboribusque comae; mutat terra vices et decrescentia ripas flumina praetereunt; Gratia cum Nymphis geminisque sororibus audet ducere nuda choros. Immortalia ne speres, monet annus et almum quae rapit hora diem: frigora mitescunt Zephyris, ver proterit aetas, interitura simul pomifer autumnus fruges effuderit, et mox bruma recurrit iners. Damna tamen celeres reparant caelestia lunae: nos ubi decidimus quo pater Aeneas, quo Tullus dives et Ancus, pulvis et umbra sumus. Quis scit an adiciant hodiernae crastina summae tempora di superi? Cuncta manus avidas fugient heredis, amico quae dederis animo. Cum semel occideris et de te splendida Minos fecerit arbitria, non, Torquate, genus, non te facundia, non te restituet pietas. Infernis neque enim tenebris Diana pudicum liberat Hippolytum, nec Lethaea valet Theseus abrumpere caro vincula Pirithoo. 1 Warton, ed. 1871, iv, 65. 2 Nott, Works of Surrey, 1815, 329. ' As one of the versions is by the Earl of Surrey, a consideration of the three is reserved for Chap. VI, page 526. 4 Arber's reprint of Tottel, 160. HUMANISM 347 The winter with his griesly stormes no lenger dare abyde, The trees haue leues, ye bowes don spred, new changed is the yere. The plesant grasse, with lusty grene, the earth hath newly dyde. The water brokes are cleane sonke down, the pleasant bankes apere The spring is come, the goodly nimphes now daunce in euery place Thus hath the yere most plesantly of late ychangde his face. Hope for no immortalitie, for welth will weare away, As we may learne by euery yere, yea howres of euery day. For Zepharus doth mollifye the colde and blustering windes: The somers drought doth take away ye spring out of our minds. And yet the somer cannot last, but once must step asyde, Then Autumn thinkes to kepe hys place, but Autumn cannot bide. For when he hath brought furth his fruits and stuft ye barns with corn, The winter eates and empties all, and thus is Autumn worne: Then hory frostes possesse the place, then tempestes work much harm, Then rage of stormes done make all colde which somer had made so warm Wherfore let no man put his trust in that, that will decay, For slipper welth will not continue, plesure will weare away. For when that we haue lost our lyfe, and lye ivnder a stone, What are we then, we are but earth, then is our pleasure gon. No man can tell what god almight of euery wight doth cast, No man can say to day I liue, till morne my lyfe shall last. For when thou shalt before thy iudge stand to receiue thy dome, What sentence Minos dothe pronounce that must of thee become. Then shall not noble stock and blud redeme the from his handes, Nor surged talke with eloquence shal lowse thee from his bandes. Nor yet thy lyfe vprightly lead, can help thee out of hell, For who descendeth downe so depe, must there abyde and dwell. Diana could not thence deliuer chaste Hypolitus, Nor Theseus could not call to life his frende Periothous. It is clear at once that in form the English is much longer than the Latin, not only in the number of the lines, but, in addition, in the number of words to each line. With the brevity goes also the elegance of Horace. The attempt has been made to render the First Archilochian Strophe by a quatrain of seven-line verses; even this breaks down and the poem continues in couplets. As the caesura is usually placed after the fourth foot, each line separates into two. If each couplet were printed as a quatrain, fours and threes, with alternate rimes, the result would be familiar as the common hymn measure. And the same criticism would apply here as there, namely, that the intensity of the accent renders the effect sing-song. It is a form almost ideally unsuited to reproduce 348 EARLY TUDOR POETRY the delicacy of Horace. In content, at first glance it seems almost literal translation. On second inspection, the definitely classical touches have been removed and the typically Christian points emphasized. By this slight shifting of the stress, Horace's gentle admonition to live while yet we may has been changed into a monody on the imminence of death. Even the Calvinistic doctrine of predestination finds expression in the final word of the line. Nor yet thy lyfe vprightly lead, can help thee out of hell. The total result is that in, both form and content the English version is unlike the Latin original. This single example would be of slight significance, were it not that it is typical of the appeal made by Horace to the Englishmen of the first half of the sixteenth century. It is not the fiery Catullus, but the philosophical Horace that is chosen as the exemplar; it is not even Horace in his lighter, lyric, and erotic moods,-it is the Horace singing the shortness of life and the coming of death. That this is not the classical Horace needs not to be argued; it is the Horace that they wished to see.1 Particularly is this true of his doctrine of the "golden mean," that happiness lies in the avoidance of extremes. Among the pieces of the uncertain authors there are three poems on this thought.2 Although not identical, in each there is the same trend of thought, that riches do not bring contentment, nor power pleasure, nor hopes fulfillment, nor ambition ease. But none of these three poems, however much they may suggest portions of Horace, is taken from his odes. Apparently the conditions of the age were such as to make these reflections congenial, and, unless by chance the three are by one common author, ideas like these must have been not unusual. Such a point of view must have been engendered by the tragedies of the times. As the aim of the early Tudor kings was to exalt the power of the crown, to be high in place was in itself a dangerous position, and precedence was a doubtful prerogative. Buckingham, Wolsey, More, Cromwell,-illustrations come easy to hand,3 even the 1 Cf. page 261-e. 2 They of the meane estate are happiest, 129; The meane estate is best, 154; The pore estate is to be holden for best, 164. 3 Cf. page 29, where the fates of those attending the baptism of Queen Elizabeth are given. HUMANISM 349 Earl of Surrey, the poet of the age, is executed for the crime of having royal blood in his veins. Thus the most casual consideration of the noble tragedies of the first half of the sixteenth century would lead to an appreciation of the blessings of social mediocrity. This opinion finds an apt illustration in the third of the poems mentioned. E xperience now doth shew what God vs taught before, D esired pompe is vaine, and seldome dothe it last: W ho climbes to raigne with kinges, may rue his fate full sore. A las the wofull ende that comes with care full fast, R eiect him dothe renowne his pompe full lowe is caste. D eceiued is the birde by swetenesse of the call E xpell that pleasant taste, wherein is bitter gall. S uch as with oten cakes is pore estate abides, O f care haue they no cure, the crab with mirth they rost, M ore ease fele they then those, that from their height downe slides E xcesse doth brede their wo, they faile in scillas cost, R emainyng in the stormes till shyp and all be lost. S erue God therfore thou pore, for lo, thou liues in rest, E schue the golden hall, thy thatched house is besT. The poem contains in anagram Edwarde Somerset, the name of the author according to Arber.' Although this is possible, it seems more probable that the poem should be regarded as a meditation upon the career of Edward, first Duke of Somerset. Born of a knightly but not highly distinguished family, he came into prominence by the marriage of his sister Jane to Henry VIII. Toward the end of Henry's life, he had become the recognized leader of the party of the "new men" in opposition to Norfolk, whose imprisonment left him the most powerful noble in the kingdom. By the king's will he became one of the executors, then Protector of the young King, and finally assumed almost royal authority. But Who climbes to raigne with kinges, may rue his fate full sore, he was unable to control the turbulent elements among the nobles, and he was brought to the block in January 1552, and his estates 1 Totte's MisceUany, 164. This suggestion has not received the endorsement of A. F. Pollard:... "and his (Somerset) nearest approach to an artistic accomplishment was his gift of eloquence and mastery of good English prose." England under Protector Somerset, 321. 350 EARLY TUDOR POETRY were forfeited. The moral of his career would be that "the pore estate is to be holden for best." So the assimilation of one phase of Horace was complete. These poems serve to illustrate, also, both how much the English poets had to learn and where they sought to learn it. We are so familiar with the oft-repeated statement that Petrarch was the master of the sixteenth-century writers, that we tend to forget that he was not the only master. The school in which they studied had many instructors, not the least of whom were the classical authors, from whom Petrarch also had learned his art. Therefore, one of the functions of humanism was to hold up poetic ideals to the new age. But among the contributors to the Miscellany, the chief representative of humanism is not Wyatt, Surrey, nor any one of the "Uncertain Auctours"; it is Nicholas Grimald. According to Bale, he was the author of twenty-nine separate works. The uncritical nature of Bale's method of compilation is well known. The final list is a combination of various different lists received from friends. It represents little more than the bibliographical gossip of the time. This appears in his note book where the persons giving the information are tabulated.1 The interesting feature in the case of Grimald is that, in several places, he seems to have supplied Bale with first-hand information. Certainly, then, the greater part of his work was unprinted and is lost. In fact, even in the Miscellany he is a vanishing quantity, since of the forty poems in the first edition, signed Nicholas Grimald, but ten remain in the second edition with the abbreviated signature N. G. But, as the interval between these two editions is only fifty-six days, an interval too short to allow the supposition that the supply had been exhausted by any normal demand, it seems rational to infer that Grimald had become persona non grata. The explanation may perhaps be found in the tale that after having been a protestant, he recanted under Mary, "not without some becking and bowing (alas) of his knee unto Baal," 2 with the result that it was feared that his name might injure the sale of the book. This possible hypothesis is somewhat supported by the fact that all of his poems with any personal allusion are carefully removed and for his name the unincriminating initials substituted. Owing to 1 Index Britannia Scriptorum, ed. by R. L. Poole, Oxford, 1902. 2 Ridley's Works, Parker Society, p. 391. HUMANISM 351 this suppression in the second and all subsequent editions Grimald was almost unknown to the next generation. The various problems of his life fortunately do not concern the literary historian. The one fact that needs stress here is that he belongs not to the court, but to the university circle. He was a Cambridge man, taking his degree there in 1540. Apparently there he made sufficient reputation as either a scholar, or a writer, or both, that Gilbert Smith, Archdeacon of Peterborough lured him to Oxford.' He was elected probationer fellow of Merton in 1541, incorporated B. A. in 1542, M. A. in 1544, and "1547, when the Coll. of King Hen. 8 (Christ Church) was to be settled and replenished with Students, he was put in there as a Senior, or Theologist, (accounted then only honorary) and the rather for this reason, because he about that time did read a public Lecture to the Academians in the large refectory of that place." 2 Bale's epithet "scholasticorum sui temporis non infimum decus," 3 is certainly not exaggerated. Naturally the mass of his work, to judge from the titles given by Bale, is purely academic in its nature. He translates from the Greek, he writes songs and epigrams, congratulatory poems, and familiar epistles. His paraphrases on the Georgics have come down to us, and his English translation of the De Offciis of Cicero (1553). More interesting are his "school dramas" the Archipropheta and the Christus Redivivus. The reason for the dramatic form is again scholastic.4 It is an extension of the same idea embodied in Erasmus' Colloquia. At a time when it was essential that Latin should be learned as a spoken language, the Latin play developed as a pedagogic device. Consequently not only were Terence and Plautus studied and performed, but even modern plays, modelled upon them, were written. Thus the Christus was avowedly modelled upon Plautus and was played by the students of Merton before the townspeople. Such plays are purely classical in form. Naturally, in the fragment of his verse preserved, even unwill"... uehemeter hortante te et pecunias ultr6 suppeditante.... Epistola Nunxpatoria to Christus Redivivus. 2 Wood, Athen. Ox. i, 178. 3 Bale, Scriptorum Brytannice, 1557, p. 701. 4 The question of the school drama is discussed by James L. McConaughy, The School Drama including Palgraves Introduction to Acolastus, Columbia University, 1913. 352R EARLY TUDOR POETRY ingly, by Tottel, the humanistic note is dominant. His allusions are all drawn from ancient times. Thus, in a poem on the not uncommon subject of friendship be bursts forth: O frendship, flowr of flowrs: O liuely sprite of life, O sacred bond of blissfull peace, the stalworth staunch of strife: Scipio with Lelius didst thou conioyn in care, At home, in warrs, for weal and wo, with egall faith to fare. Gesippus eke with Tite, Damon with Pythias, And with Menclus sonne Achill, by thee combined was. Euryalus, and Nisus gaue Virgil cause to sing: Of Pylades doo many rymes, and of Orestes ring. Down Theseus went to hell, Pirith, his frend to finde: O yat the wiues, in these our dayes, were to their mates so kinde. Cicero, the frendly man, to Atticus, his frend, Of frendship wrote: such couples lo dothe lott but seldom lend. Even when he tries to tell of his grief over the death of his mother, he becomes involved in a catalogue of classical instances: Martius to vanguish Rome, was set on fire: But vanquisht fell, at moothers boon, his ire. Into Hesperian land Sertorius fled, Of parent aye cheef care had in his hed. Dear weight on shoulders Sicil brethren bore, While Etnaes gyant spouted flames full sore... There are eighteen lines of this to reach the conclusion, And should not I expresse my inward wo, When you, most louyng dam, so soon hence go! From a man who carries such a load of learning one naturally expects a poem on the golden mean, and his is adorned by illustrations from Phaeton, Julius Caesar, Nero, Augustus, Cato, and Antonius. The names of the old gods and heroes fall trippingly from his pen whether he be in love, or in sorrow, and his poems have all the fire of a classical dictionary. If Tottel had not added the additional poems of the "Uncertain Auctour," one would be tempted to explain the omission of three quarters of Grimald's work from the second edition as being merely an unexpected manifestation of critical good sense. If such pedantry were all that humanism meant to English poetry, the value would be slight. Pedants we have always with us and Gabriel Harvey in the next age could have supplied all HUMANISM 353 that was then essential. But not only were these men, of whom Grimald is an extreme example, struggling for that compression and dignity of Latin verse, they were also studying its form. Not yet does one find the elaborate, and sometimes fantastic, experiments in English verse constructed on the rules of Latin prosody but there is one attempt in this line that merits more than passing notice. There are three possible explanations of the origin of blank verse. First, it might have evolved from the earlier English verse forms. Blank verse is Chaucer's iambic pentameter "riding rhyme" without the rimes. It is conceivable that in some manuscript the scribe by changing the final word of every other line in some passage unconsciously created blank verse. If this were done, and if it could be shown that in the sixteenth century both Grimaid and Surrey knew that particular manuscript, the explanation would be found. As no such manuscript has been found, this possibility may therefore be dismissed. In this connection, however, it is to be remarked that, as Guest showed as early as 1838, the first part of the Tale of Melibeus, although stated to be a "litel thing in prose," has almost the cadence of blank verse. Obviously Chaucer, in attempting to write prose, carried over the cadence of the heroic couplet. But as Chaucer considered the passage to be prose, and as it was printed as prose, to assume that the Tudor men realized its real character is to credit them with superhuman critical sagacity. The second possibility, that it was borrowed consciously from the Italians, is the explanation usually accepted.1 Before 1550 both Ruscellai and Trissino had used it for drama; and Alamanni in the 1532 edition of his Opere Toscane, dedicated to Francis I, had employed it in a narrative poem, II Dilvuvio Romano. Moreover, both Surrey and Alamanni were present in 1532 at the meeting of Henry VIII and Francis I. The assumption is that Alamanni then incited Surrey to make analogous experiments in English.2 1"It would, of course, be gratuitous futility to argue that, as a matter of fact, Surrey did not take this pattern also from the Italians, who were then the only nation and language in Europe that had made considerable attempts at it."' Saintsbury, Hist. of English Prosody, i, 314. 2This view is stated most clearly in The French Renaissance in England, Sidney Lee, 1910, pp. 116-117. 354 EARLY TUDOR POETRY That before Surrey's death blank verse in Italy had gone beyond the experimental stage, is not open to question. By 1515 both Trissino and Ruscellai had used it for drama; by 1520 Alamanni wrote a number of narratives in it; 1 the Api of Ruscellai in blank verse was published in 1539; and in 1541 had appeared a translation into blank verse of the Second Book of the XEneid, under the name of the Cardinal Hippolito de Medici, yet contemporaneously attributed to Molza.2 And it had been propounded as a theory by Felice Figliucci, who illustrated his principles by verses.3 What concerns us here, however, is not so much the fact as the motive. This was due to humanism. The guiding principle in the Poetica (1529) of Trissino is that modern poetry should become natural by a return to classical models. Thus the Api of his friend Ruscellai is a derivative from the Georgics. Still more is this true of Alamanni, who has curiously enough become the protagonist of modern theories. Of the ten elegies in the First Book, eight are translations from Theocritus and Bion. Moreover he defends this use of blank verse by an appeal to the classical usage.4 In Italy, then, blank verse originated in the desire to approach more nearly the system of classical versification, starting naturally with translations from classical authors and extending into other matters, such as II Diluvio Romano. The translation into versi scolti of the Second Book of the AXneid is perfectly normal. Therefore, to insist upon the Italian origin of English blank verse is merely to remove humanism one degree. There are two difficulties, however, with that hypothesis. The first is that there is no connection shown between Surrey and the Italian humanists, except that in 1532 both he and Alamanni were present at a court function in France. Surrey was at that time a young man of about fifteen or sixteen. Alamanni was thirtyseven years old. While, even in that age of caste, it is not im1 This dating is taken from Luigi Alamanni, sa vie et son auvre, by Henri Hauvette, Paris, 1903, p. 218. 2 Ortensio Lando, Paradossi, Paradox 23. 3 I know this only from Warton. Tiraboschi scarcely mentions him. (I suspect Warton's knowledge is limited by Ascham's reference). 4 "Con pii ragion sarebbe che i primi inventori delle rime si scusasser coi Greci et coi Latini, dai quali fur del tutto damnate et fuggite, che io con loro." Quoted by Hauvette, op. cit., p. 219. The copy of the Opere Toscane, 1542, in the Yale Library lacks the Dedicatory Epistle; so that I have not verified the quotation. HUMANISM 355 possible that the chosen companion of the son of the King of England should hold literary conversation with a Florentine exile twice his age, it is inconceivable that the latter should not have left some comment upon such an auspicious event. And among all the verses flattering Francis and his court, there is not a line that suggests that he had even heard of a young poet of the blood royal of England. The second of the difficulties with this assumption is that it fails to provide for Grimald. The further assumption, entirely without proof, must be made that he was the imitator of Surrey. In the first edition of Tottel, dated June 5, 1557, two poems by Grimald in blank verse, The Death of Zoroas, and Marcus Tullius Ciceroes death appear. Sixteen days later, Tottel published Surrey's translation of the Second and Fourth Books of the iEneid. Unless there be a prior issue of the Surrey,' to 1 The fourth boke of Virgil, intreating of the love between Dido (and XEneas) translated into English and drawne into a straunge metre by Henrye, late Earle of Surrey, worthy to be embrased. Printed by John Day for Wm. Owen at the Sign of the Cock. n. d. Of this edition a single copy remains, in the ChristieMiller collection at Britwell Court. As it has never been collated it forms the doubtful x in any discussion of the origin of blank verse. In spite of the courteous efforts of Dr. A. W. Pollard, as yet I have no facts in regard to it. The records show that it was sold in 1824 and in 1858. In my complete ignorance of the book, there is first the possibility that it may be a forgery. The date, 1824, is suggestively near the Collier forgeries. If this were proved true, it would explain the curious and unique addendum "drawn into a straunge metre." It seems odd that the sixteenth century editor should have thus stressed the medium of the translation, since clearly that would not help the sale of his book; on the other hand, as the sole interest in 1824 lay in the fact that it contains the earliest example of the great English blank verse, equally clearly it is explicable why the forger should emphasize this fact upon the title page. Thus that the book is sham is a sinister possibility. If, on the other hand, it be shown to be genuine, the question of the dating becomes imperative. Unhappily there are no data. It was printed for William Owen "at the Sign of the Cock"; Owen appears (Arber's Registers) in 1562 outside of Paul's, but where he was previously is unknown. The condition is summarized by Rudolf Imelmann (Surreys Aeneis IV in urspriunglicher Gestalt, Jahrbuch der Deutschen Shakespeare-Gesellschaft, Band XLI, 82, note 1) where he posits the date 1554. The sole indication is the fact that Owen dedicates the work to "Thomas, Duke of Norfolk." Clearly Hazlitt's date 1548 is untenable, since in that year the Duke of Norfolk, Surrey's father, was an attainted prisoner in the Tower. Under these circumstances no bookseller in his senses would have headed a book with his name. If he be the Duke of Norfolk of the dedication, the time is narrowed from August 3, 1553, when his title was restored to him by 356 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Grimald belongs the honor of the first blank verse published in England. But, as Surrey was executed in 1547, his verse must have been written before that date. On the other hand Warton suggests-and the more the period is studied the greater appears his scholarship and the little relative advance made since his workthat Grimald's verses were "prolusions or illustrative practical specimens for our author's course of lectures in rhetoric." In that case they would have been written between 1541 and 1547. I know no method of settling the priority of either claimant. But, until that be done, Surrey's supposed indebtedness to the Italians merely explains half the problem. Such are the facts. The only hypothesis that includes all the circumstances is that there was a general humanistic impulse in both Italy and England. The leader of that in England was Sir John Cheke. It will be remembered that he was teaching at Cambridge when both Ascham and Grimald were studying there.1 Cheke's theory is definitely stated by Ascham. The passage, although so well known, is worth quoting almost entire.2 act of Parliament, to August 25, 1554, when he died. But it may refer equally to Thomas, Duke of Norfolk, the grandson of the preceding and the son of the poet, and it would be as appropriate. This, however, would make the date much later. During the sixties Norfolk lived in London, enjoyed great popularity and was so inclined toward learning that in 1566 he gave money to restore the buildings of Magdalen College, Cambridge. Against so late a date Fest (Uber Surrey's Virgilubersetzung, Palaestra XXXIV, 10) objects that Owen would not have printed the Fourth Book alone subsequent to Tottel's edition of both books in 1557, and Imelmann adds that Tottel was privileged. Both of these objections seem based rather upon modern copyrighted editions, than on the conditions of publishing of the sixteenth century. If the Tottel edition were small, in a decade it may have been forgotten, Owen may never have seen it, or he may have obtained possession of a manuscript of the Fourth Book which he regarded as superior. This position receives some slight support from the fact that Ascham writing late in the sixties, (The Scholemaster, Arber's Reprint, 147), knows only this edition, and the "drawn into straunge metre" is comprehensible when it is realized that Gascoigne, who had himself used the meter, does not even discuss it in his Certayne Notes of Instruction 1575. Until the unique existing copy be carefully studied, I see no way to settle this question. As the later date is surely equally plausible, until the question be answered all arguments on the origin of blank verse must be regarded as tentative. 1The avoidance by Ascham of any mention of Grimald is perhaps explainable on the same grounds that caused Tottel to expurgate him from the second edition of the Miscellany. 2 Ascham, Scholemaster, Arber's Reprints, pp. 144-149. HUMANISM 357 "This matter maketh me gladly remember, my sweete tyme spent at Cambridge, and the pleasant talke which I had oft with M. Cheke, and M. Watson, of this fault, not onely in the olde Latin Poets, but also in our new English Rymers at this day. They wished as Virgil and Horace were not wedded to follow the faultes of former fathers (a shrewd marriage in greater matters) but by right Imitation of the perfit Grecians, had brought Poetrie to perfitnesse also in the Latin tong, that we Englishmen likewise would acknowledge and vnderstand rightfully our rude beggerly ryming, brought first into Italie by Gothes and Hunnes, whan all good verses and all good learning to, were destroyed by them: and after caryed into France and Germanie: and at last receyued into England by men of excellent wit in deede, but of small learning, and lesse iudgement in that behalfe. But now, when men know the difference, and haue the examples, both of the best, and of the worst, surelie, to follow rather the Gothes in Ryming, than the Greekes in trew versifiyng, were euen to eate ackornes with swyne, when we may freely eate wheate bread emonges men. In deeds, Chaucer, Th. Norton, of Bristow, my L. of Surrey,M. Wiat, Th. Phaer, and other Ientlemen, in translating Ouide, Palingenius and Seneca, haue gonne as farre to their great praise, as the copie they followed could cary them, but, if soch good wittes, and forward diligence, had bene directed to follow the best examples, and not haue bene caryed by tyme and custome, to content themselves with that barbarous and rude Ryming, emonges their other worthy praises, which they haue iustly deserued, this had not bene the least, to be counted amonges men of learning and skill, more like vnto the Grecians, than vnto the Gothians, in handling of their verse. In deed, our English tong, hauing in vse chiefly, wordes of one syllable which commonly be long, doth not well receiue the nature of Carmen Heroicum, bicause dactylus, the aptest foote for that verse, conteining one long and two short, is seldom therefore found in English: and doth also rather stumble than stand vpon Monasyllabis. Quintilian in hys learned Chapiter de Compositione, geueth this lesson de Monasyllabis, before me: and in the same place doth iustlie inuey against all Ryming, if there be any, who be angrie with me, for misliking of Ryming, may be angry for company to, with Quintilian also, for the same thing: And yet Quintilian had not so iust cause to mislike of it than, as men haue at this day. And although Carmen Exametrum doth rather trotte and hoble, than runne smothly in our English tong, yet I am sure, our English tong will receiue carmen lambicum as naturallie, as either Greke or Latin.... This mislikyng of Ryming, beginneth not now of any newfangle singularitie, but hath bene long misliked of many, and that of men, of greatest learnyng, and deepest iudgement. And soch, that defend it, do so, either for lacke of knowledge of what is best, or els of verie enuie, that any should performe that in learnyng, whereunto they, as I sayd before, either for ignorance, can not, or for idlenes will not, labor to attaine vnto.... The noble Lord Th. Earle of Surrey, first of all English men, in translating the fourth booke of Virgill: and Gonsaluo Periz that excellent learned man, and Secretarie to kyng Philip of Spaine, in translating the Vlisses of Homer out of Greke into Spanish, haue both, by good iudgement, auoyed the fault of Ryming, yet neither of them hath fullie hit(t)e perfite and trew versifying. Indeed, 358 EARLY TUDOR POETRY they obserue iust number, and euen feete: but here is the fault, that their feete: be feete without ioyntes, that is to say, not distinct by trew quantitie of sillabes: And so: soch feete, be but numme (benummed) feete: and be, euen as vnfitte for a verse to turne and runne roundly withall, as feete of brasse or wood be vnweeldie to go well withall. And as a foote of wood, is a plaine shew of a manifest maime, euen so feete, in our English versifing, without quantitie and ioyntes, be sure signes, that the verse is either, borne deformed, vnnatural and lame, and so verie vnseemlie to look vpon, except to men that be gogle eyed them selues. The spying of this fault now is not the curiositie of English eyes, but euen the good iudgement also of the best that write in these dayes in Italie: and namelie of that worthie Senese Felice Figlincci... And therefore, euen as Virgil and Horace deserue most worthie prayse, that they spying the vnperfitnes in Ennius and Plautus, by trew Imitation of Homer and Euripides, brought Poetrie to the same perfitnes in Latin, as it was in Greke, euen so those, that by the same way would benefite their tong and contrey, deserue rather thankes than disprayse in that behalfe. And I rejoyce, that euen poore England preuented Italie, first in spying out, than in seekyng to amend this fault in learynng. This passage, though written twenty-five years later, avowedly refers to the conditions at Cambridge. It is to be remarked that, as he states in the last sentence, it is a matter of pride that England in her classical revival was not at all influenced by Italian leadership. His testimony,-and it would be hard to find a better, at least for the Cambridge writers-is that unrimed iambic verse is due to humanism. Naturally owing to the familiarity of the pentameter line in English ears, that unrimed iambic verse became pentameter. In other words, that is what we call blank verse. Ascham is the theorist of the movement, Grimald is the exponent. Possibly it was for this reason that the Archdeacon of Peterborough persuaded him to go to Oxford. In any case his poetry is, such as it is, humanistic. Even in the case of Surrey, if we must have unsupported hypotheses, it is surely as probable that he was influenced by such a man as Cheke, as by Molza.2 Happily we are not reduced to such alternatives. Humanism evolved blank verse from the nature of its being in both countries. And the English writers were encouraged to persevere by the Italian precedents. 1 Of course a misprint in Arber for Figliucci. 2 "Still, it is most likely that it was from Italian poetry (possibly Molza's translation of Vergil, 1541) that Surrey immediately drew the idea." Harold H. Child, Cambridge Hist. of Lit., iii, 200. HUMANISM 359 But without the Italian the result would probably have been the same. The very poems themselves in the construction of their sentences show the Latin background. In Grimald's verses, On the death of Zoroas, said by Steevens to be a translation from thirteenth century Latin,' the subject is apt to follow the verb, and the adjective the governing noun. Now clattering arms, now ragyng broyls of warr Gan passe the noyes of taratantars clang: Shrowded with shafts, the heuen: with clowd of darts Couered, the ayre; against fulfatted bulls, As forceth kindled ire the Lions keen: Whose greedy gutts the gnawing hoonger pricks: So Macedoins against the Persians fare. Now corpses hide the purpurde soyl with blood: Large slaughter, on ech side: but Perses more Moyst feelds bebledd; their herts, and. noombers bate. Fainted while they giue back, and fall to flight: The lightning Macedon, by swoords, by gleaus, By bands, and trowps, of fotemen with his garde, Speeds to Darie: but him, his nearest kyn, Oxate preserues, with horsemen on a plump Before his carr: that none the charge could giue. This, in spite of Warton's epithet of "classical" and "elegant" cannot be said to be great poetry! Surrey, for the very reason that he was so imbued with the Latin., is much better.2 And it may also be stated that owing to Grimald's ill-repute as well as to Surrey's romantic career, whatever may have been the actual priority, Surrey is really the father of blank verse. Yet, whoever may have been the hypothetical model for Surrey, without question it was the study of classical literature, as taught by Cheke at Cambridge, and by Grimald at Oxford, that prepared the educated reader to applaud his efforts. Thus, in the conflicting currents affecting sixteenth-century literature, that of humanism is seen to be not the least. In prose, it produced a spirit of rational criticism; in poetry a form of verse big with fu1 From part of the Latin Alexandreis of Philip Gualtier de Chatillon, bishop of Megala, who flourished in the thirteenth century. Steevens Shaksp. vii, 377, ed. 1803. Note by Park in Warton, op. cit., 52. 2 Surrey's humanism is discussed in Chapter VI. 360 EARLY TUDOR POETRY ture triumphs. Fortunately for English literature the humanists did not succeed; in that case the Augustan Age would have replaced the Elizabethan and dramas like Cato would have been written instead of Macbeth and Hamlet. But equally fortunate is it that they attained the success that they did, because, otherwise, Elizabethan literature would not have been the glory that it is. CHAPTER V THE INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURES OF SPAIN, GERMANY, FRANCE, AND ITALY The influences affecting the English author of the Renaissance in his search for models was by no means limited to those of the English tradition, the Medieval Latin, or humanism. The influences exerted by the contemporary literatures on the Continent remain yet to be considered. For, however insular may have been the position of England, and however difficult may have been the passage of the Channel, the fact is nevertheless that the Channel was crossed repeatedly. In one aspect it may be argued that the long party wars of the fifteenth century tended to isolate the nation from the normal literary development of the sister nations. On the other hand, since at varying times a large number of the nobility was forced into exile on the Continent, many of them were brought into contact with foreign literature and foreign culture to a degree that would have been impossible if they had remained quietly at home. Thus the Yorkists found an asylum always open to them at the court of Mary of Burgundy, and the Lancastrians, more or less spasmodically at the court of France. Under Henry VII there were both the political and matrimonial alliances with Spain. And behind all, was Italy radiating culture from her many courts and typifying the Renaissance in her many princes. To ignore the possibility of the influence of any of these literatures upon English would be an obvious error. But since the influence of any contemporary literature depends to a large extent upon variable factors, such as political alliance, sentimental interest, and national sympathy, and even a literary clique responsive to the appeal of that particular type of literature, the exact literary epoch in England must be clearly distinguished; to estimate the amount of any such influence, to distinguish the influence emanating from one country from that emanating at the same time from others, and finally to analyze the reasons for such a con361 362 EARLY TUDOR POETRY dition, is difficult. Yet an understanding of Tudor literature requires such an analysis. Of the four literatures, Spanish, German, French, and Italian, that might have affected England in the first half of the sixteenth century, at first sight one would expect to find Spanish strongly represented. At intervals during three centuries England and Spain had been united by having one common foe in France. This traditional friendship was given visible expression when in 1501 Katharine, the daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella, became the wife of Arthur, Prince of Wales, and in 1509 Queen of England as the wife of Henry. Naturally, as a result of this, Henry's ambassadors to Spain numbered such well known men as Lord Berners, Sir Thomas Boleyn, Dr. Sampson, Cuthbert Tunstall, Sir Richard Wingfield, Dr. Edward Lee, Sir Thomas Wyatt, and Edmund Bonner.' Spain, on her side, sent not only the retinue of Katharine, but also the tutor of the Princess Mary, Juan Luis Vives. Still more, many of the men in Dorset's ill-fated expedition to aid Spain in 1512 remained there as a link between the two countries. With them there was constant communication. So with Spaniards in England and Englishmen in Spain, with the two countries in close political alliance, one would be justified in positing a strong Spanish influence on English literature, Actually such an influence is slight upon early Tudor literature. "With possibly a single exception, the Spanish books which were read in London in the days of Henry VIII and Edward VI were obtained through the French or the Latin." 2 Here again is illustrated the danger in the study of literature of deducing from a priori probability. Before 1550, certainly not more than a dozen books had been translated into English, or adapted for English readers, from the Spanish and Portuguese.3 Concerning these there are two generalizations to be made: first, that they are usually taken via the Italian or the French; and second, that they are 1With pleasure I acknowledge my very great obligations in this portion of my work to Spanish Literature in the England of the Tudors, by John Garrett Underhill, 1899. As I had independently come to the same general conclusion as Dr. Underhill, I am joyously using his illustrations. For a more thorough treatment, I refer the reader to his work. 2 Underhill, op. cit., 342. This is, however, an extreme position. 8 Underhill, op. cit., 375, lists only seven, aside from occasional tracts. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 363 all in prose. The significance of the first statement is that it shows that the relation between the countries was political, rather than popular. Spain was separated from England on the water side by the Bay of Biscay, and on land by France and the Pyrenees Mountains. With the Spanish cities thus inaccessible, there was no paramount reason for visiting them. Even the pilgrimage to Saint James of Compostella, during the religious inertia preceding the Reformation, had fallen from favor; after the Reformation naturally it was rare. On closer scrutiny, this geographic inaccessibility was not overcome by the influence of any personality. The nexus between England and Spain was undoubtedly Katharine. Yet the history of Katharine in England consisted largely of humiliations. During the lifetime of Henry VII she was held as a hostage for the payment of her dower. Her letters during this period form a series of striking complaints. She was unable to pay her servants and even had to pawn her jewels to provide herself with the necessities. Under such conditions clearly she was not in a position to stimulate writers. Equally clearly from 1518 on, when the tragedy of her life begins to take form,, she ceases to be a possible center for strong literary influence. Not even the language was domesticated in England. On Katharine's arrival, Henry VII communicated with her suite through the medium of Latin. Henry VIII, himself, is said, by the Venetian Ambassador, to know Spanish,1 but apparently it did not spread through his court. At least, words of Spanish origin are rarely encountered. In fact the whole tragedy of Katharine's life lay in the fact that she was an exile, in a foreign country, in which her customs and language were unknown. She felt, and gave free expression to her feelings, that she was in arms against a court hostile both to her and to her country. So, in regard to England, Katherine was a political rather than a literary force. The other personality, around which a literary group might gather, was Juan Luis Vives, the Tutor to the Princess Mary, and Professor of Philosophy at Oxford. That Vives exercised a distinct influence upon English thought cannot be denied.2 In Vives, however, the same problem recurs of national influence coming via humanism. To what extent in their literary output is Politian IP. 45. 2 Chapter IV. 864 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Italian, Erasmus Dutch, Von Hutten German, Bud6 French, More English and Vives Spanish? So far as their works in the languages of the respective nations are concerned, the question is easy; their Latin works, written to appeal to an European audience, were professedly free from geographic and racial limitations. Yet in any discussion of the effect of one literature upon another the nationality of these men and of their writings is apt to be assumed. Although Erasmus is usually regarded as a humanist rather than a Hollander, Vives is considered to have brought to England Spanish "influence" pure and undefiled. Actually the lives of the two are not very different. Vives left Spain as a young man to study at Paris, and after his expulsion from England he did not return there. His essentially rationalistic mind naturally felt more at home in the thought-free region of northern Europe than in the Inquisitionridden Spain. And being thus rationalistic, his turn of mind is out of sympathy with either the mystic exaltation of Saint Teresa, or the superfine chivalric ideals of the Amadis. Consequently the two motifs that were to be given to the world preeminently by Spain were not appreciated by him. Among the "ungracious" Spanish books are the Amadis, Florisand, and Tristan.1 The fact that these, and Celestina, were eventually rendered into English, surely was not on account of the influence of Vives, but in spite of it. And Vives' "disciples," Hyrde, Moryson, et al., would be more inclined to the furtherance of the humanistic propaganda, as they were, than in promulgating such works as had fallen under the master's disapproval. Consequently it is hard to see in Vives the possible source for an interest in Spanish literature. This reasoning implies merely that it is difficult to find a personal focus for Spanish influence, but it does not deny the existence of such an influence. That, aside from casual publications, begins with the English adaptation of the Celestina, a curious dramatic novel of twenty-one acts in prose. The origin of this piece, signed in anagram by Fernando de Royas, forms one of the celebrated cruces of Spanish literature. The author, except for this masterpiece, is totally unknown in literature. The plot tells the story of the love of Calisto for Melebea, which ends in his murder and her suicide. So far it is the conventional motif of unhappy 1 The whole passage is given, p. 323. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 365 love. The novelty however appears in the introduction of the bawd Celestina whom Calisto hires as a go-between. She is the reverse of the conventional character. Drawn with sharp realism, she and the disreputable scenes in which she figures have the vitality of the Murillo beggar. And just as Mu:rillo idealizes in the Immaculate Conception and yet with the same brush presents studies of street types, so Royas in this one play gives vivid expression of two extremes. This union of idealism and of realism made for its instant popularity. The first edition was published in 1499, and by 1550 thirty-three editions had appeared in Castilian.' Nor was its success limited to Spain. At Rome, in 1506, Alphonso Ordonez translated it into Italian. This translation was reprinted at Milan in 1514, at Milan and at Venice in 1515, and at Venice in 1519 and in 1525. Also there were two French translations in 1527 and 1529, and one German in 1520.2 Thus in a quarter of a century the Celestina had obtained an European reputation. Under these circumstances it is not surprising that it should appear in English dress. But in the mystery surrounding its authorship the English version far outdoes its Spanish original. It was published without the name of the author and without the date under the title A new commodye in englysh in maner Of an enterlude ryght elygant &full of craft of rethoryk/ wherein is shewd & dyscrybyd as well the bewte & good propertes of women/ as theyn vycys & euyll condicions/ with a morall conclusion & exhortacyon to vertew.3 In this cumbrous disguise Celestine, "the bawd, the mother of naughtiness," made her first appearance before the English public. It is both more and less than a translation. It is a translation because of the 1088 lines 800 are rendered more or 11 am taking these figures from La Celestina, Tragecomedia de Calisto y Melebea, par Fernando de Rdyas. Con el estudio critico de La Celestina nuevamente corregido y aumentado del excmo. Senor L. Marelino Menendez y Pelayo. Vigo. Libreria de Eugenio Krapf. 1899. 471. 2 These figures are taken from H. Warner Allen's Celestina, with Introduction on the Picaresque Novel and Appendices, 341. This, so far as the English is concerned, is the most careful discussion I know. 3 This has been published in facsimile by J. S. Farmer 1909; reprinted by Hazlitt, 1874; Farmer, Six Anonymous Plays, 1905, p. 46; Malone Society, 1908; and by H. Warner Allen, in Celestina trans. by James Mabbe, together with an Introduction. 366 EARLY TUDOR POETRY less literally.' But the adapter did not translate eight hundred consecutive lines. Parts of the original prologue, Acts I, II, IV, and V compose the English version. As an illustration of the freedom of his treatment, the episode between Celestina, Sempronio and Elicia in the Spanish here is condensed into a narrative speech by Celestina of fifty-five lines. Aside from this speech, the unpleasant side of Celestina is scarcely touched upon, since her solicitation to Melebea is outwardly merely for the sake of Calisto's health. This scene, which in the Spanish is the prelude to her machinations, in the English is the culminating point. From here on, the last one hundred and seventy lines are entirely original. The father of Melebea, here called Danio, makes his first entrance complaining of a direful dream. This is interpreted by Melebea as a warning to her, and her confession betrays a knowledge of Celestina beyond any indication given in the English version. The father then turns to the audience and, after a few moral commonplaces, very unexpectedly discusses English social conditions, a topic that is completely irrelevant to the play in hand.2 And ye faders moders & other which be Rulers of yong folks your charge is dowtles To bryng them up verteously & to see Them occupied styll in some good bysynes Not in idell pastyme or unthryftnes But to teche them some art craft or lernyng Whereby to be able to get theyr lyffyng The bryngers up of youth in this region Haue done gret harme because of theyr neclygens Not puttyng them to lernyng nor occupacyons So when they haue no craft nor sciens And cor to mans state ye see thexpience That many of them compellyd be To beg or stele by very necessite But yf there be therefore any remedy The hedys & rulers must furst be dylygent To make good lawes & execute them straytely lH. Warner Allen, op cit., 341. The Spanish is very accessible; the edition I have used is that in the Bibliotheca Romecas 142, 143, 144, 145 with an introduction by Finty Holle. 2 Malone Society reprint, 1058-1100. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 367 Uppon such maystres that be neclygent Alas we make no laws but ponyshment When man haue offendyd/ but laws euermore Wold be made to preuent the cause before Yf the cause of the myscheffs were seen before Whych by coniecture to fall be most lykely And good laws & ordynauncys made therefore To put a way the cause/ yt were best remdedi What is the cause that ther be so many Thefts & robberies/ it is be cause men be Dryuen thereto by nede & pouerte And what is the verey cause of that nede Be cause they labur not for theyr lyffyng And trewth is they can not well labour in dede Be cause in youth of theyr ydyll upbryngng But this thyng shall neuer come to reformyng But the world contynually shalbe nought As long as yong pepyll be euell upbrought Wherefore the eternal god that raynyth on hye Send his mercifull grace and influens To all gouernours that they circumspectly May rule theyr inferiours by such prudence To bryng them to vertew & dew obedyeus 1 And that they & we all by his grete mercy May be parteners of hys blessed glory. This passage has been cited in full, because it illustrates two peculiarities of the piece that are rarely mentioned. First, this "moral conclusion" is clearly inspired by the First Book of the Utopia. More's characteristic and (from the point of view of the sixteenth century) revolutionary ideas that theft is caused by idleness and idleness by poor upbringing, and that the laws are destructive rather than constructive, form here the unexpected exhortation to virtue added to a study of Spanish low life. And second, the entire play is written in the rime-royal. In the original the beginning of each stanza is marked by the paragraph sign. In consideration of the liturgic origin of the drama, the use of the many rimed Medieval Latin forms seems normal, and the use of the heroic couplet scarcely requires explanation. The rime-royal, however, is a difficult form in which to write, and in a conver1 The u is an obvious misprint for n. 368 EARLY TUDOR POETRY sation is necessarily so broken that it would be unnoticed by the audience. Yet from the fact that occasionally the speakers address the audience it must have been written to be played. The conclusion seems logical that the author is experimenting for a fit dramatic medium. As the play was published anonymously and undated, these particulars may guide our conjectures. Both the influence of More and the continuous use of the rime-royal seem to point to a date a year or two later than the Utopia (1516). This receives unexpected support from the fact that the type used here is identical with that used in another interlude, The Four Elements. In this latter, allusions to the death of Henry VII and to the discovery of America roughly place it as toward the end of the second decade of the sixteenth century. Bale, of his own knowledge, ascribes the authorship of the Four Elements to John Rastell, the brother-in-law of Sir Thomas More. And although it is all guesswork, and the colophon reads Johnes rastell me imprimi fecit, Warton's suggestion that Rastell was also the author is as plausible as any. And this also would explain why Vives, in his enumeration of the medieval chivalric books, included the Celestina with special expression of disapprobation. Upon his arrival in England he found Spanish literature represented solely by this "mother of naughtiness!" And it may have been due to Vives that the Celestina in its English dress had no greater influence. From the point of view of dramatic evolution, the interlude is vastly superior to anything entirely English, or that was to be produced in England for decades.1 There is no comparison between it and such work as The Four Elements. But the fact remains that apparently it did have no influence. It exists in a single copy. There is no record of any performance, no allusion to it in any work of the time,2 and, still more important, its lessons in dramatic construction were entirely unheeded. It stands in curious isolation. As such is the case, it can scarcely be considered as widely disseminating Spanish influence. 1 This advance in the type of drama is clearly shown by A. S. W. Rosenbach, The Influence of the 'Celestina' in the Early English Drama, 1903, reprinted from the Jahrbuch des Deutschen Shakespeare-Gesellschaft, 1903. 21 cannot find it masquerading in any of the Latin titles of Bale. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 369 In apparent contrast with the uncertainty surrounding this interlude is the work of John Bourchier, Lord Berners. As he was a great noble, the facts of his life are quite fully recorded.' For about fifty years he lived the active life of a public man, serving his sovereign in various capacities. Then in December, 1520, he was appointed deputy of Calais, a post that he held until his death in March 1533. The assumption is that the enforced leisure of these last years is responsible for his literary production. This was neither little in quantity, nor minimum in quality. Aside from regulations for the garrison of Calais 2 and a comedy Ite in vineam, mentioned by Bale but now lost, his translations included The Chronycle of Syr John Froissart,3 The Boke of Duke Huon of Burdeux,4 The hystory of the moost noble and valyant knyght Arthur of lytell brytayne, the Castell'of Love, and the golden boke of Marke Aurelie emperour. In mere quantity this is a surprising amount to have been accomplished in thirteen years, and it suggests that the duties of the deputy general of Calais were not onerous. But in quality it is still more surprising. Three of the books, the Froissart, the Huon, and the Golden Book of Marcus Aurelius became part of the English inheritance of the sixteenth century. What a rare chance to be able to introduce one's countrymen to books so vital to them! Such happy fortune arouses curiosity concerning the possessor of it, and we find with surprise that the contrast between the Celestina and the works of Berners is more apparent than real. Although we know any number of the facts of his life, of the man himself we learn curiously little. Aside from an occasional preface, his work is all translation. And even there he has no initiative. The translation of Froissart was suggested by Henry VIII, of Huon by Lord George Hastings, Earl of Huntingdon, the Castle of Love by Lady Elizabeth Carew, and the Golden Book by Sir Francis Bryan. The only one that is not definitely stated to be 1 His life has been written by Sir Sidney Lee in the preface to the Huon of Burdeux, E. E. T. S., and in the Dictionary of National Biography, and by W. P. Ker in his suggestive Introduction to the Froissart in the Tudor Translations. 2 Reprinted by the Camden Society. 3 Reprinted by Mr. G. C. Macaulay in the Globe Edition and by Mr. Ker in the series of Tudor Translations. 4 Reprinted in 1882-87 for the E. E. T. S., by Sir Sidney Lee. 370 EARLY TUDOR POETRY due to an impulse other than the translator's is the Arthur of Little Britain, the most insignificant of the lot! And it is the preface of precisely this one that is the most personal piece of his writing. The passage is worth quoting entire.' For as moche as it is delectable to all humayne nature to rede and to here these auncient noble hystoryes of the chyvalrous feates and marciall prowesses of the vyctoryous knyghtes of tymes past, whose tryumphaunt dedes, yf wrytynge were not, sholde be had clene oute of remembraunce; and also bycause that ydelnesse is reputed to be the moder of all vices; wherefore somwhat in eschewynge therof, and in the waye of lowli erudycyon and learnynge, I John Bourghchere knyghte lorde Berners have enterprysed to translate out of Frensshe in to our maternall tongue a noble hystory, makynge mencyon of the famous dedes of the ryght valyaunt knyght Arthur sonne and heyre to the noble duke of Brytayne, and of the fayre lady Florence, doughter and heyre to the myghty Emendus, kynge of the noble realme of Soroloys, and of the grete trouble that they endured, or they attayned to the perfourmance of theyr vertuous amorous desyers; for fyrste they overcame many harde and straunge adventures, the whiche as to our humayne reason sholde seme to be incredible. Wherfore after that I had begon this sayd processe I had determined to have left and gyven up my laboure, for I thoughe it sholde have ben reputed but a folye in me to translate be seming suche a fayned mater, wherin semeth to be so many unpossybylytees. How be it than I called agayne to my remembraunce that I had redde and seen many a sondrye volume of dyverse noble hystoryes wherin were contayned the redoubted dedes of the auncyent invynsyble conquerours and of other ryght famous knyghtes who acheved many a straunge and wonderfull adventure, the whyche by playne letter as to our understandinge sholde seme in a maner to be supernaturall: wherfore I thought that this present treatyse myght as well be reputed for trough as some of those, and also I doubted not but that the first auctour of this boke devysed it not with out some maner of trouthe or vertuous entent. The whyche consyderacyons, and other, gave me agayne audacyte to contynue forth my fyrste purpose tyll I had fynysshed this sayd boke, not presumynge that I have reduced it in to fresshe ornate polysshed Englysshe, for I know myself insufficient in the facondyous arte of rethoryke, nor also I am but a lerner of the language of Frensshe. How be it, I truste my symple reason hath ledde to the understandynge of the true sentence of the mater, accordinge to the whiche I have followed as nere as I coude, desyrynge all the reders and herers therof to take this my rude translacion in gre, and yf any faute be, to laye it to myn unconnynge and derke ignoraunce, and to mynysshe, adde or augment as they shall fynde cause requysyte. And in theyr so doynge I shall praye to God that after this vayne and transytory lyfe he may brynge them unto the perdurable joye of heven. Amen. Of course the tone of this preface is that of the conventional Lydgatian apology. He, like Hawes and the rest, is writing to eschew 11 am quoting this from Ker's Froissart, v. i, p. xviii, as I have never seen a copy of the book. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 371 idleness, and like Hawes and the rest he is not skilled in the "facondyous"art of rhetoric,-the very terms are hackneyed! In two places, however, the real man seems to be speaking, first where he confesses his lack of belief in the romance, and secondly where he acknowledges his limited French. Each of these would seem to imply that the Arthur of Little Britain was written very early in his career, not, as is usually given, after both the Huon and the Froissart, since the monstrous incredibilities of the first and the endless pages of the second would surely have given him adequate training in both directions. But, at least, here you seem to hear a personality. And the same is true of his preface to the Froissart. After a number of platitudinous half-truths, he tells us the way he translates. But he tells us curiously little, in comparison with the importance of the work. Perhaps the answer to the riddle is that there is no riddle. The face of Lord Berners in the Holbein portrait 1 shows no great intellect. Small eyes, large nose, thick lips, heavy jowl, —from his appearance no one would judge him a great conscious artist in style. Nor in fact was he. The mastery of his style is due to the complete subordination of his own personality to that of his author. He has no desire for scholarly accuracy, he has no artistic longing for a choice vocabulary, he makes no attempt to reproduce atmosphere. He is trying literally to translate, to write the book in such English as the author would have used had he been an Englishman and contemporaneous.2 And in that I have nat folowed myne author worde by worde, yet I trust I have ensewed the true reporte of the sentence of the mater; and as for the true namyng of all maner of personages, countreis, cyties, townes, ryvers, or feldes, whereas I coude nat name them properly nor aptely in Englysshe, I have written them accordynge as I founde them in Frenche; and thoughe I have nat gyven every lorde, knyght, or squyer his true addycion, yet I trust I have not swarved fro the true sentence of the mater. And there as I have named the dystaunce bytwene places by myles and leages, they must be understande acordyng to the custome of the countreis where as they be named, for in some place they be lengar than in some other; in Englande a leage or myle is well knowen; in Fraunce a leage is two myles, and in some place thre; and in other countre is more or lesse; every nacion hath sondrie customes. And if any faute be in this my rude trans It is reproduced in the E. E. T. S. Huon. 2 Preface to the Froissart. 372 EARLY TUDOR POETRY lacyon, I remyt the correctyon therof to them that discretely shall fynde any reasonable defaute; and in their so doynge, I shall pray God to sende them the blysse of heven. What a naive confession! Like a child, he sits down to pass the long hours at Calais by turning the French into the English. Occasionally he misses the sense of the sentence, and usually he has but the faintest idea of where the places are that he is talking about. But he is writing to eschew idleness, and it does not matter much. This unconsciousness of self, this submergence of the manner into the matter, makes of him a channel through which the charm and verve of the original pass with scarcely any let or hindrance. Thus he succeeds to a degree not possible in a more sophisticated age, or by a more sophisticated man, in transplanting the medieval masterpieces to English soil. Of the five books that Berners translated in these thirteen years, although he probably took them all from French versions, two were originally Spanish and so concern us here. A good deal of time has been spent fruitlessly in discussing the motives that led him to choose Spanish books, such as his probable interest in Spain, where he had been as ambassador. But it has yet to be shown that he had any interest in Spain, or even knew the language. The Golden Book, at least, is stated to have been taken "out of Frenche into englysh" without any mention of Spanish. And with this interpretation of his character no lengthy explanation is necessary why the particular books should have been chosen. The Castell of Love, translated from the Cdrcel de Amor by Diego de San Perdo, is a prose allegorical romance of the Romaunt of the Rose type. There is no particular significance to this particular volume except, perhaps, that the style in which it is written is mannered and artificial. In modern conceited prose the old allegorical romance was revamped for Renaissance readers. We are told that Lord Berners translated it at the instance of his niece, Lady Elizabeth Carew. Here is probably all the motive that he had. It is preeminently a lady's book, rather pretty, quaintly conventional, and with a certain long-drawn-out sweetness. Yet it belongs to a past age. The Arcadia of Sannazzaro, with its pastoral settings and with its enamelled descriptions of singing shepherds, equally mannered and equally artificial, was soon to banish these medieval lovers into the Garden of Oblivion, whose portal is Forgetfulness. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 373 But the Lady Elizabeth was quite within the literary tastes of the day when she asked her uncle to translate it for her.' The other of the two books taken from the Spanish, the Golden Boke of Marc Aurelie is quite another story. It was one of the popular books of the century. The author's edition appeared at Valladolid in 1599, by the Franciscan Antonio de Guevara, Bishop of Guadix, Confessor and Chronicler to the Emperor. According to his own account he began it in 1518. Although he kept it as secret as he could, during these years copies went abroad and it was printed at Seville, in Portugal, and in the Kingdom of Navarre. This spurious version was entitled The Golden Book of Marcus Aurelius. It was translated in 1531 by Rene Bertaut and is the immediate original of the Berners. Guevara's own edition is entitled Libro del emperador Marco aurelio con relox de principes: auctor del qual es el obispo de Gaudix: nueuamente reuisto por su senoria. And, as the title said, it was revised and enlarged. This, in turn, was translated again by Rene' Blertaut in 1540, and this second version is the original of Sir Thomas North's Diall of Princes, 1557.2 So was it possible to have two books, both translated from the same work and both through the French, that yet differ so markedly. Of the Berners there were fifteen editions during the century, and three of the North. Consequently any student of English literature of the sixteenth century must reckon with Guevara. Poptlar though it was with the sixteenth century, it has failed to win the approval of modern critics. "The Golden Book so styled is really a Brazen Calf, of the pattern invented specially for the Renaissance and its idolaters" is Ker's caustic and summary dismissal: 3 Martin Hume characterizes it as "a set of moral apologues, infinitely tedious they seem to us now." 4 Since the matter of the book seems so wearisome, its undeniable popularity has been explained by emphasizing its style, and pages are written discussing the relation of Euphuism to Guevara.5 This general 1 My knowledge of the Spanish original and of the English translation is only second-hand. 2 For this confused bibliography I am indebted to R. W. Bond's edition of Lyly, i. 136, and Underhill, op. cit., 378. 3 Froissart, op. cit., v. i, p. xxvi. 4 Spanish Influence on English Literature, by Martin Hume, 1805, p. 55. 6 The whole question of the development of prose and the relation of Guevara's style to that development is postponed to a future study. 374 EARLY TUDOR POETRY reasoning seems fallacious. It may safely be questioned whether any prose at any time was read by many Anglo-Saxons merely for the pleasure of appreciating artistic composition, however possible it may have been for the cinquecento Italian. The average English reader buys a book because he likes what it says; the neat expression of his opinion is a very real, but secondary, enjoyment. Thus he imitates the manner, because he likes the matter, just as a boy copies the personal peculiarities only of those whom he admires. Of course the style is there. At the very end of the book there is an epilogue, presumably written by the printer,l which concludes: But finally the sauce of the sayd style moveth the appetite. Many bokes there be of substancial meates, but they be so rude and unsauery, and the style of so smal grace, that the fyrste morsell is lothesome and noyfull. And of suche bokes foloweth to lye hole and sounde in lybraries, but I trust this wylle not. This is an exact statement. The book must stand or fall by its intrinsic merit; after that, "finally the sauce of the style moveth the appetite." The explanation of the great contemporaneous success lies deeper than in mere tricks of style. It is not difficult, I think, to understand why to the sixteenth century the matter of the Golden Book seemed golden. According to Guevara's own account he had found among the books of Cosimo de Medici at Florence a manuscript, written by three friends of Marcus Aurelius; giving in great detail an account of his character, and his attitude at many representative occasions. The value of it lay in the fact that it professed to be authentic. Actually of course it was a literary forgery. And Guevara could not have known much of Aurelius, since the Meditations were not published until 1558. The worthy bishop regarded profane history as a pastime; the book is a curious farrago of classical reminiscence and pure invention. The character of the emperor is merely a peg upon which he hangs his own moral reflections and into whose mouth he puts his own opinions. When accused of forgery, he retreated behind the imaginary manuscript. To us with our 1 Sir Sidney Lee (Huon of Burdeux E. E. T. S. ii, 788) says that this epilogue is "almost certainly" from the pen of Sir Francis Bryan. I know no reason for this assumption, except that the book was undertaken at his suggestion and that he himself translated a work of Guevara. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 375 critical knowledge of ancient Rome, the pretence is clumsily obvious. We have few illusions concerning the ancient civilization. But in the sixteenth century it was very different. Then was the floodtide of the Renaissance.1 In comparison with the civilization that they knew, the glories of imperial Rome seemed like a dream. When even Gibbon can state "If a man were called to fix the period in the history of the world during which the condition of the human race was most happy and prosperous, he would, without hesitation, name that which elapsed from the death of Domitian to the accession of Commodus," is it any wonder that to them that age should have seemed one of gold? All of mankind were happy. As Lord Berners expresses it, This auncient worlde that ranne in Saturnus dayes, the whiche the otherwyse was called the Golden worlde, the whyche was so estemed of them that sawe it, and soo moche praysed of theym that herde the wrytynge thereof, and too moche desyred of them that felt no parte therof, was not golde by the sages that dyd gylte, but bycause there none yll that dyd ungylte it. And with this idealization of the classic age came naturally an idealization of the classic men.2 They furnished models to be emulated but their moral grandeur could never be attained in modern degenerate days. In the same spirit Elyot wrote his Image of Governance to picture forth the perfect man. But the Golden Book was still better. Authenticated by the Bishop of Guadix, it was the real thing! The stage had been set and was ready, and the hero stepped forth! Men, who knew him, told the reader what were his mental processes in the most diverse situations, what he said to his wife when she wished to enter his study, the letters that he wrote on various occasions. This was not hard reading. It was flooded with anecdote, illustration, dialogue, and familiar allusion to all writers of antiquity. To his great delight, he found his own sixteenth-century morality endorsed by the precepts and practices of the great emperor, his own opinions of men and matters confirmed. All this is in an antithetic, epigrammatic, style, easy to remember and pleasant to quote! What matters it that we, who from the Meditations know the real pagan philosophy and whose morality is quite different from that of the sixteenth 1 Compare Chapter I of the present work. 2 Cf. pp. 317 of the present work. 376 EARLY TUDOR POETRY century, find the matter of the book dull and the style artificial? Sympathetically, at least, we should be able to thrill with the reader of the sixteenth century. But when it comes to discussing what part of the influence of the Golden Book is peculiarly Spanish, the question becomes intricate. The book itself is a product of Spanish humanism, it is true, but still humanism. Perhaps the differentiation may be found in a suggestion of Martin Hume of the "orientalism" of Spanish culture. From their contact with the Moors, the Spaniards learned to precede the moral lesson by its concrete application, as is done in the fable. This method of deducing the general moral from the particular case is that which is employed here. The reason for the mass of concrete detail, which naturally gave interest, is not on account of the interest but on account of the lesson to be deduced. With this in mind, the two books of Elyot form an illuminating contrast. The Governor is abstract; it carefully works out its propositions, and then enforces them by illustration. But the Image of Governance is exactly the reverse. By narrating the "actes and sentences notable, of the moste noble Emperor Alexander, for his wysedome and grauitie called Seuerus," 1 he endeavors to create a governor. While the aim of both books is identical, the methods are diametrically opposed. He tells us that it was while writing his dictionary, 1536-38, that he re-worked some material gathered nine years before. Even assuming, as we have no right to do, that the present work is identical in form with that of the late twenties, it yet would have been possible for him through Vives and Sir Thomas More to have seen the spurious edition. But in 1531 he was sent as ambassador to the Emperor. There, almost certainly, he would have come into contact with Guevara, or his book. So it seems a fair statement that the difference in treatment between the Governor and the Image of Governance is due to Guevara. If this be the case, the Bishop of Guadix starts the long line of fictitious biographies for a moral purpose that, not so many years ago, used to sadden Sunday for the Anglo-Saxon youth. It will be remembered that the Golden Boke was translated "at the instant desire of his nephewe syr Francis Bryan knyghte." Thus is introduced to literature one of the puzzling figures. As an 1 The whole passage is quoted, pp. 306-307. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 377 historical character he is well known. Through the various marriages of his grandmother, nee Elizabeth Tilney, he was related to many of the court; shortly after the death of his grandfather, Humphrey Bourchier, she married Thomas Howard, first Duke of Norfolk, by whom she had eight sons and three daughters. Among the descendants of these in the next generation were Queen Anne Boleyn, Queen Katherine Howard and the Earl of Surrey. Almost as a matter of course, with such a connection, he was brought up in the court circle. In 1518-19 Hall in his Chrornicle notes:1 Duryng this tyme remayned in the Frenche court Nicholas Carew Fraunces Brian and diverse other of the young gentelmen of England and they with the Frenche kyng roade daily disguysed through Parys, throwyng Egges, stones and other foolishe trifles at the people, whiche light demeanoure of a kyng was muche discommended and gested at. And when these young gentelmen came again into England, they were all Frenche, in eatyng, drynkyng and apparell, yea, and in Frenche vices and bragges, so that all the estates of Englande were by them laughed at: the ladies and gentelwomen were dispraised, so that nothing by them was praised, but if it were after the Frenche turne, whiche after turned them to displeasure as you shall here.... In whiche moneth the kynges counsaill secretly communed together of the kynges gentlenes and liberalitie to all persones: by the whiche they perceived that certain young men in his privie chamber, not regardyng his estate nor degree, were so familier and homely with hym, and plaied suche light touches with hym that they forgat themselfes: Whiche thynges although the king of his gentle nature suffred and not rebuked nor reproved it: yet the kynges counsail thought it not mete to be suffred for the kynges honor, and therfore thei altogether came to the king, beseching him al these enormities and lightnes to redresse.... Then the kynges counsaill caused the lorde chamberlein to cal before them Carew (and another who yet liveth, and therfore shall not at this time be named) 2 with diverse other also of the privy chamber, whiche had bene in the French court, and banyshed them the courte for diverse consideracions, laying nothing particulerly to their charges. And they that had offices were commaunded to go to their offices: whiche discharge out of the courte greved sore the hartes of these young menne whiche were called the kynges minions.... These young minions which was thus severed from the kyng, had bene in Fraunce, and so highly praised the Frenche kyng and his courte, that in a maner they thought litle of the kyng and his court, in comparison of the other, they were so high in love with the Frenche court, wherefore their fall was litle moned emong wise men. This extract is interesting as showing that, at the time when Katharine of Aragon was still dominant, Bryan was in the inner court 1 Whibley's edition of Hall's Henry VIII, op. cit., i. 175; 177-8. 2 Bryan survived Hall three years. 878 EARLY TUDOR POETRY circle; the Carew mentioned with him was his brother-in-law. This dubious preeminence in pandering to the disreputable side of Henry's nature later earned for him the epithet "Vicar of Hell." At least he deserved it by his cleverness. Although Carew himself, and Anne, and Katharine Howard, and Surrey and so many others of the group fell under Henry's displeasure and were executed, Bryan was chief henchman at his funeral. He himself died a sudden but natural death in 1550. And the passage quoted is also interesting, as showing that at that time Bryan was preeminently French in his sympathies. The importance of this is that modern writers have assumed in him a Spanish interest to explain another assumption that Guevara was his "favorite" author. Actually nothing is known of his literary tastes. But we do know that, traditionally, Wyatt and Surrey were merely two of a number of "courtly makers," of which Bryan is said to have been one. The first reference to his literary ability, however, is by Meres in 1598, as being, among fourteen others, "most passionate among us to bewaile and bemoane the perplexities of loue." Then Drayton adds his statement. But the curious feature is that in none of the books published in the half-century after his death, such as those by Ascham, Sidney, or Puttenham, is he mentioned. Still more curious is it that he escaped being catalogued by Bale, whose lists are all-inclusive. Theoretically, if a man socially so prominent did anything at all, Bale would know it. Apparently to his contemporaries he was as unknown as a writer as he was well-known as a leader. In Wyatt's Third Satire, the reference seems to be to him as a critic.1 When I remembr this, and eke the case Where in thou stondes, I thowght forthwith to write Brian, to thee, who knows how great a grace In writing is to cownsell man the right; To the therefore, that trottes still up and downe And never restes,... Yet as a literary figure his outlines are very uncertain. 1 The Poems of Sir Thomas Wiat, by A. K. Foxwell, London 1913, i, 147. This is the last and by far the most careful edition of Wyatt. The simpler form of spelling the name can certainly be justified, as also in the case of Bryan, but so can the conventional form. And even with the best of intentions, I should probably forget and spell it Wyatt! INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 379 It is, therefore, with a sense of relief that one turns to a definite fact. In 1548 Grafton's press brought out A Dispraise of the life of a Courtier and a commendacion of the life of the labouryng man. (Out of Castilian drawen into Frenche by Antony Alaygre and now out of the Frenche toungue into our maternal language by Sir Fraunces Bryant.1 In spite of Bale and the early critics, this is probably by Bryan, since the re-issue in 1575, with the title A Looking-glasse for the Courte adds after the name "one of the priuye chamber in the raygn of K. Henry the eyght." Via the French, this is a translation of Guevara's Menosprecio de Corte y Alabanza de Aldea.2 Now, for the Golden Boke it is possible to say a good word, although that word is not often spoken. But for the Dispraise, either in its original form, or in the translations, it is another matter. The original impulse seems to have come from the De Curialium Miseriis of gEneas Silvius Piccolomini. Although this latter is a rhetorical exercise, at least the author knew what he was talking about; he has something to say, and gives a truthful, however exaggerated, account of conditions. It is not the whole truth, but there is some truth there. The Menosprecio, on the other hand, was written by a courtier ingrained, who naturally knew nothing, and cared nothing, about the country. Again it is a rhetorical exercise. Guevara never comes down to unpleasant details. One gathers that in comparison with the existence of disembodied angels the courtiers are perhaps unfortunate. As in regard to another of Guevara's court manuals an early French commentator remarks:3 "'to conform to these rules, should more approximate the life of the saints than that of the court, because these instructions are all theological and holy, more proper for the cloister than the court." The "dispraise" is consequently really a celebration. The "commendation of the life of the laboring man" is equally vague and equally 1 Supplement to the Catalogue of the British Museum, under Guevara. Sir Sidney Lee, (Dictionary of National Biography) gives as the only edition one issued by Berthelet and anonymous. This I have been unable to trace as none of the catalogues of Berthelet's press lists it. 2 This has been issued with notes and an introduction by M. Martinez de Burgos, Madrid 1915. The translation I have never seen. 3Moyens legitimes pour parvenir a la faueur.. ou le reveille-matin des courtisans. Par Sebastian Hardy, Paris M. DC. XXIII. Tesmoignage d'un autheur celebre de ce temps en la recommandation de Dom Antoine de Guevara. 380 EARLY TUDOR POETRY insincere. The book is written in a style-" acute and very clever, but extremely artificial and laden with loathsome verbosity and piquant spices of antithesis, paranomasia, puns, and riming words.... He is a very tautological author and even Cicero can pass as a model of sobriety at his side. He drowns his ideas in a sea of words." It is the worst form of pulpit eloquence, platitudinous, insincere and extremely verbose. And it is this book that the "vicar of hell" chose to translate, and it is his sole remaining literary output! The book does, however, represent a tendency of the time. The theory and to a measure the practice of Cardinal Bembo had placed great stress upon the medium rather than on the matter in writing. The Italians valued the number of possible ways in which the thought might be expressed, rather than the thought itself. Consequently the employment of a number of words became in itself a virtue. The idea is racked on a framework of synonyms, comparisons, antitheses,-any verbal cleverness. In Italian literature this tendency is represented in the extreme by the religious works of Pietro Aretino, books which were then applauded and which seem so sacrilegious to us now. The worthy Bishop of Guadix was an admirer, evidently, of the divagations of Aretino. Bryan, through the French, brings this type of work to England. Fortunately England was not ready for it. Or perhaps the troublous times of the Regency and Mary did not dispose English readers to the enjoyment of verbal ingenuity. And fortunately, perhaps, Bryan himself died two years later, before his personal influence was able to start the fashion. At any rate the book is "exceedingly rare" now, and was apparently unknown to many of his contemporaries. For the first half of the sixteenth century, therefore, Spanish influence is very slight. Spanish authors, indeed, such as Guevara and Vives, were read even in translations, but those authors themselves represented forces that were not typically Spanish. And the language was not studied. Catharine Parr, for example, read both of these men, and yet was unable to talk to the Spanish ambassador. Nor did the English ambassadors to Spain gain an insight into Spanish literature. It is, therefore, appropriate that 1 Menosprecio de Corte, by M. Martinez de Burgos, op. cit., 21-22. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 381 the best known poem dealing with Spain in this period should be Wyatt's epigram Tagus, fare well,1 which expresses his love for England. The same difficulty that has been experienced in disentangling the Spanish influence from the influence of Spanish humanism, is found in differentiating German influence from that of German humanism. Naturally the northern countries felt the humanistic impulse at approximately the same time. Therefore the various presses of Europe poured out writings in Latin based upon the great classical authors. In general, the main characteristics of these are the same wherever found.2 The glory of humanism was that it was not bound by national limitations, and in consequence appealed to an European public. The Utopia was read widely on the Continent and the Colloquia in England was the most widely read book of its age, the nationality of the author having nothing to do with the case. In this concert of Europe, naturally, the German writers took their part. Latin books by German authors were read in England, as were Latin books by Italian, Spanish, French, and Dutch authors. But such books were not read because they gave the national point of view. In fact their appeal to English readers was in inverse proportion to the expression in them of their nationality.3 For example the reason given by Palgrave for his translation of the Acolastus of Gnapheus is to teach the Latin by means of English; the reason why that particular comedy was chosen is 4 not only because I esteem that little volume to be a very curious and artificially compacted nosegay, gathered out of the most excellent and odoriferous sweet smelling garden of the most pure latin authors, but also because the author thereof (as far as I can learn) is yet living, thereby I would be glad to move unto the hearts of your grace's clerks, of which your realm was never better stored, some little 1 The Poems of Sir Thomas Wiat, op. cit., i, 57. 2 I have tried to suggest a differentiation between the southern and the northern humanism on pp. 261-262. 3 The whole question of humanism has been treated in Chapter IV. Here this point needs emphasizing because in the very valuable and very scholarly, study of C. H. Herford The Literary Relations of England and Germany in the Sixteenth Century the sole background for English humanism is the German. And at the same time with equal emphasis I wish to express my admiration for his work. 4 Palgrave's Epistle to the Acolastus, quoted by McConaughy The School Drama, 110. 882 EARLY TUDOR POETRY grain of honest and virtuous envy, which on my part to confess the very truth unto your grace, hath continually in all the time of these my poor labors, accompanied me, and stirred me onward to achieve this manner, in this wise by me attempted. Or, this may be illustrated by the transformation of the Narrenschiff into the Ship of Fools.1 The one product of humanism that both illustrates the German spirit and historically affected the German peoples is the Epistola? Obscurorum Virorum. Yet this moved no English writer to imitation, although we know that it was read and enjoyed in England. And in this connection it is a significant fact that the first English translation of it is dated 1909. The conclusion seems unavoidable that the German humanists who affected England did so, not because they were German but because they were humanists. To us, familiar with the intellectual power of modern Germany, this seems surprising. It is necessary to reconstruct our ideas. To the gentlemen of the Court of Henry VIII, central Europe from the North Sea to Switzerland and from the confines of Burgundy going indefinitely east was vaguely labelled Almaine. Their knowledge 2 of the Flemish cities, with which they had business dealings, was naturally more precise. In addition to these, the Rhine acted as a great highway. And all the inhabitants of the vast central region indiscriminately spoke Dutch. This ignorance of Germany and its people may be illustrated again by the various modifications of the Narrenschiff. In the chapter, Von unnutzen studieren, the fool wanders abroad. As Brandt was teaching at Basel and was writing in German, the universities mentioned are German. So sint wir zil Lips, Erfordt, Wien, ZU Heidelberg, Mentz, Basel gstanden. Locher, writing in Latin but still at Basel, feels that the list is adequate. But the Frenchman Droyn, writing for Frenchman, sends his fool to Vienna, Erfurt, Orleans, Paris, Poitiers, Pavia, Padua, Toulouse, Louvain, and Montpellier, and adds the fact that he has seen the cities of Rome, London, Naples, Milan, and Avignon. For Englishmen Barclay thus renders it. One rennyth to almayne another vnto fraunce To parys padway Lumbardy or spayne Another to Bonony, Rome or orleance 1 P. 248-250. 2 Tyndale uses German as a substantive in 1530. N. E. D. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 383 To cayne, to Tolows, Athenys or Colayne And at the last retournyth home agayne More ignorant, blynder and gretter folys ihan they were whan they firste went to the scolys In deference to Brandt he mentions Almaine, but the only place in Germany he thinks that his reader will know is Cologne! 1 Politically Germany was not important. It was divided into a number of small principalities, united loosely by the Holy Roman Empire. Not until the Reformation, when there was a prospect of uniting the Protestant princes in a revolt against the Emperor, a policy that gave Anne of Cleves to the list of English queens, did the German nation figure in the schemes of the English statesmen. Germany, in anything approaching the modern sense, did not exist in the sixteenth century. But from this it must not be inferred that there was no dealing with the Germanic peoples. Quite the reverse is the case. The great English export was wool,-to such an extent that, in More's opinion, by limiting agriculture it was harmful to the commonwealth. This wool was largely taken by the Low Countries. Thus the trade relations between Englishmen and the subjects of the Emperor in northern Europe were very close. In London the Steelyard, the home of the German merchants, was one of the great associations, whose prosperity both Wolsey and Cromwell were accused of cherishing at the expense of English interests. And at the reception of Anne of Cleves the German merchants, each with his servant, stood "fyrst nexte to the parke pale in the East syde." 2 In fact the commercial ties between England and the Empire were so strong that the King had to reckon with them. War with Charles meant the closing to English ships of the ports of Flanders, with the consequent idleness, penury, and misery at home. Part of Wolsey's undoubted unpopularity was due to his preference for the French alliance, and Anne Boleyn was hated for more than moral reasons. With the two races thus brought closely into contact, the natural assumption is that the English literature of the sixteenth century would be strongly marked by German influence. Actually 1 Written before 1508, Basel had not yet become famous through the Froebens. 2 Hall's Chronicles, ed. Whibley, op. cit., ii, 296. 384 EARLY TUDOR POETRY the reverse is true. An occasional anecdote in a jest-book is borrowed from German literature, occasionally an entire book is translated and dies away in a single edition,' but the total is surprisingly little. The reasons for this are so well summed up by Professor Herford that his words shall be borrowed.2 Whether, in this strict sense, Germany, in the sixteenth century, exercised any 'literary' influence at all, is no doubt a 'question to be asked.' To all appearance, no European people was less qualified for the work. To the most stronglymarked literary tendency of the time it gave almost no response. Everywhere else the demand for elegance and harmony of literary form was being raised with continually greater insistence and authority; in Germany, outside the sphere of Humanists, it was a cry in the wilderness, which the most approved literary orthodoxy ignored with impunity. The old court-poetry of Thtiringen and the Upper Rhine was as completely forgotten as that of Provence, and had left scarcely more palpable traces behind; nor did sixteenth century Germany, like France and Spain, and even England, resume the broken continuity at a new point by the aid of Petrarch. No school of Italianate versifiers endangered the popularity of the Narrenschiff, or ruffled the industrious equanimity of Hans Sachs. To a degree unparalleled elsewhere in Europe, literature had become plebeian. The complete decay of the courts as centres of literary culture,-a decay against which only here and there a Mathilde of Wtirtemberg raised a forlorn protest,-had thrown literature into the hands of a bourgeois class not only itself lacking in the old courtly graciousness and refinement, but indisposed by a century of life and death feuds with the leagued nobility to revive its memory; and the antagonism was heightened by internal revolutions, which, with rare exceptions (as at Nirnberg), put every town in the hands of its least cultivated class. It was a literature of the workshop and the stall, a literature of men habitually familiar to brutality, plain-spoken to grossness, drastic in their ridicule, ferocious in their earnestness, not without sterling honesty, but wanting in the grace of good manners, in chivalry, in subtle and delicate intellect. In such a society the delicate and artificial forms of literature have no place; its innate power finds expression in brutal plainspeaking and in satire.3 Yet from such a society came an influence that was to mould English literature and English life from that day to this,-the 1 Caxton's Reynard the Fox (1481) had a second edition 1489 (?) later. The Parson of Kalenborow survives in a single slightly mutilated copy in the Bodleian. Herford, op. cit., 275. 2 Herford, op. cit., Introduction, xix-xx. 3This phase has been so thoroughly done by Professor Herford that there would be no gain in repetition. The literary values of the Reformation, however, with more discretion than has the present writer, he refuses to discuss. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 385 Reformation. Such a society, it may be argued, formed a virgin soil peculiarly suitable to the growth of one dominating idea. There was lacking the divergent pull of equal forces (to change the metaphor) that rendered the humanism of Erasmus static and not dynamic.1 The whole force of the people could be directed along one line. Again, the political condition of the Empire, its division into a number of independent principalities, was advantageous to the spread of the new doctrine. Whereas a strong central authority, naturally inclined toward the old, would have had both the power and the inclination to stamp out the heresy,-as was the fate of Lollardism-by the constitution of the Empire it was possible for Luther to win each individual unit separately; thereupon, each unit won affected its neighbors. And lastly, throughout their history, the Germans have shown themselves susceptible to an intellectual appeal. With them conviction leads logically to action. A brilliant theorist, like Treitschke, finds his ideas transformed into deeds. For the sake of contrast compare the attitude of the Italians towards an equally brilliant thinker. There is very little question that Macchiavelli based the generalizations in II Principe upon the conduct of the princes around him. Yet, even so, the book affected only the occasional individual; it did not change the philosophy of the nation. The relations between the Medici and the Florentines show no marked influence of one of the most brilliant books ever written. In Germany it is quite otherwise. Luther, alone in his study, could energize a people; his personality was powerful, because of the people behind him,-solely because of the people behind him. The feature of the Reformation in Germany is the readiness of the German people to respond to his appeal. In comparison with the German Reformation that in England seems confused and slow in movement. There was no great national impulse toward reform. The process continued through the entire century and seems many times to have been determined by external pressure rather than inward conviction. It is hard to believe that the policy of either Henry or Elizabeth was more than opportunist, yet each was a popular sovereign. Cromwell's ministry is described as a "reign of terror," but the most serious 1 Pp. 291-294. 386 EARLY TUDOR POETRY rebellion in the century, The Pilgrimage of Grace, was directed, not against the king, but against his evil counsellors. To the historian it seems a number of times as though Henry would lose his throne, yet as a matter of fact he died peacefully in his bed, just after having executed the Earl of Surrey and with the great Duke of Norfolk condemned to death. Neither his worst acts of tyranny nor the machinations of Reginald Pole could unite against him an effective opposition. Nor on the other hand could the reformers, even though led by the unscrupulous audacity of Cromwell, force a continuous policy. It was in 1539 that Parliament passed the celebrated Act of the Six Articles, "the Whip with Six Strings," by which in London alone five hundred Protestants were indicted. As the external policy favored a rapprochement with Spain, or dictated sympathy with the Lutherans, the internal situation was adjusted. The result was continual vacillation. The composition of the nation was not uniform. Opinions varied from that of Forrest, who believed in the Catholic dogma and in papal supremacy, and was burned in 1538, to that of Frith, who denied both the Catholic dogma and papal supremacy, and was burned in 1533. Between these extremes there was every shade of belief. And the divisions are not mutually exclusive. In all probability the great majority of the nation accepted the doctrines and the teachings of the Church, but in many cases this was modified by opposing conceptions. The most important of these was the question of papal supremacy, with all which that implies. This was the probable state of mind of the King himself. In his book against Luther, Assertio Septem Sacramentorum 1591, he musters the traditional arguments in favor of the Catholic dogma.l In spite of Luther's opinion that the author is Lee, there is little question that Henry wrote it. Traditionally he was educated for the Church, and he enjoyed theological disputes with Tunstall, Lee, More, etc. The arguments therein used are neither very profound, nor very convincing, nor necessarily original. He was speaking for the Church and by the Church he was recognized as Defensor Fidei. But from this it does not follow that he was not sin1 This has been re-edited (1908), with an introduction and critical apparatus by Rev. Louis O'Donovan, S. T. L. and with a preface by Cardinal Gibbons of Baltimore. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 387 cere. What he stated is what the immense majority of educated men believed. And he continued to believe. The Act of the Six Articles, eighteen years later, practically affirms the theological positions of the Assertio. So far as dogma is concerned, the evidence is that Henry lived and died believing in the Roman Catholic faith.1 But there is part of the Assertio with which later the author could not have been in such agreement. The first two chapters denounce Luther in scathing terms for denying the authority of the Pope.2 It is to such passages that Roper refers in his life of More.3 I will not wrong the Bishop of Rome 4 so much, as troublesomely, or carefully to dispute his Right, as if it were a Matter doubtful... For he cannot deny, but that all the Faithful honour and acknowledge the sacred Roman see for their Mother and Supreme, nor does Distance of Place or Dangers in the Way hinder Access thereunto... Truly, if any will look upon antient Monuments, or read the Histories of former Times, he may easily find that since the Conversion of the World, all Churches in the Christian World have been obedient to the See of Rome. We find, that, though the Empire was translated to the Grecians, yet did they still own, and obey the Supremacy of the Church, and See of Rome, except when they were in any turbulent Schism. More had been summoned before the Councillors. But in thende, when they sawe they could by no manner of perswasions remove him from his former determinacion, then beganne they more terribly to touche him, telling him that the Kinges highnes had given them in commandment yf they could by noe gentleness wynne him, in his name with his great ingratitude to charge him; that never was there servant to his sovereygne so villanous, nor subject to his prince so trayterous, as he. For he, by his subtill synister sleyghtes most unnaturally procuringe and provokinge him to sett forthe a booke of the Assertion of the Seaven Sacraments and maynteynance of the Popes Auctoritye, had caused him, to his dishonor throughoute all Christendome, to put a sworde in the Popes hande to fight agaynst himselfe. When they had thus layed forthe all the terrors they could. ymagine agaynste him, My lordes, quothe he, these terrors be arguments for children and not for me. But to answere to that wherwith you doe chieflye burden me, I believe the Kinges highnes of his honor will never lay that to my chardge, for none is there that canne in that poynte say in my excuse more to me then his highnes himselfe, 1 For the historical background the student is referred to A History of the English Church in the Sixteenth Century from Henry VIII to Mary, by James Gairdner. 2O'Donovan's translation, op. cit., 202. 3 Roper's Life, ed. Sampson, op. cit., 946. 4For some reason the translation renders Pontifex by the phrase Bishop of Rome; I have not retained the italics. 388 EARLY TUDOR POETRY who right well knoweth that I was never procurer nor councellor of his majestie thereunto; but after it was finished, by his graces appoyntment and consent of the makers of the same, I was only a sorter out and placer of the principall matters therein conteyned. Wherin when I founde the Popes Auctoritye highlye advanced and with stronge arguments mightily defended, I sayed unto his grace, I must put your highnes in rememberance of one thinge, and that is this: the Pope as your grace knowethe, is a prince as you are, and in league with all other Christyan princes. It may hereafter soe fall out that your grace and he maye varye upon some poyntes of the league, whereupon may growe breache of amitye and warre betwene you bothe. I think it best therfore, that the place be amended, and his auctoritye more sclenderly touched. Nay, quothe his grace, that shall it not; wee are soe much bounden unto the See of Rome, that we cannot doe too much honor to yt. Then did I further put him in remembraunce of the Statute of Premunyre, wherby a good parte of the Popes pasturall cure here was pared awaye. To that answered his highnes: Whatsoever impediment be to the contrarye, we will sett forthe that auctorytie to the uttermost; for we receyved from that See of Roome our crowne Emperiall: which, till his grace with his owne mouthe told it me, I never harde of before. The contingency foreseen by More of course occurred. Henry, in his desire for a legitimate male heir, wished a divorce from Katharine of Aragon, in order to marry Anne Boleyn. This required a papal dispensation. There was nothing unusual in such a request. Permission had been granted in analogous cases, to Louis XII of France, to Suffolk, the King's brother-in-law, and to Margaret, his sister. The factor that differentiated Henry's request from the others was that it was Katharine's nephew, the Emperor, that was all-powerful with the Pope. The latter therefore played for time, appointed Campeggio legate to try the case, but withheld from him the necessary authority, and protracted the trial. This conduct, however natural under the circumstances, produced in England results in two different ways. The King under the direction, or, as it has been said, at the suggestion, of Cromwell, assumed the headship of the English Church. By a clever but unscrupulous legal fiction, that the clergy had been guilty against the statute of prcemunire, he forced the Convocation both to pay a fine and also to acknowledge his supremacy. In the second place, the nation, as had been foreseen by Wolsey, was offended in its national consciousness at having their sovereign cited to appear before a foreign tribunal. By skillfully fanning the jealousy between the Church and the State, by stressing the imposition of the Annates and the injustice of the ecclesiastical courts, Cromwell was INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 389 able to manipulate the Commons. The result was to remove the last constitutional barrier between Henry and despotism. This was gradually accomplished through the decade. In his attack upon the temporal power of the Church in England, Henry at least winked at opinions theologically heretical. Until Tyndale attacked the divorce, he was not persecuted; Barnes was encouraged to return; and there is nothing unlikely in the story that Henry approved of the Supplication of Beggars. We must grant with Lecky that persecution does change opinions; but to accomplish this the persecution must be relentless and continuous. It is also true, however, that persecution, by enabling the persecuted to prove their faith, increases that faith. As Henry in his war with the Church was forced at times to tolerate dissent, it is the latter that was accomplished in this reign. Consequently the spasmodic attempt to suppress heresy was unavailing. The term "heresy" must be understood to mean any opinion not sanctioned by authority. In the sixteenth century the State felt itself intrusted with the preservation of dogma, just as in the twentieth the State feels itself intrusted with the preservation of morality, and this belief was not peculiar to any one nation, party, or creed. Frith's position, that belief in the doctrine of transubstantiation was the concern of the individual only, is an anachronistically modern note, quite at variance with the conceptions of the age. The party of the heretics was necessarily composed of indefinite factions of many shades of opinion. Many of the "martyrs," chronicled by Foxe, seem to the modern reader to belong to that type which is constitutionally opposed to any authority. Some of them call to mind the heretic, whipped by Sir Thomas More, who manifested his zeal for reform by inverting women's skirts over their heads as they knelt in church. In other cases, acts were committed that seem caused by hysteria, induced by the certainty of horrible punishment. All this may be granted. But there was more than this to the reform movement. Lollardism had died out, but it had left at least a predisposition to criticise the Church. Skelton's phrase, "lanterns of light," suggests a connection.1 Hu1 The Lanthorne of Light was a Lollard publication; yet Skelton was certainly a good Romanist. Cf. passage quoted p. 184. But the phrase was preserved without its religious significance, since Puttenham (Arber's Reprints, 76) uses it in a purely literary sense. 390 EARLY TUDOR POETRY manism, also, as it had developed the rationalistic faculty, had accomplished the same result. The attacks of Erasmus on the clergy are as bitter as those of the reformers.' Moreover, the Church was open to attack. With the Borgia or Julius II, as Pope, and with Wolsey as Cardinal, religion as a spiritual force was not strong. Granting that the abuses found in the Comperta are grossly exaggerated by scoundrels for mercenary ends, if the condition of the Church were as pure as its present apologists would have us believe, we are confronted with the anomalous situation that corruption in high places had left the lower ranks undefiled. This is contrary to human experience in other matters, and it is contrary also to the opinion of that age as expressed in literature. And it is as much an error to assume that the purity of the Observants and the Carthusians represents the norm as it is to believe with Bale and Foxe that the followers of the Church were a pestiferous brood. Also it must be remembered that in the suppression of the monasteries, an immense amount of property went into the hands of the king and through him to the great nobles. Thus the questions of belief in certain dogmas was bound up together with property rights among the lords and freedom from ecclesiastical taxes among the commons. The result was that in opposition to the Church the extremes were united, of men fired by a holy love of purity and of men moved merely by a mercenary love of property. The literary effect of such a condition was that the whole nation was resolved into a debating union. Each side, firmly believing in the justice of its cause, came into the forum of public opinion. For the first time in the history of English literature the pros and cons were argued at length. No longer was it a question, as with Wycliffe, of answering by suppression. The printing-press had nullified such measures, and the money spent by Tunstall to buy up and destroy Tyndale's Bibles went only to pay for new and better ones.2 Forcible suppression was also tried, and also failed. In 1521 Leo issued a bull ordering Luther's books to be prohibited. Five years later Tunstall issued the proclamation against Tyndale's New Testament.3 1 Cf. p. 35-36. 2 The story is entertainingly told by Foxe, Acts and Monuments, fourth edition (1583), p. 1019. Unreliable though he may be, Foxe is a mine of information for the writers of this period. 3 Quoted by Foxe, op. cit., 1017. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 391 By the duty of our pastoral office, we are bound diligently with all our power, to foresee, prouide for, roote out, and putte away all those things, which seme to tend to the perill & danger of our subiects, and specially the destruction of theyr soules. Wherefore we hauing understanding by the reporte of diuers credible persons, & also by the euident apparaunce of the matter, that many children of iniquity mainteiners of Luthers sect, blinded through extreme wickedness wandring from the way of truth and the Catholicke fayth, craftely haue translated the new Testament into our English tongue, entermedling therwith many heretical Articles and erronious opinions, pernicious and offensiue, seducing the simple people attempting by their wicked & peruerse interpretations, to prophanate the maiesty of the Scripture, which hetherto hath remayned undefiled, & craftely to abuse the most holy word of God, & the true sence of the same: of the whiche translation there are manye bookes imprinted, some with gloses and some without, conteining in the English toung that pestiferous and most pernicious poyson dispersed throughout all our dioces of London in great number: which truly without it be spedely foresene, without doubt, will contaminate and infect the flocke committed unto us, with most deadly poyson and heresy, to the grieuous peril & danger of the soules committed to our charge, and the offence of Gods diuine maiesty.... Consequently under the pain of excommunication and of incurring the suspicion of heresy all were urged to deliver up all copies of the New Testament. During the years following appeared lists of prohibited books, consisting of the works of Luther, Tyndale, Fish, and the reformers generally. The constant recurrence of such lists and the increasing length of them is a proof of the failure of such a policy. The third method of combatting the growth of heretical opinion is more interesting in its modernity. By a deed dated March 7th, 1527,1 More is given permission to read these forbidden publications in order that he may reply to them in the vernacular. Thus were the conservative forces in England marshalled to repel the foreign invader. Actually the majority of these works were foreign only in that they were printed in Germany, and it may be granted in that Luther's works had inspired analogous thinking. They were written by English exiles, attracted there by the freedom from persecution, but inflamed with love for their native land and with an intense desire to see her in the right way. But they were not by any means mere mouthpieces of Luther. On important dogmas they did not hesitate to differ from him. Tyndale's position in regard to the Sacrament is not the Lutheran consubstantiation,-he regards it 1 Dr. A. I. Taft, the Apology ofSir Thomas More,, dates this a year later. 392 EARLY TUDOR POETRY as being memorial only,-and Frith's position is that it is a matter for individual judgment. Nor even is the New Testament merely a translation of Luther's. Tyndale used the Greek of Erasmus, the Latin version of Erasmus, the Vulgate, as well as the Lutheran version, although it is true that the glosses in the first edition are verbatim translated from those of Luther. Consequently there was no uniformity of doctrine. In fact this is one of the points raised by More against the reformers, that on important questions they differed so radically among themselves. Therefore, in speaking of the Reformation movement as due to Germanic influence, it must be remembered that it was principally the product of Englishmen who for political reasons were living abroad. As was apparent in the prohibition of Tunstall, the first and most important of such works was Tyndale's version of the New Testament in English.' The appearance of this book in England gave rise to the most important debate of the period, that between Tyndale and Sir Thomas More. The assumption is sometimes made, as for example by Swift in his Tale of a Tub, that the objection was against any English version. But this is emphatically denied by More.2 Nor I never yet heard any reason laid why it were not convenient to have the Bible translated into the English tongue; but all those reasons, seemed they never so gay and glorious at the first sight, yet when they were well examined, they might in effect, for aught that I can see, as well be laid against the holy writers that wrote the Scripture in the Hebrew tongue, and against the blessed evangelists that wrote the Scripture in Greek, and against all those in like wise that translated it out of every of those tongues into Latin, as to their charge that would well and faithfully translate it out of Latin into our English tongue. For as for that our tongue is called barbarous, is but, a fantasy. For so is, as every learned man knoweth, every strange language to other. And if they would call it barren of words, there is no doubt but it is plenteous enough to express our minds in anything whereof one man hath used to speak with another. Now as touching the difficulty which a translator findeth in expressing well and lively the sentence of his author, which is hard alway to do so surely but that she shall sometime minish either of the sentence or of the grace that it beareth in the former tongue, that point hath lain in their light that have translated the scripture already either out of Greek into Latin, or out of Hebrew in any of them both, as, by many translations which we read already, to them that be learned appeareth. 1 The standard biography of Tyndale is by the Rev. R. Demaus, M. A., published for the Religious Tract Society. 21 am quoting the modernized version used by Taft, op. cit. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 393 So according to More,-and he is the official mouthpiece of the Roman Church in England,-there is no reason in the nature of the language why the Bible should not be translated. tIe feels, however, that there may be a grave moral danger.1 And also though Holy Scripture be, as ye said whilere, a medicine for him that is sick, and food for him that is whole; yet sith there is many a body sore soulsick that taketh himself for whole, and in Holy Scripture is an whole feast of so much divers viand that after the affection and state of sundry stomachs one may take harm by the selfsame that shall do another good, and sick folk often have such a corrupt tallage in their taste that they most like the meat that is most unwholesome for them; it were not therefore, as methinketh, unreasonable that the ordinary, whom God hath in the diocese appointed for the chief physician to discern between the whole and the sick, and between disease and disease, should after his wisdom and discretion appoint every body their part, as he should perceive to be good and wholesome for them.... And thus may the bishop order the Scripture in our hands with as good reason as the father doth by his discretion appoint which of his children may for his sadness keep a knife to cut his meat, and which shall for his wantonness have his knife taken from him for cutting of his fingers. And thus am I bold without prejudice of other men's judgment to show you my mind in this matter, how the Scripture might without great peril and not without great profit be brought into our tongue, and taken to lay men and women both, not yet meaning thereby but that the whole Bible might for my mind be suffered to be spread abroad in English. That the danger, foreseen by More, of a divided Christendom was real, the history of the succeeding centuries, even to the present year of grace, is eloquent testimony. Such division, doubtless, would have been avoided were the Scriptures to be read only under expert advice, and by readers willing to accept the authorized interpretation. So great a sacrifice of individual belief More himself was willing to make, but clearly this was not the attitude of the age. The spirit of rationalism demanded that the reasoning faculty should be satisfied, and where the interpretations of the Church were at variance with the new discoveries, since the Bible was infallible, other interpretations must be found. Had the Church been perfectly flexible, adapting its views to the expanding age, More's solution might have been practical. Actually the Church is the most conservative of all human institutions; it glories in traditional points of view. And by the Copernican hypothesis the rational explanation of the astronomical peculiarities in the valley 1 Taft, op. cit. 394 EARLY TUDOR POETRY of Ajalon is quite different from the traditional one, based upon the Ptolemaic system. The natural result of such a condition is that More's supervising bishop would actually have been futile. More, moreover, assumed that there is but one correct interpretation of the Greek and Hebrew words, namely that sanctioned by the Church. Tyndale naturally denied this and in his translation used others. Equally naturally followed the condemnation of the book and its spectacular burning. This was defended by More.' It is, quoth I, to me great marvel that any good Christian man having drop of wit in his head, would anything marvel or complain of the burning of that book if he know the matter.... But now the cause why he changed the name of charity, and of the Church, and of priesthood, is no very great difficulty to perceive. For sith Luther and his fellows, among other their damnable heresies, have one that all our salvation standeth in faith alone, and toward our salvation nothing force of good works; therefore it seemeth that he laboreth of purpose to minish the reverent mind that men bear to charity, and therefore he changeth that name of holy virtuous affection into the bare name of love, common to the virtuous love that men beareth to God, and to the lewd love that is between fleck and his make. And for because that Luther utterly denieth the very Catholic Church in earth, and saith that the church of Christ is but an unknown congregation of some folk... having the right faith (which he calleth only his own newforged faith); therefore Hitchens (Tyndale) in the New Testament cannot abide the name of the Church, but turneth it into the name of congregation, willing that it should seem to Englishmen either that Christ in the Gospel had never spoken of the Church, or else that the Church were but such a congregation as they might have occasion to say that a congregation of such some heretics were the church that God spake of. Now as touching the cause why he changed the name of priest into "seniour", ye must understand that Luther and his adherents hold this heresy, that holy order is nothing; and that a priest is nothing else but a man chosen to preach, and that by that choice to that office he is priest by and by without any more ado, and no priest again whensoever the people choose another in his place; and that a priest's office is nothing but to preach. For as for saying Mass, and hearing of confession, and absolution thereupon to be given,all this he saith that every man, woman, and child may do as well as any priest. Now doth Hitchens, therefore, to set forth this opinion withal, after his master's heresy, put away the name of priest in his translation as though priesthood were nothing. Aside from the rather unpleasant implications, this passage is a fair statement of the case. It is merely the question of the connotations of the words. Tyndale, in the Obedience of a Christian Man and in the Wicked Mammon, consequently retorted that the words 1 More, Works 1557, The Dialogue,.20-92; modernized by Taft. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 395 church, charity, priest, etc., had become so perverted in their connotations by the conduct of the Catholic Church and her ministers, that they failed to give the sense of the Scripture. And he illustrated his position by violent attacks against the Church. More replied in the very lengthy Confutation in which the first of Tyndale's positions was explained and answered. He based his argument for the traditional interpretation upon the doctrine of the "unwritten verities," namely that while all in the Bible is true, all that is true is not in the Bible, that the Christ transmitted to his disciples knowledge not given in the Bible, and that they in turn transmitted this knowledge to the fathers of the Church. Tyndale of course objected, sneered at the "unwritten vanities," and believed that the councils had been called for the purpose of making "every opinion, that seemed profitable, an article of the faith." The reading of these tracts, and of others like them, filled with abuse and sometimes billingsgate is, it must be confessed, a dreary matter. A man's religion is not a matter primarily of intellectual conviction, nor is he apt to be convinced by argument. To the debate each brings his own preconceptions, and is very honestly convinced by the pleader of his own side. Whether Our Lord in giving the keys to Peter contemplated the historic development of the Papacy is not a question open to a purely rational solution. Consequently both More's English works and those of Tyndale have been relegated to the libraries of the special student. And however vital they may have been then, today they have slight literary interest. It is pathetic to realize that the brain that conceived the Utopia should have been employed in such a task. And it cannot be truthfully said that the effect upon their contemporaries was commensurate with the labor. England became protestant, not because Tyndale out-argued More, but because forces other than spiritual swept the nation somewhat unwillingly in the destined direction. But this futility is not true of the original cause of the controversy, Tyndale's translation of the New Testament. As with slight modifications and rectifications it became the basis of all subsequent renderings of the New Testament into English, it is impossible to overstate the indebtedness owed to it by general English literature. Tyndale's simple, idiomatic, and dignified English, sounding in the ears of the child until that child had be 896 EARLY TUDOR POETRY come an old man, and from one generation to another, set a standard to which all writers have conformed. It is preeminently the link that binds the present to the past and, in space, holds together the far-flung members of the English race. 1 Even Shakespeare has his seasons and lesser authors vary in corresponding degrees. It is only the Bible that, in all ages and by all peoples from the king to the peasant, is read. Therefore as a literary force Tyndale's version is one of the great factors in the development of the race. But aside from Tyndale's version, the products of the religious controversy belong rather to the historian than to the student of literature. For it must be remembered that the various dogmas were not merely abstract speculations, but that they were of intensely practical interest to the community. The doctrine of "justification by faith" was far-reaching in English life. If man were saved by faith alone, as Luther preached, "good works," represented in the innumerable chantries, monasteries, convents, were supererogation. This deduction did not fail to be drawn. In 1529 Simon Fish brought out his little tract, A Supplicacyon for Beggers.2 In only thirteen pages of modern type Fish succeeds in effectively arraigning the clergy for their immorality and their excessive wealth. Foxe is the sole authority for the two contradictory stories of its introduction to the king's notice by Anne Boleyn and by two merchants. This, however, gives him the opportunity of crediting to Henry two diverse, but dramatic, scenes, agreeing in the single particular that the reception was favorable. Clearly, if such were the case, the favorable reception was due to its contents, not to its literary qualities. Its cardinal merit is its brevity, and perhaps the vigor of its invective. But also the effect is due to the use of clever literary mechanism, which is given at once in the first paragraph. Most lamentably compleyneth theyre wofull mysery vnto youre highnes youre poore daily bedemen the wretched hidous monstres (on whome scarcely for horror any yie dare loke) the foule vnhappy sorte of lepres, and other sore 1 For an appreciation of the Bible as literature the reader is referred to Professor Cook's presentation, Cambridge History of English Literature, Vol. IV, Chapter 2. 2 Reprinted as No. 4 in Arber's English Scholar's Library, 1878. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 397 people, nedy, impotent, blinde, lame, and sike, that live onely by almesse, howe that theyre nombre is daily so sore encreased that all the almesse of all the weldisposed people of this youre realme is not halfe ynough for to susteine theim, but that for verey constreint they die for hunger. And this most pestilent mischief is comen vppon youre saide poore beedmen by the reason that there is yn the tymes of youre noble predecessours passed craftily crept ynto this your realme an other sort (not of impotent but) of strong puissant and counterfeit holy, and ydell beggers and vacabundes whiche syns the tyme of theyre first entre by all the craft and wilinesse of Satan are nowe encreased vnder your sight not onely into a great nombre, but also ynto a kingdome. These are (not the herdes, but the rauinous wolues going in herdes clothing deuouring the flocke) the Bisshoppes, Abbottes, Priours, Deacons, Archdeacons, Suffraganes, Prestes, Monkes Chanons, Freres, Pardoners and Somners. He then reckons their incomes, discusses their morals, and ends by insinuating that they owe allegiance to another than the king of England. Such briefly is "the most celebrated and perhaps most dangerous attack against the religious orders made in the early sixteenth century." ' But unless Abbe Gasquet greatly over-estimates Fish's effort, these superlatives are applicable largely on account of the form employed. This was answered in the same year by Sir Thomas More in the Supplication of Souls. The form of this was obviously predetermined by that of its predecessor in being a supplication from the souls still in purgatory. Unfortunately it was by no means so effective. Its very bulk (and it is ten times the length of Fish's stinging little tract!) was against it. At length he refuted Fish's calculations of the income and property of the clergy, and at length justified the existence of purgatory. Actually, however, Sir Thomas was here at fault. If the clergy were parasites, as Fish assumed in his first paragraph, the exact amount of their depredations was a matter of minor importance; any amount, however small, was too much. And clearly, whether or not there be a purgatory, if we are justified by faith, the efficacy of the ordained clergy is strictly limited to the living. Fish died of the plague the following year, and More tells us 2 But god gaue hym such grace afterwards, that he was sory for that good zele, and repented hym selfe and came into the chyrche agayne, and forsoke and for1 Henry VIII. and the English Monasteries, by Francis Aidan Gasquet, 1, 32. 2 More's Apology, ed. Taft, op. cit., 123. 398 EARLY TUDOR POETRY sware all the whole hyll of those heresyes, out of which the fountayne of that same good zeale sprange. As Sir Thomas is both reliable and had access to sources of information closed to us, the fact need not be questioned; that this conversion was owing to an intellectual conviction due to reading the Supplication of Souls is, however, beyond the credulity of the modern reader. Of the many propagandist publications, which filled the air between 1530 and 1540, those we have been considering may be taken as fair examples. The others, therefore, need not detain us. Like all work written for a particular occasion they are interesting only to those interested in that event. Just as, while thousands know Gulliver's Travels and the Tale of a Tub, it is the chance student only that knows the Conduct of the Allies, said to be the most effective political pamphlet ever written. So here. The various works have been forgotten with the disputes that called them forth. There is one peculiarity, nevertheless, that deserves a passing consideration, namely the predominance among them of the dialogue used for polemic purpose. To so great an extent was this used that it may be said that a new literary type was created. It is quite true, however, that the dialogue had been a favorite form of the Middle Ages, or rather, that the division between the dialogue and the conflictus cannot be sharply drawn.1 It is equally true that in classical times it had been used for exposition, as in Plato, and for satire, as in Lucian. In both classic and medieval times the function of the work was literary. But when the nation was confronted with the grave questions arising from the divorce, interest in the purely literary was lost in the interest in thoughts, vital to the well-being of each individual. Thus the author of the Utopia in Latin spends his strength in the composition of works on local issues and in English. Such a condition occurs but once more in the history of the literature. Between 1640 and 1660 there was very little pure literature produced, because of the intensity of interest in actual events. Before that period Milton was writing great poems; after that period he was writing great poems; but for those twenty years he devoted himself to the composition of tracts. These may or may not be of interest to the modern reader, 1 Chapter III, pp. 128-129. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 399 but clearly the interest is quite different from that aroused by Paradise Lost. Analogous to this is the situation during the last half of the reign of Henry VIII. The very tracts were written with a passionate desire to convince. Under these circumstances, it is noticeable that so many of them take the form of a dialogue. When Starkey wishes to explain to the nation at large and to the king in particular the attitude of Reginald Pole, he represents him in conversation with Lupset.1 When Thomas wishes to defend the king's marriages, he describes a conversation between himself and various Italian gentlemen.2 When More wishes to explain the Lutheran heresy of justification by faith, he is interviewed by a messenger who represents a doubting friend and wishes More's opinion on the matter. Without prolonging the list of illustrations, it is evident that the dialogue form has been pressed into the service of pamphleteering. The reason for this literary fashion is not very clear. Professor Herford seems to attribute it to the German influence.3 Now, while granting that the original impulse was derived from English contact with German thought, the form. seems rather to be derived from humanism, and humanism via Erasmus. More, for example, early had translated the dialogues of Lucian. Satire is very close to attack, so that certain of the Colloquia read like work of the reformers. And as the Colloquies were immensely popular, when the reformers wished to attack, the form was ready to hand. It is to be noted, also, that in proportion as the dialogue approached the Platonic, rather than the Aristotelian, form of dialogue, it was less suitable for party purpose. The Messenger in More's Dialogue was felt to have expressed the heretical opinions rather better than the heretics themselves could do. Even More himself seemed to have been conscious of this and consulted advisors. But the literary flavor of Erasmus is exactly this, that all parties in the conversation are human. Consequently the nearer the polemic dialogue approached a work of art, the less the 'man of straw' was of straw 1 Printed in England in the Reign of Henry VIII, edited by J. M. Cowper for the E. E. T. S. 2The Pilgrim, ed. by J. A. Froude. 3 Literary Relation between England and Germany in the 16th. century, op. cit., Chapter 2. The reader is referred there for a very thoughtful discussion of the phenomenon. 400 EARLY TUDOR POETRY and the more he was human, in equal ratio was the work less fitted for the purpose. Perhaps for that reason, after a vigorous existence, the dialogue was surrendered to uses purely literary, and the controversies at the end of the century, such as the Martin Marprelate and the Nash-Harvey pamphlets take the form of the personal essay.1 The polemic dialogue remains a distinct and curious development in the history of the literature. As the Germanic element in the prose polemic dialogue is so slight, in this vagueness a definite relation is welcomed. This is to be found in Professor Herford's hypothesis that the Rede me and be nott wrothe in part is a derivation from Manuel's Der kradnkheit der Messe.2 It will be remembered that the Rede me is a polemic dialogue in verse, the first part of which laments the death of the personified Mass and discusses a suitable place for its burial. This conception, perhaps owing to the fact that it is at the beginning, caused the poem, as we know from Sir Thomas More, to be familiarly called the Burial of the Mass. In any case, it plays an important part. But this idea seems logically to follow from the immensely popular and very clever dialogue of Niclaus Manuel, the Bernese poet. There the progress of the Reformation in Switzerland is typified in the death struggle of the expiring Mass. And it is followed by the last Testament of the Mass. As Strasburg was so closely connected with the strife over the border, it is incredible that so dramatic a situation, handled with so much power and verve, should not have penetrated there. This may be, therefore, the reason that Strasburg figures in the English work. We know that Roy and Barlow were in Germany, just when Der Krankheit der Messe was circulating. The assumption is, therefore, that "as the most effective handle within reach for the elaborate assault upon the English clergy which he (Roy) contemplated, he seized upon it-and then came the complaisant and industrious Barlow to give form to his conception." 3 This assumption seems so plausible that one tends to accept it as fact. If it be accepted, it may 1 This must not be understood as implying that later the dialogue was never used in this form. The Diotrephes (1588) and other works prove the contrary. Yet in the second half of the century the occasional appearance of this type is merely the survival of a past fashion; the usual form was the personal essay. 2 Cf. pp. 208-212. 3 Herford, op. cit. 43. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 401 be regarded as epitomizing the whole subject of German influence. When by chance an English author found something to his liking in the German literatures, he simply appropriated it, incorporated it into his own work, and gave it a strictly English setting. Consequently there was no German influence as such; it is a record of individual writers purloining the particular feature with which their fancy had become enamoured. The best illustration of this appropriation of German work on the part of individuals is to be found in the works of "good" Bishop Coverdale, and at the same time the best illustration of the lack of literary interest. It must be always a matter of regret to the conscientious student of literature that "good" as applied to life and as applied to literature so rarely means the same! So many bad men write good books and so many bad books are written by men whose intentions areexemplary. So often the life of the great writer must be considered in the light of a warning to youth, and so often the writings of the great and good must be regarded as models of what to avoid. To a certain extent these trite meditations apply to the case in hand. Coverdale is a voluminous writer,1 but to a very large extent his works are translations. Of these, one assures him fame, since he made the first translation of the whole Bible into English. On the title page of the 1535 edition of this, the statement is made that it was translated "out of Douche and Latin into Englische." Unlike Tyndale, he felt no necessity for a study of the Greek and Hebrew originals. Perhaps for that reason his sentences are more fluid than those of Tyndale and some of his phrases have been retained in the Authorized Version. With Buffon's statement in mind concerning the man and the style, the contrast between Tyndale's life and work and the life and work of his successor is inevitable,-not to Coverdale's advantage. But the effect on literature of either Coverdale's Bible, or any of his numerous tracts, is indirect. They were to be judged, and he wished them to be judged, for their religious value. Probably, also, that was his attitude in the attempts at religious verse, his Goostly Psalmes and Spirituall Songes. These are translations and adaptations of Lutheran hymns,2 as Bale lists Cantiones Wittenber1 Many of his tracts and the Goostly Psalmes have been reprinted by the Parker Society. 2 The resemblance of Coverdale's hymns to the German was first pointed out 402 EARLY TUDOR POETRY gensium among his works. And the date of issue must have been before 1546, when, as is shown by the entry of Bishop Bonner, the book was placed upon the prohibited list. Before that time Coverdale visited the continent at least twice. In 1529 Foxe, with convincing detail, states that he was in Hamburg;l and after the reaction in 1540 he again fled to Europe. As the Goostly Psalmes was issued without any date, the time of publication and still more the time of composition are purely inferential.2 The case is complicated by three factors, namely; first, that the number of hymn books published both in High German and in the Plattdeutsche are exceedingly numerous, so that it is difficult to determine even what edition Coverdale used; secondly, that his own translations are so free that it is sometimes impossible to decide which of two, or three, hymns is his immediate original; and thirdly, because, apparently, he occasionally also wrote with the Latin original in mind.3 It seems safer, therefore, to assume a dating around 1540. The question of the dating, here, is by no means of mere academic importance, because to a large extent the accomplishment of the purpose for which Coverdale undertook the work is affected. His avowed aim was to substitute, for profane ballads, songs of spiritual content.4 by Professor A. F. Mitchell (The Wedderburns and their Work, 1867); in the 'Academy' May 31, 1884, Professor C. H. Herford gave his independent results; June 21, in the same publication, Mearns, then working on the Dictionary of Hymnology, added to the number; June 28, Mitchell supplemented and criticised the results; 1886, in Literary Relations Herford replied; 1887, H. R. Tedder (D. N. B. article Coverdale) summarizes the controversy; 1892, Mearns published his list in the Dictionary of Hymnology; 1897, Mitchell (The Gude and Godlie BaUatis, Scottish Text Society, pp. cxiv ff.) restates the whole matter. 1 Foxe, Actes and Monuments, ed. 1583, 1077. "Thus having lost by that ship, both money, his copies and time, he (Tyndale) came in another ship to Hamborough, where at his appoyntment M. Coverdale taried for him, and helped him in the translating of the whole 5 bookes of Moises, from Easter till Decemb. in the house of a worshipfull widowe, Maistres Margaret van Emmerson, Anno 1529, a great sweating sickness being the same time in the Towne." 21 take pleasure in acknowledging the assistance given me by Mr. Walter Abel, who is working on this problem. 8 This may be illustrated by a comparison between the English rendering of Christe Qui lux (Parker Society, Works of Coverdale, Remains, p. 584) and the Latin and the German. As Mr. Abel has shown, quite clearly he used both versions. 4 Coverdale's Remains, op. cit., 538. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 403 Seeing then that, as the prophet David saith, it is so good and pleasant a thing to praise the Lord, and so expedient for us to be thankful; therefore, to give our youth of England some occasion to change their foul and corrupt ballads into sweet songs and spiritual hymns of God's honour, and for their own consolation in him, I have here, good reader, set out certain comfortable songs grounded on God's word, and taken some out of the holy scripture, specially out of the Psalms of David, all whom would God that our musicians would learn to make their songs; and if they which are disposed to be merry, would in their mirth follow the counsel of St. Paul and St. James, and not to pass their time in naughty songs of fleshly love and wantonness, but with singing of psalms, and such songs as edify, and corrupt not men's conversation.l His pious purpose, however, failed of fulfillment. The book exists in only one copy,2 and there was no second edition until modern times. The usual explanation of this fact is to be found in Coverdale's lack of lyric quality. Clumsy as are the hymns, this theory will fail to satisfy anyone familiar with many of the popular ones of our Protestant collection, where the lack of poetic feeling is compensated by religious fervor. Apparently, the will is often taken for the deed, and one may be truly successful in a hymn, in which enough faulty rhyming, atrocious meter and vulgar phrasing are combined to make a secular poem a hissing and a reproach. Therefore, however sternly Coverdale's efforts may be judged as poetic compositions, the reason for their failure lies elsewhere. The real explanation is, I think, that they are a foreign importation, foreign in both words and music. What Coverdale was trying to do was to transplant bodily certain portions of the Kirchenlied. In this he was attempting a task much more difficult than that of the original authors. As is well known, the early Lutheran hymns were set to tunes both secular and profane, well known to the German people. To familiar melodies Luther set pale and colorless words with phrases like trumpet calls. But these melodies were not familiar to the English nation. Nor, it must be confessed, does Coverdale's rendering faintly suggest a trumpet. The mere fact that he was forced by his tune to maintain a definite form made his work labored. Consequently the English public was confronted both with strange music and strange verse forms. Even so, it is conceivable that the attempt might have succeeded had not an EngIt is characteristic of the age, rather than of the man, that the good bishop does not feel it necessary to say that they are translations. 2 Coverdale's Remains op. cit., 535. 404 EARLY TUDOR POETRY lish rival appeared upon the scene. Early in 1549, only a few years after Coverdale's work was published, were printed nineteen psalms of Thomas Sternhold. In December of the same year eighteen additional psalms by Sternhold appeared, with seven by Hopkins. This volume, increased little by little, went through edition after edition, and became the standard metrical version of the Psalms. The reason for this preference is easily comprehensible by a comparison between the two. For this I shall cite the first two verses of the Second Psalm, Quare fremuerunt gentes. Coverdale's version is as follows: 1 Werfore do the heithen now rage thus, Conspyrng together so wyckedly? Wherfore are the people so malicious, Vayne thynges to ymagyn so folyshly? The kynges of the earth stonde up together, And worldly rulers do conspyre Agaynst the Lorde and his Christ truly. They saye, Let us breake up theyr bondes, And let us cast theyr yocke awaye; Theyr lawes wyll make us lose oure londes, Therfore none soch wyll we obeye. But he that in heaven hath residence, Shall laugh them to scorne and theyr pretence; The Lorde shall mocke them nyght and daye. Sternhold's version of the same Psalm runs as follows: 2 Why did the Gentils tumults raise? what rage was in their braine? Why did the Iewish people muse? seeing all is but vaine? The kings and rulers of the earth conspire and all are bent: Against the Lord and Christ his son, which he among us sent. Shall we be bound to them say they? let all their bonds be broke: And of their doctrine and their law, let us reiect the yoke. 1 Coverdale's Remains op. cit., 568. 2 I am using the text printed by John Windet in 1601, not because it is good, but because I happen to have it by me. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 405 But he that in the heauen dwelleth, their doings will deride: And make them all as mocking stocks, thoughout the world so wide. Now, irrespective of any poetic difference between these two, clearly the second is more easily remembered. And whereas Coverdale is forced by his tune into many involved stanza-forms, the Sternhold and Hopkins has always the same, and that very simple and well known to the English public. Naturally, then, they preferred the latter. The reason for Coverdale's failure is in the last analysis due to the fact that he did depend upon German originals. Consequently here also German influence upon English is found to be of the slightest. Before dismissing the discussion of the influence of the Germanic literatures upon the English of the first half of the sixteenth century there remains one more phase to be considered. Under the stable government of the two Henrys, coincidently with the decline of the feudal theory, came the rise of the middle class. The merchants became a power, London a great center. State policies, which formerly were directed in accordance with the wishes of the nobility, now were modified by the flow of trade. So in literature, also, this new class must be represented. As the knight found his poetry in Hawes and his recreation in the chivalric romance, and as the humanist turned toward More and Erasmus, so the new merchant class read the jest-books.1 In general they may be divided into two quite clearly defined types. The first consists of a miscellaneous collection of separate short anecdotes. This main division is subdivided into three stages. The first of these is represented by the Hundred Mery Talys, published in 1526 by John Rastell, the brother-in-law of Sir Thomas More.2 Here each story has its separate title and closes usually with a moral application. The addendum suggests the origin. Rastell modelled his collection upon those used by medieval preachers to find illustra1 The best general discussion is in Herford's Literary Relations, Chap. V. The general condition is outlined by F. W. D. Brie, Eulenspiegel in England, Palestra XXVII, 1903, and the special problem of the Eulenspiegel is treated with masterly thoroughness. 2 This has been reprinted by Dr. Herman Oesterley, with sources and imitations. 406 EARLY TUDOR POETRY tions for their sermons.1 But he was not limited merely to the medieval sources; he drew upon the humanists and apparently even upon the life around him. This collection was so successful that a second edition was issued.2 The second stage is shown in Mery Tales, Wittie Questions, and Quicke Answers, published about ten years later.3 Here the moral application appears, but only rarely. In addition to the tales gathered from the Renaissance humanists, such as Poggio,4 there are anecdotes, from classical stories, "The Answer of Fabius to Livius," "The Answer of Poltis the King of Thrace to the Trojan Ambassadors," "The Wise Answer of Hannibal to King Antiochus," etc. The trace of the medieval origin has almost disappeared. It completely disappears in the last stage, represented by the Sack Full of News,5 registered in 1557. All pretense of either educational or moral value is gone, and the anecdotes are presented at their face value, merely a succession of jokes told against members of the middle class. Although they seem unspeakably dreary to us, there is no harm in them, and, considering social conditions of the time, they are curiously free from offense. In comparison with the humanistic facetiae such as those of Poggio, or Morlini, the Italian novelle, such as those of Bandello, or Fortini, or the French contes, such as the Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles, or those in Le Moyen de Parvenir, they are surprisingly moral. It must be granted that they are equally lack1 As a matter of fact, five of the hundred are taken from Bromyard's Summa Prcedicantium, a compilation dating from the end of the fourteenth century. As Oesterley notes only five, Brie's expression "Wie in den H. M. T. Bromyard vorherrscht" must be understood only in general. 2 This is reprinted by W. C. Hazlitt in Shakespeare's Jest Books. As it is undated, the question which is the first edition on this side of the ocean is unanswerable. Faute de mieux I accept Oesterley's opinion. 3 Reprinted by Hazlitt in Shakespeare's Jest Books. It is undated. I give 1535 as the date on the authority of W. W. Greg, Hand-lists of English Printers, Bibliographical Society, Pt. III, 1905. I do not understand why Emil Koeppel (Studien zur Geschichte der Italienischen Novelle in der Englischen Litteratur des Sechzehnten Jahrhunderts in Quellen und Forschungen zur Sprach-und Culturgeschichte der Germanischen V6lker Heft 70, p. 77) lists it dated at 1549. 4 Brie, op. cit., 77, lists seventeen tales from the Facetice of Poggio. 6 This was reprinted by J. O. Halliwell, 1861, in an edition of forty copies only, and by Hazlitt, Shakespeare's Jest Books. Hazlitt suppresses two which have "no point" and are "too gross for publication." Unhappily they are all without much point and about as gross! INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 407 ing in any conception of art. The good folk that laughed at them were both honest and dull, living plain homespun lives, and finding relish in the mistakes of their servants and jokes on farmers and tradesmen. These stories mirror a fat-witted contented world, without the elevation and emotional stress of high art, and equally removed from the debauchery that attended it in the Renaissance. This deduction seems sound from the fact that the majority of these are translations. Although largely taken from the humanistic Latin, yet as the source was unimportant to the compiler, they are drawn also from the Italian, the French, and the German. But as the French or German in turn had drawn from the Latin or the Italian, the question of the original authorship, or even the intermediary, becomes involved. And as the English translator took his own where he found it, and rewrote it for his English public, it is also difficult even to do more than point analogies.1 Yet it is certain that for some of the stories the German compilations constitute the immediate source. The criticism against the books of this first type would be that, as there is no connection between the anecdotes, the interest is not cumulative. Obviously a means of increasing the interest and of unifying the whole work would be to have all the anecdotes center about one personality. Whereas in the first type there would be three separate stories told of a butcher, a baker and a candlestick-maker respectively, the second step would be to have the same stories told, but all told of one person, the Parson of Kalenborowe, or Till Howleglas, or Skelton, or Scoggin, et al. Here each story becomes one manifestation of the hero's activity and thereby contributes to a comprehension of his character.2 Such an idea of unifying the whole might perhaps have come from the Renaissance versions of the medieval conflictus between Solomon and Marcolf. Originally this consisted in an interchange of antithetic gnomic sentences, but through the ages this antithesis was extended from the 1Herford notes certain of these. 2This method differs from the conventional framework of the novelle, where a party of men and women, each in rotation, tells a tale. By this means an apparent total unity is gained, although each story remains separate. As each story does remain separate, each is necessarily carefully developed, the length is increased, and much more conscious art is employed. 408 EARLY TUDOR POETRY opinions themselves to the characters of the men who uttered them. Solomon became representative of the court and Marcolf of the peasant, who indulges in coarse practical jokes. In this form in the Latin and the German it went through a large number of editions.' This type of the legend appears in English, the Dialogue or communing between the wise king Salomon and Marcolphus, translated from the Dutch and printed by Gerard Leeu of Antwerp.2 But also there was a French version in which Marcolf's rejoinders are always based upon the manners of prostitutes. And this was translated and printed by Pynson.3 Consequently in England there were not only the Latin copies accessible, but also two quite different versions in English. As the Renaissance has shifted the emphasis upon Marcolf, and as in this form the legend was so widely distributed, it is quite possible that this work played a part in the development. Whatever may be the hypothetical connection of the Salomon and Marcolf legend with the change that we are discussing, the main impulse can be clearly shown to have come from Germany. But whereas a reading knowledge of Latin and, to a less degree, French may be assumed for the English public of the sixteenth century, the same assumption may not be made for the Germanic dialects; in fact, although naturally the dialect would be familiar in proportion as it was spoken by those having trade connections with England, it was not generally read.4 Consequently with any German work, unlike the Latin, it is necessary first to show the intermediary. Fortunately this is found in the work of Jan van Doesborgh, printer at Antwerp between 1505(?) and 1530.5 From his press, between these dates, there are known twenty-nine definite issues. The remarkable feature of this list is, however, that fifteen of the items are of books printed in English, and still more remarkable is the fact that the books printed by this Dutchman in Antwerp are, not religious tracts as might be supposed, but 1 In Salomon and Saturn, London 1848, Kemble cites eighteen editions in the Latin alone, about 1500. Edited by E. Gordon Duff, 1892. 3 Eight characteristic stanzas are quoted by Kemble, op. cit., p. 92. 4This is evident from the rarity of words imported from the Teutonic dialects. 5 Here I am indebted to Robert Proctor's Jan van Doesborgh Printer at Antwerp. An Essay in Bibliography. London, 1894. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 409 pieces pertaining to general literature, such as a reprint of Caxton's Longer Accidence, Robin Hood, or the novel Euryalus and Lucretia of XEneas Sylvius Piccolomini. Most of them also are translations, and naturally nearly half, seven of the fifteen, are from the Dutch. The first, The Fifteen Tokens, is stated to have been translated by Van Doesborgh himself. It is clumsily done, and evidently by a foreigner. This is not true of most of the others. They were written, if not by an Englishman, by one certainly perfectly at home with the language. In this connection Proctor makes a fascinating suggestion that is unfortunately impossible to prove.1 In the prologue to the Wonderful Shape we are told that "Laurens andrewe of the towne of Calis haue translated for Johannes doesborowe booke prenter in the cite of Andwarp this present volume deuided in thre parts which was neuer before in no maternall langage prentyd tyl now." But we find this Laurence Andrewe in 1527 setting up himself as a printer in London on Fleet Street, at the Sign of the Golden Cross, where he printed five books, one of which is the debate between Somer and Winter.2 As Van Doesborgh printed six translations from the Dutch in the years 1518(?)-1520(?) Proctor suggests that Laurence Andrewe was his translator for at least five of them. Some color is given to this surmise from the fact that in the first of his books printed in England, a scientific work, he says:" After dyvers and sondry small volumes and tryfles of rnyrth and pastaunce som newly composed, some translated and of late finished, (I am) now mynded to exercise my pene in mater to the reder som what more profytable." 3 If there be truth in this conjecture it was the singular fortune of one man to be the chief channel through which Germanic literature entered England. Of the translations some are merely from Dutch versions of works in other literatures, and some clearly of only temporal interest. Frederick of Jennen, of which there were apparently at least three editions in England, purports to tell of a merchant's wife that lived disguised as a man. Mary of Nemmegen is still more interesting 1 Proctor, op. cit., 29. 2 Cf. p. 128. In connection with this suggestion it would be interesting to see whether the version of this old medieval conflictus did not come from the Dutch. 3 Quoted from Tedder's article in the D. N. B. 410 EARLY TUDOR POETRY in that the heroine was the paramour of the devil for seven years. There are two of these translations, however, that cannot be dismissed in this summary fashion. The Parson of Kalenborowe 1 is the famous German collection of tales of the tricky Pfarrer Vom Kahlenberg.2 It exists in a single copy and there was but one known edition. It is a curious fact that the book that was welcomed both in Germany and in France should have been so coldly received in England. Certainly that is not true of the other equally famous collection, namely the Eulenspiegel stories.3 This was printed in 1519(?) under the title Tyll Howleglas.4 Fifty years later it was reprinted, together with another of Doesborgh's publications, in three editions (1559-ca. 1563) 5 and is a literal reprint with the spelling and punctuation modernized.6 Here then we have a definite example of German influence. Doesborgh's volume was still vital after half a century and through Copland's reprinting became absorbed into Elizabethan life.7 1 There is some doubt whether this be an issue of Doesborgh's press. Proctor (op. cit., 35) says: "It is remarkable that with the exception of a single cut, none of the ornaments in this book are found in any other of Doesborgh's productions at present known." Brie notes (op. cit., 5, note 4). "Ich selbst hege starke Zweifel, ob das Buch (einziges Exemplar in der Bodl. Library) iiberhaupt aus der Presse Doesborgh's geflossen ist, wie mir auch Proctor selbst seiner Sache nicht recht sicher zu sein scheint." 2The name of the parson gave the word calembour to the French language. According to the N. E. D. it does not appear in English until 1830. 3 This in turn gave French the word espibglerie which was not introduced into English until Walter Scott. 4 The only remaining fragment has been reprinted by Brie (op. cit., 1261-38). 6 This dating, taken from Brie (op. cit., 9), is based on the typographical peculiarities. 6 Reprinted by Frederic Ouvry in 1867 in a very small edition. He combines two imperfect copies. To illustrate the close similarity I shall quote the beginning of the wine-drawer episode in each version. Doesborgh (quoted from Brie op. cit., 130) " On a tyme came Howleglas to Lubeke where is very strayght Justyce And whyle yt Howleglas was there abydynge he harde tell of a wyne drawer yt was in a Lordes seller that was very prowde and presumtyouse and sayd that there was no man that culde deseyve hym or passe hym in wysdome..." Copland (quoted from Ouvry op. cit., 52). "On a time came Howleglas to Lubeke, where is very straight Justice, & the while that Howleglas was then abidin, he herd tell of a wine drawer that was in a lordes seler, that was very proud and presumptuous. And it was sayd that there was no man that could deceiue him nor passe him in wisdom..." 7 In the Bodleian copy, facsimiled by Ouvry, is a curious illustration of this in INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 411 Because the Howleglas was so much read, because it is the best example of the type of literature introduced by Laurence Andrewe(?), and lastly because it is merely the precursor of others, an analysis of the book is here necessary.1 The book purports to be a compilation of the knavishness and falseness of one Howleglas, who died in 1350.2 It begins with his christening "in the land of Sassen, in the vyllage of Ruelnige," gives an anecdote of him as a child, as a boy, and as a lad, all in his native village. His mother was glad that he was "so sottele and wyse" as he had apparently shown himself in the previous tales, and suggests that he be apprenticed to a craft. But "Howleglas would euer fare well and make good cheare but he would not work." He leaves home to wander through Europe from the Baltic to Rome to avoid labor. If hired, he plays some motiveless practical joke that causes him to resume his wanderings. In this phase the usual method is to execute the orders given him by his master literally. The shoemaker, for example, tells him to cut the leather for shoes "little and great, as the swineherd did drive his beastes," with the result that Howleglas cuts the leather in the shape of the feet of beasts; when told to sew the shoes, the great with the small, he sews them altogether; when told to cut the shoes on one last, he cuts all the leather for shoes of the left foot. He thus wins his discharge. Sometimes there seems the form of a note. As I cannot decipher it, I quote Herford's Reading (op. cit., 288, note). "This Howleglasse, with Skoggin, Skelton and Lazarillo, given to me at London, of Mr. Spensar, XX. Dec. 1578, on condition that I would bestowe the reading of them on or before the first of January immediately ensuing; otherwise to forfeit unto him my Lucian in fower volumes, whereupon I was the rather induced to trifle away so many howers as were idely overpassed in running thorowgh the foresaid foolish bookes; wherein me thought that not all fower togither seemed comparable for false and crafty feates with Jon Miller, whose witty shiftes and practices are reported among Skelton's Tales." Collier, who discovered it, recognised it as the handwriting of Gabriel Harvey and thought it alluded to the poet Spenser. I can do no better than quote Herford's comment: "In any case it is a contemporary testimony, of some interest, assuming of course that it is genuine,-a proviso never quite superfluous where Collier is concerned." 1 For a discussion of the place of the English version in the whole Eulenspiegel cycle, see Brie, op. cit., 47-68. The discussion of the relation of the English to the German version of Murner (?) is irrelevant here. 2 The historicity of the character does not concern us here. I am using the Ouvry reprint of the Copland on the assumption that it fairly correctly supplements the fragment of Doesborgh. 412 EARLY TUDOR POETRY to be some motive, that he is underfed, or in some way feels abused, or is promised a reward, but often the prank seems to be done for the pleasure of it. As after each performance he changes his situation, all classes of society from the duke to the peasant, from the pope to the priest, pass in review. And after a lifetime of practical joking, he dies and perpetrates his last prank by his will. The avowed object of the collection was to promote merriment. As Preface states it: "This fable is not but only to renewe ye mindes of men or women, of all degrees from ye use of sadnesse to passe the tyme, with laughter or myrthe, And for because ye simple knowyng persones shuld beware if folkes can see. Me thinke it is better no (to?) passe the tyme with suche a mery Jeste and laughe there at and doo no synne: than for to wepe and do synne." The very characters are represented as being highly amused and full of admiration. "And when that the(y) knewe it then they returned home laughing, and praised greatly ye falsenes and suttelty of howleglas." 1 Now, of all forms of literary composition, works intended for humor are not the least characteristic of the race and age. In the other forms the writer may preserve a false appearance; though ignorant, with a little skill he may appear learned, though vulgar, he may ape elegance, and though base, he may preach morality. And the reader, too, may buy the book from a thousand motives. But when a man laughs he loses control of himself, he flings dignity to the winds and shows his own hidden nature. From this point of view the Howleglas becomes extraordinarily interesting, both for what it contains and for what it omits. In comparison with similar collections of the Latin countries it is strikingly free from the erotic appeal. In the Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles a large proportion of the stories turn upon the erotic where man is frankly the hunter and woman his game. But the Eulenspiegel came to England originally from the Low Countries and in the English version at least bears witness to a sturdy morality.2 The English is not at all obscene. But on the other hand it is incredibly and indescribably filthy. A large number of the anecdotes are scatological. Whatever point there may be seems to consist in the delight in presenting coprolitic detail. In Mackenzie's edition (1860) the 1 The press work in the Copland editions is abominable. 2 Cf. pp. 17-18. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 413 editor speaks of his interest in "the humourous quips and quiddities of the strolling vagabond," but later he confesses to a special duty "viz., that of purification and modification, for it may readily be believed that a book written of the fourteenth century, for the sixteenth century, would abound with homely wit, not quite consonant with the ideas of the nineteenth." But there is no question here of time; it is a question of culture. There are classes today who greet such anecdotes with approving roars, but they are not to be found among the most cultured. So the natural deduction is that in the sixteenth century such classes formed a large percentage of the readers. Rude and boisterous, the life deadened their sensibilities. Their nerves required strong stimulus to cause them to react. Stink is a good old English word that is now banished from polite society, together with the conditions it implies. Both the word and the fact, as is shown by the Howleglas, were in good standing in the sixteenth century. But they are not "immoral;" it is "healthy" dirt. On the other hand, if they lack the cynical acuteness of the novella or the naughty cleverness of the conte, it must also be confessed that they lack equally the narrative art of either. The form, the expression, and the substance all alike point to a coarse, uncultivated age. Written as these stories were solely for merriment, I fail to see any satire in them. Yet clearly they approach satire. The story, for example, where the crowd collects to see Howleglas fly from the roof of the town-hall only to be told that they are fools to believe an impossibility, or the one of the painting invisible to all except those of pure birth,' may be so construed, but, when read in connection with the others, the satire seems merely a bye-product.2 It is almost invariably associated with this type of work. The unconscious effort of the author of the Eulenspiegel is to achieve humor by showing reality. To do this he paints humanity in its weakness, and stresses the frailty. Consequently the tone is mordant and the scene disgusting. There is no elevation, there is no 1 This has been retold by Hans Christian Andersen. 2 This at least is my interpretation even in those stories dealing with the Church. They were written long before the Reformation. Consequently when Howleglas plays his prank upon the priest and his maiden or palms off an imitation relic, there is no indignation at the state of affairs, but an attempt to extract humor from accepted conditions. 414 EARLY TUDOR POETRY thrill in the reading and there is no desire to imitate. While the chivalric romance may be absurd, there is a fine side to its absurdity. On the other hand, while this presentation of life may be disgusting, at least it does not shock. Exactly the same point of view may be brought out by a comparison of the Dutch painters. A drunkard by Jan Steen is not ennobling, and there is no satiric effort on the part of the painter, but at least he has caught the vital humanity. Or, to illustrate again, compare the possible treatment of such a subject as the capture of Ganymede by the eagle with that by Rembrandt. The painter might have chosen to bring out the sheer beauty of the male form against the eagle's feathers, or he might have developed repugnant eroticism; actually Rembrandt's Ganymede, in defiance of all mythology, is a baby,-an utterly terrified baby caught up by an eagle. And to show the terror is added an unnecessary touch of realism. It is this love for detail, so often repugnant, and so often vital, that distinguishes the Dutch School, and that has caused such diversity of critical opinion. Exactly the same condition is brought into English literature by the translation of Howleglas. As such, it by no means lacks importance. At a time when literature under the chivalric tradition presented a life ideal, but out of sympathy with the needs of the age, and when Petrarchan refinement was imposed upon a brutal society,l here men found conditions portrayed with perfect frankness and with perfect good humor. It is life seen from the under side. Thus it contrasts sharply with the dreamy idealism of Hawes and the Platonic mysticism of Wyatt, and acts as a needed tonic. Literature was brought down to earth by this brand made in Germany. The Howleglas thus performs the function of modern realism. Brie is correct in terming it the first realistic novel in English.2 One personality dominates the whole. Occasional minor characters reappear. Except that the short chapters remain undeveloped, there is a structural similarity to the picaresque rogue stories. It, therefore, is the germ from which much later sprang the novel of indefinite number of incidents, held together by the bond of having a single hero,-such as Pickwick Papers. Of course it is the germ only, but it took vigorous hold. During the second half of the cen1 Henry's love letters to Anne Boleyn show no Platonism. 2 Brie, op. cit., 72. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 415 tury a number of similar collections appeared, the merry tales of Skelton, of Scoggin, of George Peele, of Tarleton, of Will Sommers, etc., etc. that bear witness to the popularity of the type. Whether or not this genre might not have arisen spontaneously, is beside the question; the fact is that both in conception and form it came to England from Germany. In reviewing as a whole the influence of the Germanic peoples upon the English of the first half of the sixteenth century, among the many vague and shadowy forms only two stand out with definiteness and distinction, Luther and the anonymous author of the Eulenspiegel. The first impression of this union of Luther and Eulenspiegel is one of horrified amazement. It seems sacrilege to place them thus side by side, that there can be no quality common to them both, that it is a paradox. A second thought, however, gives one pause. Each in utterly different spheres was trying to present the truth as he saw it. Before this, all distinctions of caste and rank were as nothing. Money and reputation were not considered. Each is, therefore, eminently virile. They lack the grace of ornament and the power of phrase, academic distinctions of form to such men seem trifling. They care only for the essential. And, therefore, their readers to a large measure come from the same class. Foxe's martyrs may be imagined taking their pleasure in the rough foolery of the Howleglas, for there they would find the same defiance of convention and the same hatred of sham. The comparison must not be pushed far, but there is a side in which there is a similarity,-at least the reader feels that they belong to the same nation. And this common quality, love of truth, or courage of conviction,-call it what you will-is the distinguishing mark of the influence of Germany on Tudor Eng land. With Spain and Germany, as the investigator unconsciously assumes that there will be no influence upon England, the danger is that he will lose sight of what there is; in the case of France, the danger is exactly the opposite, for of all the nations that have affected England during her history France easily takes first place. This is true also in the literary relationship. Literary movements have so often crossed the channel, that the student of English must reckon with France. No student of Pope can ignore Boileau and no student of Hugo can forget Shakespeare. And in these 416 EARLY TUDOR POETRY literary exchanges it is usually France that has the advantage. Particularly is this true as we go back to the early times. Chaucer acknowledged a debt to the French, while his influence upon the French is almost negligible. The idea that in France we find the starting point for Tudor culture comes therefore inevitably.1 The first reason for such a conception is to be found in the juxtaposition of the two countries. When Brittany was joined to the French crown by the marriage of Charles with Anne in 1491, the French coast paralleled that of England for six hundred miles. Of the three countries that geographically bound England, the question of Irish influence may be dismissed. By Tudor England, Ireland was thought of very much as our grandfathers thought of the Great West. English government and English law reigned spasmodically in the Pale; beyond that was a wilderness of savages. The time was not yet when even the Irish race was familiar with its own literary heritage, and that English literature should ever receive inspiration from the Gaelic would have seemed to them incredible. Even Spenser in Ireland always turns his face toward England. Although to a much less degree, the same situation holds in regard to Scotland. The traditional enmity between the two countries, which had been covered by the marriage of Margaret Tudor, the sister of Henry VIII, to James the Fourth, flamed again at Flodden Field. And the incessant forays on the Border, while giving subject matter for ballads, merely intensified the general feeling. The two countries were separated by a sort of no-man's land. And as in addition English culture tended more amd more to center at the court which was situated at London, Scotland was very far away. Moreover the Scottish writers, Henryson, Dunbar, or Gawin Douglas, however individually brilliant, represent derivatives from Chaucer. As such they brought no new impulse into English, and in cases of similarity represent common inheri1Sir Sidney Lee (The French Renaissance in England, 1910) has brilliantly expounded this view, so brilliantly in fact that his work is not quite trustworthy. His enthusiasm leads him to see a Frenchman hiding behind every bush. It must be remembered that conditions in the last half of the century were different from those in the first half, and that therefore statements true of the second half do not hold for the first. And it may well be that his extensive Shakespearean studies have thus prevented him from considering early Tudor literature impartially. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 417 tance rather than literary interchange.1 Consequently the nearest neighbor to Tudor England lay across the Channel. And, although the small vessels were unsafe for long journeys, travel by water was then much more commodious, more expeditious and less dangerous. Naturally from all the English ports to the corresponding ones on the French side there was a continual va-etvient. Still more, through the whole of this period (1346-1558) the English owned Calais. Here in times of peace, and especially in times of war, was a port of entry. A large English garrison was stationed there, the commander of which, such as Lord Berners, had the leisure to translate French books. Consequently, from the very nature of the geographical relations of the two countries, the connection was intimate. From this geographical situation a close historical relationship naturally follows. This is so obvious that it needs no insistence. The battles of Crecy and Poitiers and Agincourt became national glories; on the French side, equally, Jeanne d'Arc the popular national heroine. To Tudor England a foreign war meant the invasion of France. And it is this possibility of the invasion of France that is the keynote to the foreign policy of the period. England's value to Spain lay in this ability to hamper France; to France, that it freed her from the danger to her rear when she was engaged with Spain. Consequently both the Tudor kings led expeditions across the Channel, and both threatened many more than they led. There were countless embassies to discuss state policies. Gorgeously gowned envoys passed from capital to capital. Of these the most striking is the celebrated interview between Francis I and Henry VIII in 1520, the "Field of the Cloth of Gold." However futile from a political standpoint may have been that meeting, or other functions that differed from it only in degree and in gorgeousness, they must have served to bring the great retinues of the contracting parties into close contact socially. A large proportion of the English court must at some time have been in France and have known Frenchmen personally. An event, such as the marriage of Mary Tudor, the sister of Henry VIII, to Louis XII of France, affected many more than the bride. Not the least of these was one young woman destined 1 Brie, Skelton-studien, op. cit., feels that he has shown a connection between Skelton and Dunbar. 418 EARLY TUDOR POETRY to play a conspicuous role in the history and consequently the literature of England, Anne Boleyn. With her alone in mind there can be no question of the reality of French influence! Much less dramatic than the career of Anne Boleyn, but much more important in a discussion of the influence of French literature upon the English, is the early history of the Duke of Richmond, who in 1485 became Henry the Seventh. At the time of his assumption of the English crown, he was twenty-eight. Of these twenty-eight years the last fourteen, half his life up to that time and those years the formative half, had been spent as an exile at the courts of Brittany and of France. Leaving England at the age of fourteen he had thus passed the whole of his young manhood under French influence. Naturally as during this period his eyes were turned always toward England these years did not make him a Frenchman; equally naturally, however, they did predispose him in favor of the French language and French literature. This condition was recognized by Bacon.1 He was rather studious than learned; reading, for the most part, books wrote in French. Yet he understood Latin, as appears from hence, that Cardinal Hardian, and others who were well acquainted with French, yet always wrote to him in Latin. This judgment seems to be borne out by facts. Although Hawes was Groom of the Chamber, the chief court writer seems to have been Bernard Andre, at least if judged by the payments made to him,2 and he seems to have been the official historiographer.3 Andre is the blind French writer who is the only contemporary authority for the history of the period. He seems to have also taught at Oxford, and was the recipient of several pensions. His French poems have all disappeared, except one incorporated in the body of his Latin annals, and perhaps the anonymous Les douze 1 Francis Bacon's King Henry VII. 2 On New Year's Day 1506 he was given 100 shillings, a gift that was repeated annually until 1521. 3 The title of his Life of Henry VII reads Bernardi Andreae Tholosatis Poetae Laureati, Regii Historiographi.. Memorials of King Henry the Seventh, ed. by James Gairdner in the Rolls Series. Speed is the first to make the confusion between the academic degree of poet laureate in the case of Andr6 with the moder office. All it means is that, like Skelton, he had taken the degree of poet laureate. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 419 triomphes de Henry VII. Consequently these two are interesting as examples of the sort of literature encouraged at court. The same trend toward French is to be seen in Henry's employment of Roger Machado on the embassy to Spain and Portugal, when the reports were written in French. And also his extensive patronage of the Parisian printer Verard is a confirmatory detail. All this merely tells what we should have deduced from Henry's personal history. His long residence on the continent, as one would expect, gave him both facility in reading the French language and an interest in French literature. And equally naturally such an interest would have affected the court circles. The particular person in the court circle primarily affected by this semi-French influence was the most influential one of the coming generation, Prince Henry, Duke of York. Andre was the tutor to his brother Arthur, and may perhaps also have instructed him. In any case Henry was brought up with a speaking knowledge of French.1 More to the point he apparently essayed French verse.2 To judge from the specimens that survive there is no likelihood of his having been a French poet; but the main point is that he had the inclination. When a king writes French verse it is a safe assumption that the courtiers follow suit. Thus there must have been considerable French verse produced at the Court. Cornysshe, the Master of the Royal Chapel, has two poems. And there was a fashion of working in French lines as refrains, and French phrases. Apparently this literary mannerism reflects only the actual habits of the age. The personal rivalry between Henry and Francis showed itself in magnificent embassies in which great numbers participated. Wolsey went to France with a train of six hundred. To build the meeting place of the Field of the Cloth of Gold three thousand workmen were sent from England, and practically the whole court attended the ceremony. A fair proportion of the inhabitants of London, not merely of the Court, must have been familiar to some extent with the French language by having heard it spoken in France. Therefore it is with no surprise that we read that at the entertainment of the French ambassadors the ladies 1 Cf. p. 44. 2 In Anglia 12, 231 Ewald FlUgel has published the so-called "royal manuscript" (Add. MS. 31922, British Museum), in which are found two French songs by Henry himself. 420 EARLY TUDOR POETRY dancing with the strangers spoke French.1 A quarter of a century later Nisander Nucius states: "Les Anglois se servant presque tous du langage franCois."2 This is certainly an exaggeration. But without multiplying illustrations ad nauseam, it seems certain that French was quite generally known, probably very much as it is today, in England. It was considered as a polite accomplishment. But whereas today French is paired with German, then it was paramount. After Latin, a speaking and reading knowledge of which was essential to an educated gentleman, French without any doubt was the foreign language best known. The most obvious proof of this assertion is to be found in the language used in the writing of the time. According to the precepts of Medieval Latin, it will be remembered,3 the introduction of a word from a foreign language was regarded as an ornament. Scholastically of course such words were drawn from the Latin, but in court circles a large number were taken from the French. Thus Cavendish, for example, uses such phrases as "for his depeche" 4 "their hault brags," 5 although it seemed to others very "difficile" 5 and "puissant army." 5 With him the substitution of a French word for its English equivalent imparts a noticeable piquancy to his style. His mannerism is the more interesting because there is no exigency due to the difficulties of meter or rime. The French words are used for their own sakes. It is allowable therefore to assume that in the poetry much the same is true. When Skelton, for example, says 6 Your brethe yt ys so felle And so puauntely dothe smelle, And so haynnously doth stynke... he is consciously contrasting the elegant French with the homely English for a comic effect. This use of French to express social distinction may perhaps be better illustrated by Barclay since we have the Latin originals for his Eclogues. AEneas Sylvius is discussing the fine white wheaten bread served to the master.7 panem ante dominum niveum ac molli siligine factum aspicies... 1 Cavendish, Life of Wolsey, op. cit., 88. 4 Op. cit., 7. 2 Travels, Camden Society, 13. 6 Op. cit., 15. 3 Cf. section 4, p. 137. 6 Skelton, op. cit., 1, 124. 7 Barclay, Eclogues, i, 863, 865. For these illustrations I am indebted to Dr. J. R. Schultz, who has prepared an edition of the Eclogues. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 421 But for this bread there was no English equivalent. When thou beholdest before thy lorde pein mayne.. If thou our manchet dare handle.. Still more curious is his line 1 For lyse, for fleas, punaises, myse and rattes... Evidently the bed-bug had not yet been domesticated in England. Clearly for certain nouns the French word was accepted, just as for the table set by the king the usual term was bouche, or as Skelton spells it, bowge. This does not show that the individual was importing new words; the custom is too general. For certain things either unknown in England, or associated with France, the French expression was taken over bodily; other expressions were current, when for variety or elegance the French was preferred to the English. In other words, the condition then was similar to that today. We use chauffeur or garage because the automobile was first perfected in France, and we also use joie de vivre, bon voyage, and respondez s'il vous plait for cultural or social reasons. The great difference then and now lies in the fact that our vocabulary draws upon so many languages, while then of the modern languages French was vastly predominant. And it is to be remarked that, in contrast to the importations from. the Latin, the French words have failed to maintain their place. Either the condition that caused them has disappeared, or the fashion changed. Consequently the vocabulary of the first half of the sixteenth century seems to a modern reader curiously Gallic. As such, it testifies to the continual intercommunication between the two countries. Up to this point our researches have yielded definite results. But when we come to discuss the effect of French literature upon the literature of England, the clarity yields place to confusion. Theoretically in literature also, French influence should be at least as evident as it is in the Chaucerian period, or in the Restoration. Actually it is not. And the first reason why it is not is due to the fact that the contemporary French literature itself was not unified. There was no dominant critical theory with a definite propaganda, as later is to be found in the Pleiade, in Malherbe, or in Boileau. In France, as in England, it was a period of transition, during which at least three completely different types of 1 Barclay, op. cit. 3, 78. 422 EARLY TUDOR POETRY poetry existed side by side, though not in harmony. And at least two of the three affected the English. The first of these three types of poetry corresponds to that developed in England by the scholastic tradition. In the discussion of that 1 there was an attempt to show the development of the Medieval Latin influence upon early English poetry, because, owing to the change in the language, there was no literary continuity. The effect of these theories upon English so far as the present purpose is concerned, was for a comparatively brief period. But in France there was no such break. A theory of poetic composition naturally similar to the theories of the Medieval Latin was gradually formed, by Deschamps, by Montmerque-Didot and by Baudet Herenc. With the growing stability of the monarchy under Louis XI, it would be natural to suppose that there would be an increase in literary output and an increased interest in literary theory. Therefore it is not surprising to find Verard printing such works.2 In 1493 he issued the Art et science de rhethorique by Henri de Croy(?) and in 1500-1503 the Jardin de Plaisance etfleur de Rethoricque by an unknown, who signs himself L'Infortune. This last was reprinted in 1504. Then in 1521 Fabri published Le Grand et Vrai Art de Pleine Rhetorique, in which the last two are drawn upon.3 This in turn went through six editions. In Fabri, then, will be found the most complete exposition of the theory of the regular school, previous to Marot, Les grands rhetoriqueurs, Meschinot, Molinet, Cretin, Jean Marot, and LeMaire de Belge. Here this type had developed much farther than the corresponding form in England. The emphasis originally laid upon form had turned poetic composition into a game of verbal ingenuity. Brunetiere thus questions them: 4 Already prosaic with Alain Chartier, poetry with these writers becomes pretentiously didactic. Were they alive to the fact themselves; and, being unable to make their poetry beautiful, was it for this reason that they made it "artificial" by overloading it with infinite complications and regrettable ornament? 1 Chapter III. 2 These bibliographical details are taken from Antoine Verard by John Macfarlane, printed for the Bibliographical Society, London 1900. 3 This has been edited with an introduction, notes and glossary by A. Heron, Rouen, 1890. 4 Manual of the History of French Literature by Ferdinand Brunetiere, authorized translation by Ralph Derechef, p. 32. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 423 The answer to the question is No! What Brunetiere considers ornament, to them was the essential. Fabri gives elaborate rules by which pleasing verbal curiosities may be produced. As a heading to his chapter De plusieurs sortes de rithme, he lists rithme leonine, rithme croisee, rithme enchainee, rithme de basse enchaineure, anadiplosis ou gradation, epanalepsis, rithme entrelachee, rithme annexe, rithme couronnee, rithme basse couronnee, and rithme retrograde. Clearly it is the form and not the content that is the object; that is, the writer did not desire to write a poem on Spring in the form basse enchaineure, but he chose to write a poem in the form basse enchaineure and the subject was immaterial. As Fabri was judge at the great poetic competitions held at Rouen, his point of view must be accepted as that commonly held. In such competitions, held in the various literary centers, clearly it was verbal dexterity that won the prize. Or in the numerous boutsrimes, where the test consisted in composing a poem with all the riming words given, the same is true. But clearly this represents a stage more advanced than that in England. Compared to this elaboration the English writers are mere tyros. Nor is there much possibility of French influence. The English scholastics normally went back to the Medieval Latin; these French subtleties were beyond them.' Consequently for the first part of Tudor literature This is certainly true for the writers of the rime equivoque, such as Cretin, Jean Marot, and even Clement Marot in some of his early work. In poems of this type the riming words are identical in sound, but differ in sense,-a trick in English called a pun and used only for humor. In these men the pun became the basic principle of verse. Cretin "souverain Poete Frangois," writes to the Bishop of Glandeves (Les Poesies de Guillaume Cretin, Paris 1723, p. 245), Si les escriptz que bons amys transmettent De moys en moys, & d'an en aultre an mettent, Amour au cueurs de ceulx oil sont transmis Pose encore qu' on y eut quatre ans mys; Quant Poste arrive, & porte erre ncuvelle, L'affection, sans doubter, renouvelle, Et au recueil n'entend, fors de viser L'amy pensant A l'amy diviser, Si que souvent en visitant la lettre, Visiblement cuyde avoir l'oeil a l'estre De sa presence, & croit ouyr le son Du sien parler, qui retient pour legon. etc. 424 EARLY TUDOR POETRY the influence of French rhetorical poetry may be regarded as negligible. The second type of poetry persisting in France in the early years of the sixteenth century is the allegorical poem. The great mediJean Marot also has poems of this sort (Oeuvres de Clement Marot et Augmentees avec les Ouvrages de Jean Marot son Pere... A la Haye 1731, Vol. 5, p. 286.): Faux detracteurs A langues de lezars, Qui de mesdire scavez trop bien les ars Pensez en vous, & vous trouverez que estes Piresque nous, si bien faictes les questes: Trop le demonstre vostre cueur faulx & lasche, Qui sans cesser de mesdire ne lasche Vous qui deussiez nostre honneur maintenir A nous blasmer voulez la main tenir Contre raison, car les droitz n'ont permis Que nostre honneur soit de vous apart mis... This desire for identity in sound led to the employment of the triple rime, so characteristic of LeMaire. And the importance of this is that these writers are the immediate predecessors and models of the brilliant Clement Marot as he tells us himself. In Complainte V, dated 1543, the famous old Gallic poets are: Adonques Molinet Aux vers fleuris, le grave Chastellain, Le bien disant en rithme et prose Alain, Les deux Grebans, au bien resonnant stile, Octavian, A la veine gentile, Le bon Cretin aux vers equivoque, Ton Jehan le Maire, entre eulx hault colloqu6, Et moy, ton pre.... The natural result was that his early work shows their influence. In his Epistre au Roy (dated by Guiffrey toward the end of 1517 or the beginning of 1518) he shows what he can do: En m'esbatant ie fay rondeaulx en rithme, Et en rithmant, bien souuent ie m'enrime: Brief, c'est pitie d'entre vous, rithmailleurs, Car vous trouuez assez de rithme ailleurs, Et quand vous plaist mieulx que moy rithmassez: Des biens auez & de la rithme assez: Mais moy, atout ma rithme & ma rithmaille, le ne soustiens (dont ie suy marry) maille. Or ce me dit (un iour) quelcque rithmart; Viens Ca, Marot, trouues tu en rithme art Qui serue aux gens, toy qui a rithmasse? Ouy vrayement (respond ie), Henry Mac.... Guiffrey's ed.3, 21. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 425 eval representative of this is, of course, the Roman de la Rose. From this as a convenient parent may be traced a formal literary tradition in both countries.' Naturally there is a strong resemblance between these literary cousins, and still more naturally the French poem would lend itself to translation. And, since the general type was common to both languages, it needed only slight adaptation to make the translation read like an original English work. That this is not mere hypothesis is shown by the history of the Castle of Labour.2 Freed from assumptions, the facts are these. In his epigram A un Nomme Charon he has an example of rime enchainee (quant le terme equiuoque termine une ligne et iceluy terms equiuoquement pris recommence la prochaine ligne, Fabri, 2, 41): Mets voille au vent, single vers nous, Charon, Car on t'attend: puis quand seras en tente, Tant et plus boy bonum vinum charun, Qu'aurons pour vray: donques (sans longue attente) Tente tes piedz a si decente sente Sans te fascher, mais en sois content, tant Qu'en ce faisant nous le soyons autant. It seems quite clear that as the art in work, of which these are examples, is purely verbal, it is not capable of translation. On the other hand the root of the mannerism is to be found in the Medieval Latin (ante, pages 124 ff). Consequently, when in Tottel (132) we find the poem, The lenger lyfe, the more offence: The more offence, the greater payn: The greater payn, the lesse defence: The lesse defence, the lesser gayn. The losse of gayn long yll doth trye: Wherefore come death, and let me dye. The shorter life, lesse count I fynde: The lesse account, the sooner made: The count soon made, the meryer minde: The mery minde doth thought euade. Short lyfe in truth this thing doth trye: Wherefore come death, and let me dye.. it seems an attempt to apply the old rules rather than copy the French. The characteristic punning of the French verse is here completely lacking. 1 Cf. pp. 60 ff. for the English development. 2 The Castell of Labour, translated from the French of Pierre Gringoire by Alexander Barclay, reprinted in facsimile from Wynkyn de Worde's Edition of 1506 with the French text of 31 March, 1501 and an introduction by Alfred W. Pollard-Edinburgh-Privately printed for presentation to the Members of the Roxburghe Club, 496 EARLY TUDOR POETRY In October, 1499, a re-working of a fourteenth century poem, Bruyant's Le Chemin de Povrete et de Richesse, was published by Simon Vostre and printed by Philippe Pigouchet. This is signed in the first verse of the last speech of the Acteur by Gringoire. This was reprinted 31 December, 1499, 31 May, 1500, and 5 November, 1500, by Jacques le Forestier at Rouen. Thus at the opening of the century there were three Parisian editions and one at Rouen. In the next Parisian edition, 31 March, 1500-1, between the prologue and the poem proper is inserted a long interpolation, (lines 74-655), describing the education of the hero. Antoine Verard, who had already enjoyed the patronage of the English Court, brought out an English translation of this popular French poem, the Castle of Labour.l This was reprinted in London by Pynson (c. 1505), by Wynkyn de Worde 1506, and again by de Worde (c. 1510).2 The poem then was exceedingly popular with five editions in the original French and four in the English translation. So far we are dealing with facts. Unhappily that is as far as the facts carry us! The English version by Verard is both undated and unsigned. For the date there is one indication. The long interpolation, (lines 74-655), although the translation is usually close, in the English edition is omitted. The probable inference is that it was made from one of the first four of the French editions, i. e. before 31 March 1500-01, but it is inferential, because considerations of which we know nothing may have dictated the omission. If it be true, it places the date of composition not later than the year 1500. This date practically rules out Alcock as a possible author as he died that year.3 That a French poem published as late as October, 1499, should have reached an English bishop, be translated by him as he was dying, and be returned to France, while not impossible, yet requires proof before it be accepted. The other claimant is Alexander Barclay. Bale 1905. Sixty copies only printed. One is torn between gratitude towards the Roxburghe Club that their publications are printed at all, and irritation that the editions are so limited that copies are almost inaccessible. The fragments were identified by Mr. E. Gordon Duff. 2 In the article on Alcock, D. N. B. Professor Mullinger mentions an edition by de Worde 1536; this must be a misprint for 1506. 3 Professor Mullinger (article Alcock D. N. B.) states this on the authority of Cooper, Athenw (Cantabrigiensis, ed. 1858, Vol. 1, pp. 3-4. I do not know Cooper's authority. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 427 lists it among his works without comment or question. And Pollard's attitude -'The attribution of the translation to him rests on the statement of Bale, which there is no reason to doubt'expresses the consensus of scholarly opinion.2 Yet a doubt arises from the implication of his own words. In his dedication of the Ship of Fools, 'translated the yere of our Lorde god, M.ccccc.viii,' he says:'Opus igitur tue paternitati dedicaui: meorum primicias laborum qui in lucem eruperunt'-a statement that, if he were the author of a poem which had just gone through four editions, would be a gratuitous falsehood, unexplainable by any lapse of memory. Moreover, as he was at that time serving as chaplain to the Thomas Cornish 3 to whom the Ship of Fools is dedicated, such falsification for the purpose of flattery would be a somewhat dangerous proceeding. On the other hand, Bale's method in compiling his lists is seen in his autograph notebook,4 taking the items which he gathered from various sources and then striking ou* apparent duplicates. The uncritical nature of this process in the case of Barclay is shown by the fact that in the final result the Eclogues appear four times as four separate works. That Barclay was the author of the Castle of Labour is given in only one of the original lists. Therefore in opposition to Barclay's own statement this attribution rests upon the unsupported authority of "Ioannes Alen," of whom we know nothing but that he is twice labelled "a painter." So far as the external evidence of Barclay's authorship be concerned, it is almost negligible. Internal evidence is, of course, a more difficult question, since the poem is a translation, quite exact when the difficulty of transferring a complicated stanza-form from French to English is considered. That is what is done here. The rime scheme of the original is what is called in English the "Monk's Tale" stanza, from Pollard, op. cit., xxxvii. 2 Bale has been followed by Dempster, Pitts, Wood, Warton, the Biographia Britannica, Herbert Ames and Dibdin, Jusserand, Ward (in the D. N. B.) and by the last edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica. Thomas Cornish had been Provost of Oriel College, Oxford, 1492/3-1507, and Suffragan to Richard Fox and Hugh Oldham, Bishops of Bath and Wells, with the title Bishop of Tyne 1486-1513. According to the Preface it is on account of the latter dignity that the Ship of Fool. was dedicated to him. 4 Index Britannia Scriptorum, Oxford, 1902. 428 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Chaucer's use of it there.' The lines are octosyllabic. In both these respects the translator has followed his original. Naturally although he is unable to preserve all in the French poem, he makes a loyal attempt. The first two stanzas may be cited to show his method. Cotemplant vng soir a par moy Euz d'ung prouerbe souuenance, Que qui met vng fol a par soy II pence de luy sans doubtance, Et lors me vint en remembrancePensant a plusieurs dignitezQue l'homme qui a suffisance Met hors de son cueur vanitez. Vous congnoissez bien que ieunnesse Est tres dangereuse a passer; L'ung vit en ioye et en liesse, L'aultre taiche biens amasser. On voit le ieune trespasser Comme le vieil; mort nul ne lache, Pour nostre cas bien compasser. Aussi tost meurt veau comme vache. In musynge an euenynge with me was none An olde prouerbe came in me subuenaunce A naturall foole in a house alone Wyl make for hymself shyft or cheuysaunce Than came in to my remembraunce A cyrcunspect of many dygnytees Fro whiche a man hauynge suffysaunce Withdraweth his herte as fro vanytees It is ay sene that youthes lustynesse For to subdue is harde and daungerous Some lyue in ioye/ pleasure and gladnesse Fortune to some is ryght contraryous Some dethe tacheth in theyr estate prosperous Whome he ouerthroweth with his mortall blast Thus goeth the worlde/ none is so curous But other must he dye fyrst or last. A comparison of these two passages shows clearly that the translator aims to transfer not only the stanza-form and the line, but 1A curious fatality has followed this poem! It is invariably described, if at all, as having been written in seven-lined stanzas. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 429 even, when possible, the very words.1 But this is very different from Barclay's manner as we know it from works definitely his.2 If this poem were certainly proved to be his work, it would be an interesting speculation why he so completely changed his theory of translation; as the external evidence is, on the contrary, slight, such a change argues only that John Allen was mistaken, and after him Bale, Dempster, Pitts, Wood, etc., etc. There can be no doubt that Barclay is not the translator of the Castle of Labour. But with the phantom Barclay laid to rest, the real question comes to the fore, what is the significance of this poem as an illustration of the influence of French literature upon the English. To answer this requires a brief analysis. The ego of the poem, while his wife is asleep beside him in bed, is visited by worries, Poverty, Necessity, Distress, Thought, Heaviness, Discomfort, etc., each personified. A beautiful lady, Reason, puts them to flight, and tells him how to rout them. Then Wisdom comes to give him good advice. Eventually he brings with him Good Heart, Good Will, and Lust To Do Good. They lead him to Business, who guides him to the Castle of Labour, after meeting Pain and Cure. After working in the Castle, he returns to upbraid his wife, first because she was asleep and secondly because she was of no account anyway. Such is the substance of the poem. From this digest we are at once conscious of the medieval quality of the poem. As a matter of fact the version by Gringoire is only a re-working of the poem written by Jehan Bruyant in 1342.3 The story seems medieval, for the excellent reason that it is medieval. But so also is the form. Here is the dream-structure, the allegory, 1 Pollard, p. xl, comments on the scansion: "The modern reader who expects to find all the lines of a stanza of equal length, or of different lengths arranged in a fixed order, may look askance at the suggestion that Barclay normally uses lines of four accents, but mixes with them (especially towards the beginning of his poem) others of a slower movement with five. Yet this is what Barclay found when he read Chaucer, as he must have done, in the editions of Caxton, Pynson, or Wynkyn de Worde, and I believe that he accepted these alternations as a beauty, and one which should be imitated." I question this. These lines become octosyllabic by stressing the accents without regard to the syllables, in accordance with the English adaptation of the principles of the Medieval LatinCf. pp. 145-147. The French at the close has a number of seven-lined stanzasa characteristic faithfully followed by the English. 2 P. 249. 3 For Gringoire's indebtedness to Bruyant see Pollard, op cit., xxvii-xxxiv. 430 EARLY TUDOR POETRY and the personification. This type of poem had persisted in England for a hundred years. And to make perfectly evident that the translator intended no innovation, instead of translating Gringoire's finaltprayer, he added the conventional Lydgatian apology. Go forth small treatyse I humbly the present Unto the reders as indygne of audyence... After this it is without surprise that we read there is "lacke of eloquence," that he is following the steps of those who write "craftely," but that his language is "rude" and that he has smelled the "floures" of "parfyte eloquence." Aside from the fact that a poem of this type was usually written in the rime-royal, there is nothing to suggest that the Castle of Labour was not indigenous. And this probably explains both its translation and its subsequent popularity. Poems such as this were translated, because to the readers they seemed English. They seemed English, because to all intents and purposes they were indistinguishable from exactly similar poems written in England. Consequently, except for the occasional French word introduced, French influence on this count, also, seems slight. The third type of French poetry, like the second, derived from the Roman de la Rose, in point of view, though not in form. It will be remembered that the peculiarity of that poem consists in its having been written by two poets and with two antithetic points of view. The first part by Guillaume de Lorris is the allegorical convention. From this come the various allegorical poems already discussed,l of which the Castle of Labour is a specimen. But the second author, Jean de Meung, turned toward satire. Whereas the first part aims at beauty, the second aims at brilliancy, and whereas the first is emotional, the second is intellectual in its appeal. In all probability this combination caused the poem to be so immensely popular. But in England it was the first part only that had much effect. That had been translated by Chaucer, and imitated, not only by him, but also by his successors. During the fifteenth century English writers for the most part took themselves and their work seriously; their satire turns to preachments, and their attacks are heavy. The high sententiousness of Lydgate does not lend itself to the I Chapter 2. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 431 flash of wit. The French origin of the Castle of Labour is indicated by just this combination. In this case it is the medieval contempt for woman, clearly humorous, since his troubles have been in a dream. And therefore my welbeloued wyfe Consyder the payne and the trauayle Whiche whyle ye slepte without stryfe Ryght cruelly dyde me assayle But now am I well without fayle Syth I haue escaped this daungere And in your presence may appere My wyfe therof cared no thynge But leughe me to derysyon She scorned me and my talkynge For were it wynnynge or perdycyon It was to her all one conclusyon For so she were serued at her desyre She cared not yf I laye in the myre She called me fole and cared nought And was nere redy with me to fyght She swore by god that her dere bought She wolde make me remembre that nyght Therfore I went toe bedde euen ryght For the thre foted stole sore fered I To chat with a woman it is but foly.... This comic element took the form of a mock will in which the testator bequeaths satiric legacies. The germ of this conception is found in the Roman de la Rose 1 where the royal lover makes his will and bequeaths his heart; Ja' ne seront autre mi les. The first definite example of the mock will in verse belongs to Eustace Deschamps, where his lady is left to the cure, his old trousers and shirt to the Grey Friars, etc.2 Without enumerating the interRoman de la Rose, ed. Francisque-Michel, 1864, 28-31. 2 For this genealogy the reader should consult the edition of Le Petit Testament of Villon edited with an elaborate introduction by W. G. C. Bijvanck; Colyn Blowbols Testament, edited with an elaborate introduction by Friedrich Lehmeyer; and the bibliography to Chapter V, Vol. III of the Cambridge History of English Literature, compiled by Professor Harold V. Routh. 432 EARLY TUDOR POETRY mediate stages, it will be sufficient to recall the Grand and the Petit Testament of Villon. These poems were so popular that, between the first in 1489 and the edition of Clement Marot in 1533, there were twenty separate editions.1 As this conception spread also into the Latin and into the Italian, it would be expected to make its appearance in the English. This it does in a rather worthless jeu d'esprit called Colyn Blowbol's Testament, which existed only in manuscript until published by Park in Nugce Poeticae, 1804.2 The poem opens with a description of Colin Blowbol so ill from drinking that he calls in the priest to make his will, wherein, after various bequests, he founds an establishment, situated in the stews of Southwark and with Mab Sloth as abbess, that shall be devoted to drinkers. It was apparently written for the amusement of a definite group, as certain names, Robert Qtwey, Nicholas Inglond, Robert Horsley, Robert Cure, William Copyndale, et al., which, as they have no point in themselves, must have been given significance by the fact that the persons were friends of the author. Quite clearly also it must have been written hastily, as it changes from the third to the first person without apparent intention. The author attempts to bring it in line with the conventional form by affixing the Lydgatian apology in rime-royal, although the poem itself is in the heroic couplet. Thow litell quayer, how darst thow shew thy face, Or corn yn presence of men of honeste, Sith thow ard rude, and folowist not the trace Of faire langage, nor haiste no bewte? Wherefore of wysedom thus I councelle the, To draw the bake fer out of their sight, Lest thow be had in reproef and dispite. Conventional as is this ending, after perusing the poem, the reader feels that it probably represents the genuine feelings of the author, or at least it should! As the broken-backed line, the fourth in the stanza quoted, suggests Lydgate, the date may be placed fairly early in the century. Somewhat later is Jyl of Breyntfords Testament, where a long series of fools are each left the same insult.3 As 1 I am here quoting from the bibliography appended by Auguste Longnon to his Oeuvres Completes de FranCois Villon, Paris 1892. 2 It has also been published in Hazlitt's Early Popular Poetry of England, I, 9i, and in an annotated edition by Lehmeyer, 1907. 3 Reprinted by Furnivall for the Ballad Society in 1871. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 433 this was printed by William Copland, it must have been issued around the decade 1550-1560. The interesting feature of the poem consists in the prologue written by Robert Copland. The tone here is personal and familiar, and there is a perfect command of the medium. Jyl of Brentford kept an Inn near Sion House. She was so full of pastime that her name had passed into a proverb. Copland had never understood it, until one day having met John Hardlesay to have a drink of good ale at the Red Lion, the proverb was quoted. On his return home he found an old scroll, ragged and rent, antique, broken and defaced, in which the origin of the proverb was explained. Later in a moment of despondency, For recreacion I it toke, To pas the tyme, ther on to loke; And of trouth, oft in the redyng It dyd styre me to fall on smylyng, Consyderyng the prety pasty me And rydycle ordre of the ryme, The couert termes, vnder a mery sence, Shewyng of many the blynd in-solence, Tauntyng of thynges past and to come, Where as my selfe was hyt with some; And for that cause I dyd intend After thys maner to haue it pende, Prayeng all them that mery be, If it touch them, not to blame me. So, in guise of his own experience, Copland gives us the reasons for the popularity, not only of this particular poem, but also for all of its type. Primarily the appeal is to the sense of humor, but there is satire intermingled. There is none of the acuteness, however, nor the unexpected reversal, found in Villon. The English poem is straightforward, broad and coarse. In English there are several more,1 but, once the differentiating characteristics are clear, they need not be discussed. It is clearly an English adaptation of the French form. To return a moment to the passage from the Romaunt de la Rose, another derivative is possible, namely the convention of the dying lover bequeathing his all to his love. This is so normal that the distortion from it seems due to the brilliance of Villon. 1 An analysis may be found in Lehmeyer, op. cit. 434 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Naturally in France a number of love poems were composed along these lines. In English this is represented by a poem among those of "Uncertain Authors" of Tottel's second edition, miscalled The testament of the hawthorne.1 In a pretty, but artificial manner the poet gives directions for his funeral and his dying wishes. And euen with my last bequest, When I shall from this life depart: I geue to her I loued best, My iust my true and faithfull hart, Signed with the hand as cold as stone: Of him that liuing was her owne. The importance of this, as in the case of the mock-will type, is that it shows the persistence of the medieval form in the midst of the Renaissance movement. It must be again reiterated that, as we have but a small part of the poetry presumably composed during the reigns of the first two Tudors, a single specimen of a certain form probably indicates the existence of many that are at present unknown. If this hypothetical condition be true, we may find here a definite example of French influence. The three forms of French poetry that have been discussed all hark back to medieval conditions, that is, conditions quite different from those at the opening of the Renaissance. In the tumult and distress of the Hundred Years War, chivalry has been lost. Jeanne d'Arc is the last great epic figure, and she was then, as Gaston Paris dares to express it, an anachronism.2 "While she struggled and while she died, this 'gentil duc d'Orleans' whom she so ardently desired to free from his English captivity took that captivity lightly enough, and, entirely occupied in polishing his pleasing rimes, did not find time to send to his martyr a single po1 Tottel's Miscellany, Arber's Reprint, op. cit. 260. The title comes from the first line, " I Sely Haw whose hope is past." As the poem has nothing whatever to do with the hawthorne, the word haw of the line quoted must signify "a thing of no value" N. E. D. sb. 2, 2, in spite of the fact that under S haw is given as equivalent to hawthorn with this particular quotation cited. 2 Gaston Paris, La Paesie au XV Siecle, Deuxieme Serie, 215. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 435 etic greeting." In place of the old feudal age with its magnificently impossible ideals, grew up a bourgeois society, stressing realities, without the fine enthusiasms of the past, but also without its foolishness. The poetry of such an age will lack great emotional outbursts; its feet are too solidly planted upon mother earth. There will not be the mysticism and the exaltation of great love; marriage is a serious business and involves pecuniary considerations. But there will be, on one side, an acute perception of actuality and a recognition of the individual in his relation to society,-as appears in the mordant phrases of Villon, ---and, on the other, an artistic appreciation of the value of form,-as is shown by Clement Marot. There is nothing surprising in this condition. A society such as this wishes its ideas clearly cut. Its dislike of sentimental vagueness, or emotional profundity, is equalled by its horror of obscurity. There must be no romantic halflights. This merciless clarity entails a respect for form. In proportion as the substance of a poem is of less consequence, the presentation must approach an exquisite and elaborate perfection. In justifying the ways of God to man, Milton can afford to disregard the adornment of rime; to celebrate a lady's glove in blank verse would be ridiculous. On the other hand, as the mass of literature is not employed in Miltonic justification, there is space a-plenty for slighter effort and less ambitious attempts. And for these there grew up the involved rime-schemes of the ballade and the rondeau. As the names imply, here there is close union with the music and the dance. Originally of popular origin, by the beginning of the sixteenth century they had been appropriated by the masters of verse technique. Villon's ballades are not the outpourings of unsophisticated genius; they are artistic masterpieces, and the impression that they give of spontaneity is merely the result of the supreme mastery of his art. But Villon is merely the best known to moderns of a crowd of such writers. When one considers the extreme technical difficulty of the form, it is remarkable to find the large number of poets that can handle it so well. And although in French the proportion of riming words is greater than in English, yet it is surprising that English poets did not attempt to render the ballade. Even Villon's Ballade des Dames du Temps Jadis, which has challenged the skill of so many of our modern poets, remained unimitated, although certainly 436 EARLY TUDOR POETRY it was easily accessible in the French.l As a general negative is the most extreme of positive statements, I dare not risk the remark that the ballade was not used in England, but it is a safe position to assert that, when translated, usually the form was changed into one more easily written. The process may be illustrated by Barclay's envoy to his fifty-first chapter of the Ship of Fools, wherein the typically medieval subject of the inevitability of death is celebrated.2 O man that hast thy trust and confydence Fyxed on these frayle fantasyes mundayne Remember at the ende there is no difference Bytwene that man that lyued hath in payne And hym that hath in welth and ioy souerayne They both must dye their payne is of one sort Both ryche and pore, no man can deth refrayne For dethes dart expellyth all confort Say where is Adam the fyrst progenytour Of all mankynde is he nat dede and gone And where is Abell of innocence the flour With adamys other sonnes euerychone A: dredfull deth of them hath left nat one Where is Mathusalem, and Tuball that was playne The first that played on Harpe or on Orgone llz sont tous mortz ce monde est choce vayne Where is iust Noy and his ofsprynge become Where is Abraham and all his progeny As Isaac and Jacob, no strength nor wysdome Coude them ensure to lyue contynually Where is kynge Dauyd whome god dyd magnyfy And Salomon his son of wysdome souerayne Where ar his sonnes of wysdome and beauty Ilz sont toutz mortz ce monde est choce vayne Where ar the prynces and kynges of Babylon And also of Jude and kynges of Israeli Where is the myghty and valiant Sampson He had no place in this lyfe ay to dwell Before the edition of Villon by Marot in 1532, there had been twenty printed editions. 2Jamieson, op. cit., I, 268. As this is neither in the Narrenschiff, nor the Locher, nor the Riviere, it must be either original with Barclay, or (what is more probable) a translation from an independent French poem,-to me, at least, unknown. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 437 Where ar the PrynceS myghty and cruell That rayned before Christ delyuered vs from payne And from the Dongeons of darke and ferefull hell 11z sont toutz mortz ce monde est choce vayne. Of worldly worsyp no man can hym assure In this our age whiche is the last of all No creature can here alway endure Yonge nor olde, pore man nor kynge royall Unstable fortune tourneth as doth a ball And they that ones pas can nat retourne agayne Wherfore I boldly dare speke in generall We all shall dye: ce monde est choce vayne. Ryches nor wysdome can none therfro defende Ne in his strength no man can hym assure Say where is Tully is he nat come to ende Seneke the sage with Cato and Arture The hye Arystotyll of godly wyt and pure The glorious Godfray, and myghty Charlemayne Thoughe of theyr lyfe they thought that they were sure Yet ar they all dede: ce monde est choce vayne. Where ar the Phylosophers and Poetis lawreat The great Grammaryens and pleasant oratours. Ar they nat dede after the same fourme and rate As ar all these other myghty conquerours Where ar theyr Royalmes theyr ryches and treasours Left to theyi heyres: and they be gone certayne And here haue left theyr riches and honours So have they proued that this worlde is but vayne. So I conclude bycause of breuyte That if one sought the worlde large and wyde Therin sholde be founde no maner of dere That can alway in one case suerly byde Strength, honour, riches cunnynge and beautye All these decay, dayly: thoughe we complayne Omniafert etas, both helth and iolyte We all shall dye: ce monde est choce vayne.1 A comparison of this poem on the same subject and similar in treatment, Villon's Ballade des Seigneurs du Temps Jadis will show the limitations of French influence in this type. Both are catalogues It is surely unnecessary to remark that the eccentric punctuation has been retained. 438 EARLY TUDOR POETRY of names. Yet Villon has condensed his into three stanzas and an envoi of four lines. Barclay, in spite of his "brevity," requires eight full stanzas. And whereas Villon for the total twenty-eight lines employs but three rimes, Barclay in the English fashion changes his rime with the stanza, although he suggests his French original by retaining the refrain, even in the French words. The inference seems to be that the English author is lacking the technical mastery to render the ballade form. But it is not fair to attribute this inability entirely to Barclay's lack of skill. The language, which in the hands of Chaucer had been shown to be capable of elaborate riming, in the early sixteenth century was then in a state of transition. A very possible reason, therefore, for the lack of translations of the ballades is that the English language was not then a sufficiently definite instrument. In any case, whether the poets lacked the ability, or the language lacked the capacity, the fact remains that the French ballade was not domesticated in England. But the ballade is but one of the forms. With the increasing stability of the throne under Louis XI and his successors, poetry responded to the social demand made upon it. Especially was this true of the court circle. Pieces were written, brilliantly compressed and clever in execution, that were suitable to whisper in a lady's ear, or that would attract the attention of a king. Of this type the poet par excellence was Clement Marot.1 As the son of his father he had a poetic inheritance. Although he began his career with the allegory and verbal tricks of the older school, he quickly adapted himself to his surroundings, so that his verses mirror the gay, witty and licentious court of Francis I. Roman1 Aside from the sixteenth century editions that are difficult to procure here in America, there are three well-known editions of the complete works. (a) 4 vols. ed. by Pierre Jannet 1868-1872; unhappily the editor died before completing his work, so that the last volume was brought out by d'Hericault, who had himself published a selection of Marot in 1867. (b) the elaborate edition by Georges Guiffrey, Vol. 2 in 1875 and Vol. 3 in 1881; unhappily he also died leaving these two volumes as a torso. They include only the Opuscules and the Epistres. Up to the point that Guiffrey carried it, there is adequate discussion of the problems, but he carries it such a short distance. Therefore (c) the best modem (!) edition is that of Lenglet du Fresnoy in 1731. This is in six volumes and contains also the poems of Jean and Michel Marot. When possible I cite (a) the Guiffrey, then (b) the Jannet, and lastly (c) the du Fresnoy. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 439 tic chivalric love has been replaced by gallantry. Since the Petrarchan convention has not yet reached France, his attitude is objective. The long diluted medieval poem, also, has been supplanted by epigrammatic terseness, and the verbal play of the Rhetoriqueurs by the flash of wit. For this, the old French stanzaforms are handled en maitre. Before Cleraent Marot the rondeau, for example, was a name loosely applied to a large number of forms having little more than the use of the refrain in common.1 Some of these forms are fantastic to the last degree, even to the extent of writing enigmas in rondeau form.2 The only essential is the refrain. As Fabri defines it: 3 "Item he who wishes to make a rondeau, must make it round, that is to say that he must necessarily take care that the ends and the sentences of the half, or last, clauses be so skillfully accommodated to the commencement of the first clause that the first clause seems necessary to complete the meaning, and yet that in themselves they be complete and give perfect sense without the addition of the first clause.... " It is this twofold aim, namely that the refrain must both be appropriate in its place, and also refer back to the first of the poem, that makes the rondeau so difficult to write. Rules for its composition abound. In the Jardin de Plaisance, in rondeau form, L'Infortune gives his directions: 4 Par et, pour, mais, donq, par, car, quant, Ne se doibt rondeau commencer. Qui ne sgait son faict despenser A bien conclurre et rimacer, Ou de plat fauldra ou de cant. Acteurs seront celuy mocquant Qui rondeau cuidera passer, Sans bien rentrer et compasser. Par et, etc. 1 Cf. Recherches sur le Vers Frangais au XV Siecle by Henri Chatelain, 1908: Gaston Raynaud has published Rondeau et Autres Poesies du XVe Siecle, 1889, from a manuscript in the Biblioteque Nationale; there is also Chansons du XVe Sicle, 1875, by Gaston Paris. 2 Cf. Jean Marot's rondeau L'Homme dupe. 3 Fabri, op. cit., II, 63. 4 Quoted by Fabri, op. cit., II. 63. 440 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Plusieurs s'abusent en pensant Que rondeau soit bon pour rentrer, Mais non chascun couplet porter Doibt sens parfaict et suspenser Clos et ouuert non suspensant. Par et, etc. Clearly the effect of such precepts was to make the rondeau a purely artificial form. A perfect rondeau was not the result of inspirational frenzy, but of careful deliberation in the choice of both the idea and the expression. Consequently the widespread use of such a form was to develop ability in poetic technique. This is expressed by Clement Marot: 1 En un rondeau, sur le commencement, Un vocatif, comme "Maistre Clement," Ne peult faillir r'entrer par huys ou porte; Aux plus scavans poetes m'en rapporte, Qui d'en user se gardent sagement. Bien inventer vous fault premierement, L'invention deschiffrer proprement, Si que raison et rythme ne soit morte En un rondeau. Usez de motz regeuz communement, Rien superflu n'y soit aucunement, Et de la fin quelque bon propos sorte Clouez tout court, rentrez de bonne sorte, Maistre passe serez certainement En un rondeau. These two rondeaux are interesting both in form and in content. The first is of the "open" type, that is, the refrain is the whole of the first line; the second, on the contrary is of the "closed" type. The rime-scheme of the first is abbba abbR abbbaR; that of the second aabba aabR aabbaR. This latter, a common form in the 15th century, in the 16th century practically supplanted all the others. While by no means peculiar to Clement Marot, his preference for it probably established it as the form for the rondeau. Probably also his practice established the rondeau convention. First there must be a single conception. This must then be pre 1 Jannet's ed. Q, 127. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 441 sented simply, with no forced rimes and no superfluities, and finally must be keyed by the refrain. But, aside from the refrain, these are the characteristics of a great part of his work. These are true not only of the rondeau, but of the etrenne, the dizain, the epigram, etc. A clever idea neatly phrased is the ideal. There is no great emotional outburst. It is preeminently social, and as such is characteristic of the age. For the ladies and gentlemen of the court he and, to a far greater extent, Melin de Saint-Gelais wrote elegant trifles. To be sure, Marot is a good deal more than that,-his versions of the Psalms have a certain elevation of tone,but the sense for form, for moderation, cleverness, such qualities as these, rather than any fine frenzy, are the characteristics of his work and that of his school. But these are not the qualities that characterize the exuberance of the Renaissance spirit! Such calculated cleverness, such perfect control, and such critical acumen are signs of a ripe maturity that needs but a little to be over-ripe. From this point of view, Marot and the school are rather the last of the medievalists than the first of the moderns. In consonance with this conception is that fact that he edited both the works of Villon and the Roman de la Rose. It is not quite correct to say that he "overthrew" the Rhetoriquers; rather he developed out from them, for his aim, as was theirs, was to please by his wits,-only his natural good sense gradually refused their verbal puerilities. Medieval, also, is his attitude towards the classics.l His Greek seems to have been secondhand and his Latin little more than a veneer. Born in the provincial town of Cahors and brought up to speak the native dialect, his energy was absorbed in learning French; Greek and Latin went by the board. Naturally in the Court of FranCois Ie one could not be completely ignorant of classical civilization, nor of classical allusion, but the errors he makes show conclusively that his knowledge of it was only superficial. This lack has been claimed for him as an advantage.2 But irrespective of the effect upon his own work, such a condition is significant for its effect upon the lit1 Cf. De Fontibus Clementis Maroti Poetae, Henricus Guy, 1898. 2 d'Hericault, op. cit., xxxiv. Marot le confesse, du reste "Si peu que je comprisse aux livres latins." II fait cet aveu avec )humilite. Pour moi., je n'hesite pas A dire que cette quasi-ignorance de Clement Marot fut la grande cause de sa gloire. Il avoit mieux que le latin a apprendre; il avoit a connoitre la langue 442 EARLY TUDOR POETRY erature of his age. Rightly or wrongly, the current was setting toward a revival of the interest in the classics that is characteristic of the Renaissance. But in France this movement was retarded by Marot. A comparison of his handling of the Hero and Leander story with that by Marlowe illustrates how slightly he was touched by the Renaissance. In his version there is none of Marlowe's pagan sensuosity nor Greek love of beauty. The incidents are the same; the impression completely different. But his mastery of the language was so great that he gathered a school around him. The result was that after his death, when the new movement came, it came in a burst. In 1549 the Pleiade issued the Defense et illustration de la langue franfaise, in which the former theories and forms were repudiated; they illustrated the principles by a rapid publication of poems, and another age had begun. But this sudden change is only explicable on the assumption that the new movement had been accumulating until, figuratively, the dam burst. Thus French literature of the first half of the sixteenth century, as dominated by Marot and his school, was to a very large extent unaffected by the new forces. But in discussing the effect of the court poetry of France upon the court poetry of England such literary tendencies need careful consideration. For, a priori, there must have been some effect; the exact amount of it is the baffling problem. Theoretically there would have been a great deal. The personal rivalry between the two kings, the interchange of embassies, and the natural emulation of each court to outshine the other would seem to predicate relationships also literary. Hall tells us that certain courtiers, Carew, Bryan, and others did carry to excess an imitation of French manners.' Just at this time More was writing his epigrams, among which is one In Anglum Gallicac Linguac Affectatorem.2 Amicus & sodalis est Lalus mihi, Britanniaque natus, altusque insula. At cum Britannos Gallike cultoribus Oceanus ingens, lingua, mores dirimant. frangoise et a la limer: ce sera, comme il l'indique, l'occupation du reste de sa vie. 1 Quoted in full, p. 377. 2 Epigrammata Clarissimi Disertissimique uiri Thomae Mori Britanni ad emendatum exemplar ispius autoris excusa. Basileam. Froben 1520, 45. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 443 Spernit tamen Lalus Britannica omnia, Miratur, expetitque cuncta Gallica. Toga superbit ambulans in Gallica, Amatque multum Gallicas lacernulas. Zona, locello, atque ense gaudet Gallico, Filtro, bireto, pileoque Gallico, Et calceis, & subligare Gallico, Totoque denique apparatu Gallico. Nam & unum habet ministrum, eurlque Gallicum. Sed quem (licet uelit) nec ipsa Gallia Tractare quiret plus (opinor) Gallice, Stipendii nihil dat, atque id Gallice. Vestitque tritis pannulis, & Gallice hoc. Alit cibo paruo, & malo, idque Gallice. Labore multo exercet, atque hoc Gallice. Pugnisque crebro pulsat, idque Gallice. In coetu & in uia, & foro, & frequentia Rixatur, obiurgatque semper Gallice. Quid? Gallice illud? imo semigallice. Sermonem enim (ni fallor) ille Gallicum Tam callet omnem, quam Latinum Psytacus. Crescit tamen, sibique nimirum placet, Verbis tribus, si quid loquatur Gallicis. Aut Gallicis si quid nequit uocabulis, Conatur id, uerbis licet non Gallicis, Canore saltem personare Gallico, Palato hiante acutulo quodam sono, Et foeminae instar garrientis molliter, Sed ore pleno, tanquam id impleant fabe Balbutiens uidelicet suauiter Pressis quibusdam literis, Galli quibus Ineptientes abstinent, nihil secus, Quam uulpe gallus, rupibusque nauita. Sic ergo linguam ille & Latinam Gallice, Et Gallice linguam sonat Britannican. Et Gallice linguam refert Lombardicam. Et Gallice linguam refert Hispanicam. Et Gallice linguam sonat Germanicam. Et Gallice omnem, praeter unam Gallicam. Nam Gallicam solam sonat Britannice. At quisquis insula satus Britannica, Sic patriam insolens fastidiet suam, Vt more simile laboret fingere, Et emulari Gallicas ineptias. Ex amne Gallo ego hunc opinor ebrium. Ergo ex Britanno ut Gallus esse nititur, Sic dii iubete, fiat ex gallo capus. 444 EARLY TUDOR POETRY It would be natural to expect that by such courtiers as these the influence of Clement Marot, his predecessors and his disciples, would be brought into England. This is supported by the appearance of an occasional French song by an English writer, by an occasional refrain, and certain verse forms. On the other hand, such French influence by its very excess caused a reaction. Lalus may have been a friend of More, as he states, but the tone of contempt throughout the epigram scarcely supports the assertion. Nor was More alone in his feeling,-and the others did not expend their energy in epigrams. As Hall tells us, in the passage cited, the opposition became strong enough to banish these "kynges minions" from the Court. In this whole affair Henry's attitude is puzzling. The picture Hall paints of his "gentle nature" is rather at variance with the usual view of his character. If, on the contrary, he resented this banishment of his most intimate friends and the implied criticism upon himself, the dislike of France, her language and her customs must have been overwhelming. In line with this, although it may be merely a coincidence, Cloked Colusyon, one of the villains in Skelton's Magnificence, has two speeches in French. The obvious conclusion seems to be that, while there were men at Court who were enthusiastic imitators of Gallic culture, the majority were not only not imitators, but in addition were even hostile. Outside of the limits of the Court, owing to the great trade relations with Flanders, French influence was still less. A part of the unpopularity in London of both Wolsey and Anne was due to the French alliance. French influence on English literature, broadly speaking, must have been confined to a very definite and very limited circle at the Court. Although theoretically it is easy thus to define and limit French influence, actually to produce poems in which such influence is shown is a difficult matter. We are hampered by lack of data. To recapitulate what has been said in another chapter,1 it must be remembered that the printing press in England was still comparatively undeveloped, and that the writers of the court circle felt no need of calling upon its aid to reach their very limited reading public. An author moved by the moral impulse, such as Hawes, or the desire to attack, such as Skelton, or the controversial spirit, such as More, naturally published. Occasional leaflets, the Nut Brown 1 342 pp. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 445 Maid, for example, appeared, and of course longer prose compositions whose very length forbade the effort of copying by hand. But the time had not yet come when volumes of short occasional verse were formalized in type. Nor was it necessary. The readers for whom either Wyatt or Surrey wrote could easily be satisfied by copies made by hand. Moreover, in an age of caste it is improbable that the noble writers had the desire to bare their hearts before the ignoble gaze of the London tradesman.1 From incidental references we know of a large number of authors whose works survive, if at all, even yet in manuscript.2 It is this condition that gives the unique importance to the collection known as Tottel's Miscellany, published in 1557, for to the majority of the Elizabethans the poems included in it of necessity represented the work of the whole of the court circle. Unfortunately we have absolutely no knowledge why Tottel made the selection that he did. Apparently it represents the poetry of the previous thirty years at least. But as these years were years of rapid development, the Miscellany is not homogeneous. It includes the work of Wyatt and that of Surrey and Grimald, besides a miscellaneous aggregation labelled "Uncertaine Authors." As there is a difference of almost a generation between Wyatt and Surrey, the first period would be represented in the work of Wyatt. Some idea of the relation of Tottel's publication to the amount of work composed may be gained by a comparison of his selection in the case of Wyatt. By a rare chance we have what is recognized by experts as Wyatt's autograph manuscript.3 With this as a 1 Miss Foxwell in A Study of Sir Thomas Wyatt's Poems, London 1911, p. 8 says in regard to the Egerton MS: "That the poems were intended for publication is evident from certain headings in the E Ms." If by publication be meant printed, I doubt very much the correctness of the inference. Aside from Latin works intended for an European public, there is no evidence that a single English author, with the exception of those engaged in controversies, ever prepared his manuscript for printing. 2A recent collection is Prof. Padelford's Early Sixteenth Century Lyrics, in the Belles-Lettres Series, Heath & Co., 1907. The student is referred to the bibliography there. 3Brit. Mus. Egerton No. 2711, purchased in 1889; previously used (but modified) in Nott's edition of 1816; published unchanged by Ewald FlUgel, Anglia 18-19. Flligel accepts it as being autographic: Endlich sei noch bemerkt, dass Sir Thomas Wyatt's handschrift einen Ziemlich ausgesprochenen charakter hat, so dass es nicht mit zu grosser unsicherheit verbunden ist, seine hand festzustellen. 446 EARLY TUDOR POETRY basis, other manuscripts increase the number of poems to 191. Of these, only 82 are printed in Tottel. On the other hand there are 14 in Tottel that do not appear in any manuscript. Consequently of the total number of Wyatt's poems, 205, Tottel prints less than one half, 96. Moreover as the text differs considerably, the presumption is that Tottel did not use this manuscript. And as the last entry here consists of the Psalms, still in an unfinished state and with corrections in Wyatt's handwriting, the date is clearly late. The conclusion seems to be that the Egerton manuscript represents Wyatt's own version of his poems. If this be true, why he omitted certain poems, now found in other manuscripts, has never been explained. In any case, we have a large body of Wyatt's verse so that it is possible to arrive at definite conclusions.1 Equally definite also are the facts of Wyatt's life. The publication of the Calendar of State Papers makes it possible to follow his career year by year.2 As it is unnecessary to make a biographical excursus, the facts that concern us here are the following: Thomas Wyatt was born, 1503; as his father had been a Lancastrian, he was early connected with the Tudor Court; he received two degrees from Cambridge before he had completed his eighteenth year; in 1526 he spent two months at the French court. Three months of the following year he was in Italy; from 1528-32 he was at Calais, apparently the greater part of the time holding the office of marAnglia 18, 270. But he does not regard it as the best text because Tottel's is "viel glatteren, poetischeren." Until Tottel's text be proved authoritative, personal preference must be disregarded. 1 The Poems of Sir Thomas Wiat, edited from the Mss. and early editions, by A. K. Foxwell, M. A. (Lond.) London, 1913. As I am so much indebted to this and to her Study of Sir Thomas Wyatt's Poems, London 1911, I here make general confession. It is noticeable that in her later publication she has changed the spelling of the name. However rational may be the latter form, as the name has been spelled Wyatt for three centuries, it seems futile now to revert to the other spelling. 2 It is unnecessary, but very human, to express the gratitude every student of the period feels toward this publication! It gives us the facts. These have been gathered by W. E. Simonds in his little book Sir Thomas Wyatt and his Poems, 1889. Professor Simonds' work is limited (a) by the lack of the Egerton MSS.; and (b) by the fact that the Calendar was then brought up only to the year 1536. So far as he can go; he quotes the original entries. Miss Foxwell merely summarizes. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 447 shal; after five years in England, in 1537 he was sent as ambassador to Spain; the following year he was again sent to meet the Emperor at Marseilles; 1539 finds him at Blois with the French Court, 1540 in Flanders with the Emperor, 1541 again at Calais. And he dies in 1542 while on another embassy. The mere recital of these dates shows him to have been extraordinarily exposed to foreign influences. Definite as is the text and definite as are the facts of his life, difficulty arises when we try to put two and two together; unhappily they do not make four, but x! 1 Given a poet with such opportunities, the natural expectation would be that his verse would show signs of foreign influence. And as he spent approximately four years at Calais,-a place, at least in the case of Lord Berners, favorable to literary composition,-two assumptions seem plausible; (1) that a certain amount of his work was done there, and (2) that the work done there would be that in which the foreign influence appears most strongly. Unfortunately, however plausible, these are only suppositions. During this time Clement Marot had become recognized as the dominant French poet. Although his first collected volume, L'Adolescence Clementine was not published until 1532, the poems certainly had circulated before, and even had been printed.2 Again the natural supposition would be that in the works of Wyatt would be found traces of Clement Marot. Such traces would be shown either in form or in content, or in both. Wyatt's poems are indexed under the headings rondeaux, sonnets, epigrams, satires, the Psalms, and miscellaneous poems. So far as merely the form is concerned, the sonnets, satires and psalms may be rejected, leaving French influence to be shown in 1 This is illustrated by the different dates assigned to individual poems by Professor Simonds and Miss Foxwell. The latter believes that the poems in the Egerton MS. are in chronological order of composition. Then by making certain poems refer to definite events it is possible to give "approximate" dates for the entire set. But apparently the order is casual, since later Wyatt himself sorted them into groups. If he had to take the trouble to arrange them chronologically in the first place, why did he re-arrange them? 2 Marot's Preface de'Adolescence Clementine: Ie ne scay (mes treschers Freres) qui m'a plus incit6 a mettre ces miennes petites ][eunesses en lumiere, ou voz continuelles prieres, ou le desplaisir que i'ay eu d'en ouyr crier & publier par les rues vne grande partie toute incorrecte, mal imprimee, & plus au prouffit du Libraire qu'a l'honneur de l'Autheur. Guiffrey, op. cit., 2, 13-14. 448 EARLY TUDOR POETRY the rondeaux, epigrams and miscellaneous pieces. Of the total, two hundred and five poems, only nine are in the rondeau form. Six have the conventional rime-scheme aabba, aabR, aabbaR, although two of these have octosyllabic lines. The rime-scheme of the fourth is aabba bbaR aabbaR; of the fifth, aabba bbaR bbaabR; and of tbe eighth, aabbcR ccbR aabbaR. In other words, of the small number of rondeaux over half the number do not follow the type selected by Marot! Of the thirty-one epigrams all but six are in the ottava rima. Of the six, two are in the rime-royal, and the remaining four seem rather curious experiments in riming. The only feature in the miscellaneous section suggestive of the French is the use of the refrain,-a feature that is not necessarily French at all. As many of them were written to be sung, the origin of the refrain is obvious. For, the form alone considered, French influence must be regarded as curiously slight.' Some there undoubtedly is, but the surprising fact is that there is not more. When it comes to discussing the content of the poems, the question is exceedingly difficult. It was the fashion of the age in France and Italy, as well as in England, to write occasional verses to be given to ladies. As the conditions that called them forth were similar in all three countries, the poems themselves are very similar. It was a social convention without deep feeling. The age of chivalry had passed, but there yet remained the literary tradition of the cruel lady and the longing lover. There is little more emotion in these trifles than in the verses for St. Valentine's Day; it was good form to have a bleeding heart. But as the same condition prevailed in all the courts, extensive reading in the literatures is sure to produce analogies. Wyatt, Marot and the Italian Serafino have short poems in which the heart after separation accompanies the loved one.2 Certain phrases in Wyatt's are suggestive of either 1 Lee quotes a poem the form of which is identical with one by Marot, (Wyatt, Works, P. 160.). There is some error in the reference, as it is not to be found on p. 160 of Nott's edition (the edition that he apparently used) nor can I find it indexed in any edition. The point is immaterial as it is in the Chaucerian "Monks' Tale" stanza form ababbcbc. 2 Foxwell 2, 18: "The refrain and setting, however, is influenced by C. Marot's Rondeau, "S'il est ainsy." This Rondeau was first printed by M. Jannet from the MS. FF. 2335, f. 65. This would seem to settle the question as a poem Marot himself rejected would probably not be copied by Wyatt, were it not that INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 449 of the other two. The poems differ in that in both the French and Italian it is the lady that has the lover's heart, whereas in the Wyatt the condition is reversed. It is quite possible, therefore, that further research may unearth others more alike. The resemblances between Wyatt's poems and those of Marot are all of this type, occasional similarity in the treatment of conventional subjects. This may, perhaps, be worth further illustration. One of Marot's celebrated vers de societe is his etrenne A Anne: 1 Ce nouvel an pour estrenes vous -donne Mon cueur blesse d'une nouvelle playe, Contrainct y suis, Amour ainsi L'ordonne, En qui un cas bien contraire j'essaye: Car ce cueur la, c'est ma richesse vraye: Le demeurant n'est rien ou je me fonde; Et fault donner le meilleur bien que j'aye Si j'ay vouloir d'estre riche en ce monde. The charm of this little New Year's present is clearly due to its brevity; in eight lines the compliment is turned. With this compare the analogous poem by Wyatt.2 To seke eche where, where man doeth lyve, The See, the Land: the Rocke, the Clyve, Ffraunce, Spayne, and Inde and every where: Is none a greater gift to gyve Lesse sett by oft, and is so lyeff and dere, Dare I well say than that I gyve to yere. I cannot gyve browches nor ringes, Thes Goldsmithes work and goodly thinges Piery nor perle, oryente and clere; But for all that is no man bringes Lesser Juell unto his Lady dere Dare I well say then that I gyve to yere. Nor I seke not to fetche it farr, Worse is it not tho it be narr, And as it is, it doeth appere Uncontrefaict, mistrust to barr; Lest hole and pure withouten pere Dare I well say the gyft I gyve to yere the same rondeau, in a better text, was printed in the 1731 edition, 5, 269, and there attributed to Jean Marot! 1 Jannet, 2, 199. Lenglet du Fresnoy, on the doubtful possibility that Anne refers to the Duchesse d'Alengon, dates it 1528. 2 Foxwell's ed. 1, 161. 450 EARLY TUDOR POETRY To the therefore the same retain The like of the to have again Ffraunce would I gyve if myn it were Is none alyve in whome doeth rayne Lesser disdaine; frely, therefore, to here Dare I well gyve I say my hert to yere. To place these two poems in juxtaposition is cruel to Wyatt. The conceit is the same, but Marot's graceful eight lines are paralleled by twenty-four with a refrain, composed entirely of monosyllables, that is grammatically clumsy. Fortunately the conceit is so obvious that it is not necessary to infer that Wyatt was familiar with the Marot, for, if the Frenchman were the master, it must be confessed that he had a poor pupil.1 French influence, as represented by the effect of Marot upon Wyatt, is thus unexpectedly slight. More definite traces may be found in the connection between Wyatt and Melin de Saint-Gelais. Although older than Clement Marot, Saint-Gelais survived him fourteen years and maintained "la veille tradition gauloise" against the Pleiade. Marot thus apostrophizes him: O Sainct Gelais, creature gentile, Dont le scacvoir, dont l'esprit, dont le stile, Et dont le tout rend la France honoree,....2 The verses that Marot greets so enthusiastically lack both the depth and the brilliance of his own. They are light, rather clever, and sometimes rather broad, vers de societe. And as he is without Marot's Huguenot inclinations, they probably better reflect the gay court of the time. Saint-Gelais is the typical courtier. As he was continually connected with the court, Wyatt in his various embassies in all probability knew him personally. There are three poems in which the resemblance is striking. A sonnet, "Like to these unmesurable montayns," an epigram, "Thenmy of liff, decayer of all kynde," and one in the section of miscellaneous 1 It is only fair to Wyatt to append Miss Foxwell's comment. In her opinion Wyatt "has not come short of the original." "This is the best instance among the lyrics of Wiat's masterly handling of material, in stamping his own individuality upon it." 2, 117-118. 2Jannet's ed. 1, 211. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 451 poems, "Madame withouten many wordes." Of these three the question of the sonnet is the important one, for reasons that do not concern the English. In the Epitre au lecteur, prefixed to Du Bellay's Olive, occurs the phrasing: estant la sonnet d' Italien deuenu Francois, comme ie croy, par Mellin de Sainct gelais... At the time when these words were written Saint-Gelais had published only one edition, the 1547, and in that there was not but one sonnet, the one in question. Consequently the inference was made, not unnaturally, that this particular sonnet was the first sonnet to be written in French.1 Then the dating followed, 1536, because in that year Saint-Gelais was in view of the Alps! It is tenuous reasoning that justifies the oft-repeated statement, that the sonnet made its appearance in France in 1536. But this chain of reasoning was overthrown by the discovery of Mr. S. Waddington 2 that the Saint-Gelais sonnet was a translation of one attributed to Sannazaro.3 As the three sonnets, the Italian, French and English are so very much alike, there is no doubt of translation. It is interesting to note that the general tendency was to infer that the order was, as I have given it, Italian, French and English. This was assumed really without much question. We are so familiar with English dependence upon the French in the eighteenth century, and even in the Elizabethan, that in the early Tudor period, given a resemblance between a French and an English poem, we automatically assume that the English is a translation from the French. In this case it is clearly not true, because the English is more like the Italian than is the French. The next position is that the two writers translated from the Italian independently. Even this seems to me untrue.4 The single sonnet from Sannazaro, translated by both authors, is doubtfully attrib1 Modern scholarship has shown that Marot published sonnets much earlier. 2Athenaeum, July 11, 1891. 3 Without knowledge of this note, subsequently Mr. Arthur Tilley, Professor Kastner and myself each discovered the same fact independently. 4 This is the subject of a controversy between Professor Kastner and myself. Modern Language Notes, February, 1908; Professor Kastner objected in Modern Language Review, April, 1908; I replied in Mod. Lang. Review, January, 1909; as my article was sent to him in proof, he replied in the same number; I responded in Mod. Lang. Notes, January, 1910; to my knowledge there has been no reply to this last. 452 EARLY TUDOR POETRY uted to him, and, as such, appears in only four of the ten editions previous to 1547; certain expressions in the French seem more like the English than like the Italian; the riming in the French follows the English, not the Italian; and the French terminates in a couplet, the conventional English ending. Any one of these by itself might be accidental, but the cumulative effect is interesting. The solution cannot be proved; it is merely a question which hypothesis is preferable. Surely the assumption is more probable that Saint-Gelais knew Wyatt's sonnet than that two men working independently chanced upon the same author, chanced upon one sonnet only, chanced upon the same sonnet, chanced upon a sonnet that appears in but few editions, and chanced upon the same renderings. But this assumption is "startling" not for itself, but for what it implies. And the first implication is that for poems of the early Tudor period one should be very careful of speaking of French "sources." This is applicable to the two other pieces "borrowed" from Saint-Gelais. The first of these is an epigram, the point of which is that the arrow of death striking the arrow of love already in his heart only makes him love the more.1 It is noticeable that the form Wyatt here employs is the ottava rima. Under the circumstances it seems probable that the original is an unknown Italian poem; further than that it is impossible to go. The other consists of three quatrains: 2 Madame withouten many wordes Ons, I am sure, ye will or no: And if ye will, then leve your bordes And use your wit, and shew it so: And with a beck ye shall me call; And if of oon that burneth alwaye Ye have any pitie at all, Aunswer him faire with ye or nay. If it be ye, I shalbe fayne: If it be nay, frendes as before; Ye shall an othr man obtain And I myn owne and youres no more. The similarity between this and Saint-Gelais' S'amour vous a donne au cueur en gage is so marked as, I think, to preclude inde 1 Identified first by Emil Koeppel, Anglia, 13, 77. 2 Foxwell's ed. 1, 83. Identified first by Miss Foxwell. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 453 pendent working. The question then arises whether both are taken from a common source, or whether the one is translated from the other. It does not seem to come from the Italian, as the attitude assumed by the lover is quite different from the conventional Italian one. And it is not, presumably, due to Wyatt, since the French version is the more polished. Moreover the tone is characteristic of Saint-Gelais, the lightness, the cleverness and the antithesis at the climax: Un autre aurez ct moy ne pouvant estre Servant de vous, de moi je seray maistre. In this case it seems safe to assume that Saint-Gelais is the master and Wyatt the disciple. But granting this, we have very little to show altogether for French influence on Wyatt. In form the rondeau, and perhaps a song or two, and in content a single epigram! The poems of the "Uncertaine Authors" produce no more. If, as seems probable, they belong to a generation later than Wyatt it is easy to understand this lack. By that time English had settled down to its own development. If this conception have any truth, French influence would be strongest at the beginning of the dynasty, under Henry VII, be strong in the early years of the reign of Henry VIII, and gradually fade away. There are not enough facts to enable us to dogmatize, but what facts there are are covered by this hypothesis. And in a rough way it enables us to give approximate dates. It also explains why there was so curiously little effect. The time, when the French influence upon the literature was the strongest, was when the social conditions were the most unsettled, and when writing would be less done and printing most difficult. By the middle of the sixteenth century, when Tottel printed, an immense quantity of the early work must have been lost. It is only the occasional manuscript that has come down, it is only Wyatt that we have in anything like entirety. Consequently the existing literature very possibly is an unfair representative of the amount of French influence that once existed. But surely however much that may have been, it was confined within court circles. The two peoples had been hostile for a century, and their writings express antagonism. But the great reason why even in court cir 454 EARLY TUDOR POETRY cles it declined, was due to the rise of the Italian. Consequently by the time that the poems in Tottel's manuscript were collected, French influence scarcely appears. A second implication may be made from the history of the Sannazaro-Wyatt-Saint-Gelais sonnet, namely that, so far as it is a question of Italian influence, the English was ahead of the French. This fact is not due to any condition complimentary to the English writers. The reasons for it are two, one negative and one positive. First, there was no writer in England comparable to Clement Marot to perpetuate the old tradition. The authors wrote for cliques, rather than for the nation at large. There was no general sense of form, and apparently no demand for it. Skelton might perhaps have unified the nation, but he wasted his strength in local issues and lost in breadth what he gained in intensity. And in any case it would have had to be a broader, sweeter, mellower Skelton! And the second reason, dependent upon the first, is that the language was still so unsettled that the very medium was lacking to the great poet. It was an age of innovation, of adjustment. Perhaps necessarily the writers were trying out the various systems of composition, feeling their way, as it were. Under these conditions it need be no matter for surprise that the English writers, especially Wyatt, turned to Italy.1 That of the European countries it should have been Italy to which the poets of all nations turned was inevitable under the circumstances. To the modern reader this statement may need a word of explanation; we tend to think of Italy as the location of ancient Rome and of primitive Christianity, a country primarily interesting only for what it has been. Even while we are there, the great past obscures the present and we go to modern Naples because it is near ancient Pompeii.2 The increased use of iron and coal,-we are living in literally the Iron Age-has transferred the economic power to the northern nations, where these minerals may be found. 1 For the development of English poetry, Italian influence is here considered; the continuity of the French influence is thus broken, as the effect of French prose will be taken up later. 2 Even Baedeker remarks: "In historical and artistic interest this part of the Italian peninsula is singularly deficient. The dearth of handsome buildings and indigenous works of art creates a void, for which Herculaneum and Pompeii with their matchless treasures of antiquity alone in some measure compensate." (!) INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 455 There has been thus a gradual shifting of the center of civilization.' Today no one would seriously compare Florence, for example, with London, Paris, Berlin, or New York as a world factor. But in the early sixteenth century the reverse was true. The Italian princes felt themselves world-leaders, their courts were the most brilliant, and their cities the most beautiful. The reasons for this condition have been outlined before. Partly it was due to the fact that, except in the Lombard plain, chivalry never took deep root, so that, in consequence, the communes developed at the expense of the nobility; partly that the remains of ancient Rome, scattered broadly over the peninsula, preserved memories, however inchoate, of another civilization; partly the geographical situation of Italy, so that its people were the first to come again into contact with the Greek thought preserved in Constantinople; and partly, of course, to the susceptibility of the Italians themselves. However adequate, or inadequate, may be these reasons and others like them, the fact remains true that while the northern nations were still in the transitional stage, in Italy the mode of life was in many respects modern. For the northerner coming to these cities with their paved streets, their great palaces adorned without and within with artistic masterpieces, to a society, polished, elegant, ordered, it was like the entrance to a new world. Into this new civilization Wyatt entered, arriving at Civita Vecchia on the fourth of February, 1527, and reaching Rome on the eighth. On March 2nd, he was dispatched to Venice in place of the ambassador who was ill. Instead of joining the party at Rome via Bologna and Florence, he made a side trip down to Ferrara, on his return from which he was captured by the Spanish troops of the Emperor. In spite of a safe-conduct from the Duke of Ferrara, he was held for a ransom of three thousand ducats. Whether the ransom was paid, or remitted, or whether he escaped is uncertain; all that is known is that on April sixth he appeared at Bologna. Early in May the party returned to England, via Lyons and Paris. The Italy that he had seen in these three months was an Italy distracted by war. The embassy in which he had a part was designed to encourage the Pope, and his journey to Venice was also to bring 1 It is an interesting speculation whether with the increased use of electricity, which may be generated by water-power from the Apennines, Italy may not again come to the fore. 456 EARLY TUDOR POETRY together the Confederates. As a matter of fact it was futile, as the army of the Emperor, under the Connetable de Bourbon marched south and on the fifth of May took Rome. In the first assault the Connetable was killed by a ball from an arquebus,-fired according to his own story by Cellini himself-and the soldiers, left without a leader, put Rome to a sack paralleled only by that of the Goths nine hundred years before.1 With events of this kind going on, it is hard to imagine a young man of twenty-four talking literature! Although it is idle to speculate upon the great and wonderful men he might have met, it is probable that he would bring back an intense interest in the country where he had had so many exciting experiences. It is certain, in any case, that he brought back an interest in Italian literature. This apparently was the opinion in his own day.2 It certainly was the opinion of the next age. Puttenham, writing in the time of Elizabeth, states this definitely: 3 In the latter end of the same kings raigne sprong vp a new company of courtly makers, of whom Sir Thomas Wyat th'elder and Henry Earle of Surrey were the two chieftaines, who hauing trauailed into Italie, and there tasted the sweete and stately measures and stile of the Italian Poesie as nouices newly crept out of the schooles of Dante Arioste and Petrarch, they greatly pollished our rude and homely maner of vulgar Poesie, from that it had been before, and for that cause may iustly be sayd the first reformers of our English meetre and stile. Puttenham here brackets together Dante, Ariosto, and Petrarch. Of the three, it is Petrarch alone that influenced Wyatt. It is quite possible that in his jaunt to Ferrara Wyatt might have met Ariosto, but this hypothetical meeting has left practically no traces in his work.4 Of the other two, in spite of the preference of The celebrated analysis of these events is to be found in the Eighteenth Book of Guiccardini's Historia. Five contemporary accounts have been collected by Carlo Milanesi under the title II Sacco di Roma del MDXXVII, Florence, 1867. 2 Leland (Naeniae in mortem Thomae Viati equitis incomparabilis, 1542) compares him to Dante and Petrarch. 3 Puttenham's The Arte of English Poesie, Arber's Reprint, 74. This commonplace would need no emphasis, had not Lee with a vast amount of ingenuity endeavored to subordinate Italian influence to French. 4 Koeppel (Romanische Forschungen, 5, 72) sees a resemblance in two epigrams to Ariosto. (a) Epigram 4, "The wandering gadlyng" where the comparison is used of a man who starts aside to avoid treading on a snake; the same comparison is used in the Orlando C. 1, st. 11 and C. 39, st. 32; but it is surely com INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 457 the modern reader, it is Petrarch that was the chosen model of the Renaissance. Dante is serious, mystic, grand, but he is not social. He remains austere, with contemptuous indifference for us little men. And to us his work seems the epitome of the great soul of a long distant past. But medievalism was not long distant to the Renaissance; it was the immediate past that they were endeavoring to outgrow and longing to forget, not the superficial past of tourney and court of love, but the real past of the:mind. When it was the fashion to discuss Platonism, and God was mythologized, and the pope was agnostic,-what could such a world find sympathetic in the pages of Dante? They admired him, talked about him occasionally, sometimes read him, but very rarely imitated him. His great stanza, the terza rima, which we today associate with the terrors of Hell and the blaze of Heaven, in their hands was debased to verse epistles and to obscene capitoli. So the presence of the terza rima in a writer of this period suggests a reading quite the contrary from Dante! But if Dante summarizes the past, Petrarch begins the present. In his subjectivity, the consciousness of his own individuality, in his eager curiosity, his love of nature, in the very complexity of his desires and the contradictions of his ambitions, he is modern. During his lifetime he had an immense reputation,-he tells us so himself! That reputation was largely based upon his works in Latin, such as his Eclogues and his epic, Africa. In his own mind and in that of his immediate successors, these Latin works constituted his chief claim to fame. For at least a century they carried the name of Petrarch to the uttermost boundaries of Europe. At the same time that he was composing in Latin, he was gradually accumulating poems in Italian, the Rime, or the Canzoniere.1 This consists of three hundred and seventeen sonnets, twenty-nine canzoni, nine sestine, seven ballate, and four madrigali. It purports to tell of an ideal love lasting twenty years during the life of the Lady Laura and ten years after her death. Interspersed are some occasional pieces, and some attacks. It conmonplace: (b) Epigram 19, "From the hye hilles" where the comparison of love to a flooded river is made; much the same comparison is made in Elegia Quinta v. 7-12. As these were not published until 1537, either Wyatt's epigram is very late, or he learned it verbally, or it is merely a coincidence. 1 In the Willard Fiske Collection in the Cornell University Library there are 430 editions of the Rime (Cf. Catalogue compiled by Mary Fowler, 1916). The edition I shall use is that by Scherillo, Milan, 1908, 458 EARLY TUDOR POETRY stituted, therefore, a fairly large body of verse from which to draw and one which, moreover, offered models for the types of composition most in demand. Woman was taking her place in society, not that of the lonely medieval chatelaine, but that of the modern hostess. In her presence grossness of expression must be refined and pruriency purged away. And however licentious she may be in reality, convention demands that she be considered chaste as Diana and cold as Penelope. Yet, to her, love is the most interesting subject in the world. To such a society it is evident at once how strong an appeal was made by Petrarch's subject-matter. Here all stages and phases of love, delight, desire, despair, regret, are elaborately and delicately expressed. The very vagueness in Petrarch's description of Laura was advantageous; he left the face blank, as it were, so that each lover might fill the space with the portrait of his own inamorata. When a man is in love, his lady surely has the begli occhi, and, unless jetty black, the chiome d'oro of Laura. Still more, all this was done in a series of short poems, imitations of which could easily be slipped into the lady's hand or whispered in her ear as she stood in the embrasure of the window. Other sonnets express thanks for gifts received, turn compliments, congratulate,-it is quite comprehensible, I think, Petrarch's vogue during the Renaissance. Moreover, Petrarch is not only a great poet, he is also a great artist, a conscious artist. These poems, written in the fire of youth and under the immediate stimulus of the events, were later in his old age carefully reworked and re-arranged.l And we have even his own comments upon his sonnets.2 For example, at the head of sonnet 211 is written: Mirum, hoc cancellatum et damnatum, post multos annos casu relegens, absolvi, et transcripsi in ordine statim, 1369, junij 22, hora 23, veneris. Non obstante, pauca postea, die 27 in vesperis, mutavi fine, et de hoc finis erit.... On the lower margin of the page in which sonnet 155 appears is written: 1This is the celebrated Cod. 3195 in the Vatican. Although only one third of this is in the hand of Petrarch, the whole was revised, corrected, and arranged by him. It is the definite copy of the work. 2 Cod. 3196 in the Vatican. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 459 Attende quod hos 4 versus venit in animum mutare, ut qui primi sunt essent ultimi, et e converso: sed dimisi propter sonum principii et finis, et quia sonantiora erant in medio, rauciora in principio et fine: quod est contra rethoricam... Opposite the beginning of the canzone 268 appears: Non videtur satis triste principium... Without citing further, these are enough to justify Sig. Finzi's conclusion: 1 Commenced, one may say, with the ardor of a lover, continued with minute care through more than ten lusters, elaborated, corrected, arranged with the feeling of an artist, the Canzoniere is not a collection of historic and psychologic documents on the love of Petrarch for Laura. It is an elaboration, artistic, slow, and manifold, of the motive which dominated poetry for more than a century in Provence and Italy. On this general motive of art, the poet has grafted the personal motive of his love for Laura, melting the two elements into a work which, on account of its perfection, remains one and indivisible, and wnich cannot be discomposed so that they appear sharply distinct. Fortunately the objective reality of Laura does not concern us here. Whether she be an allegorical figure, or the composite of all Petrarch's loves, or the single dominant love of his life,-and each of these has been argued by eminent scholars, usually with more heat than light-whether the famous note in the Ambrosiana Vergil be a forgery to increase the value of the book (as was believed in the sixteenth century 2) or genuine (as is the more usual view today), and what was her name,-these questions form a veritable morass of scholarship. It is enough to mark the detour but to keep to the turnpike, namely that; the sixteenth century believed the story of the poems. They became interested in the biography of the poet. In 1525 Vellutello published the first elaborate life, the result of his personal research in Avignon. Whereas the quattrocento writers cared little for the life of Petrarch and Petrarca, Giuseppe Finzi; Firenze, 1900, 102. 2 "onde noi tegniamo, che tal epist. sia stata posta in esso libro solamente per far credere che stato sia di lui, e tanto maggiormente, per non esser di sua mano, come affermano tutti quelli, che n'hanno hauuto notitia".. Alessandro Vellutello, 1525.. and through the century. My own edition happens to be 1550..."onde crediamo non esser del Poeta quella Epistola, laquale scritta di sua mano in un Virgilio dicono hauer truouato nella libraria di Pauia.. Giovanni Andrea Gesualdo, 1533. My own edition happens to be that of 1558. 460 EARLY TUDOR POETRY imitated individual sonnets, the cinquecento discussed elaborately biographical problems and regarded the whole as an unified work of art. There are two sharply differentiated phases in Petrarchan imitation, (a) the quattrocento imitation of separate poems, and (b) the cinquecento imitation of the Rime as a whole. As confusion reigns without this distinction I have tried to mark it by calling the first Petrarchism and by keeping the Italian term Petrarchismo for the second.1 The second need not detain us long, and the reasons for its existence in Italy do not here concern us.2 The main fact is that under the leadership of Bembo, who had edited the first Aldine edition, Petrarch was accepted as the great literary model, and that imitations of his Rime filled the air. But it was not only this. It passed into imitations of imitations; it became an insincere literary fashion in which Petrarch figures only as the first of the type. It was this last that spread over Europe the last half of the century. M. Pieri defines it thus:3 Petrarchismo is the art of treating cleverly and wittily matters of the heart, of composing love-poems without the emotion in the soul, of feigning passion for an imaginary mistress, and of singing a fiction of amorous intrigue, whose phases and whose stages are fixed, and, as it were, established by an immovable tradition. To succeed in this type our sixteenth-century poets needed only a little learning and imagination, a great deal of memory, and a certain ability in the art of composition. This type is quite familiar to the English reader in the Amoretti of Spenser, the Delia of Daniel, the Idea of Drayton, or any of the other Elizabethan sonnet-cycles. Although Petrarchismo did not affect Wyatt, it is important because it did affect his commentators. In the England of the sixteenth century biographic details are very rare. Quite naturally therefore, scholars, not understanding the nature of the fashion, seized upon such sonnet-cycles as being the outpourings of the heart of various poets.4 The monumental edition of Wyatt by George Fred. Nott was brought out 1 Cf. Definition of Petrarchismo, Pub. Mod. Lan. Ass. 1909, XXIV, 4. 2 This has been brilliantly expressed by Arturo Graf, Attraverso il Cinquecento, 1888. ' Marius Pi6ri, Pttrarque et Ronsard, 1896, 268. 4Cf. The Preface to Sir. Sidney Lee's Elizabethan Sonnets, or his chapter in the Cambridge History of English Literature 3, 281. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 461 in 1816 when the romantic movement was at its height. Quite in accordance with the strictest principles of romance, he finds Wyatt involved in a beautiful, but hopeless, passion for Anne Boleyn.1 As no regular detail of the history of Wyatt's attachment to Anne Boleyn has been preserved, we must be content to connect the few facts we do know respecting it by conjecture... Anne Boleyn's personal charms and manners were such as could not but have attracted Wyatt's admiration, whilst his own were of a nature likely to make an impression upon her youthful and susceptible mind... It is true that Wyatt was then a married man; and that he therefore could not aspire to more than Anne Boleyn's confidence and friendship. These she deemed herself at liberty to give.. Thus circumstanced, we may believe Wyatt and Anne Boleyn to have mutually regarded each other with the lively tenderness of an innocent, but a dangerous friendship. Often, I have no doubt did Wyatt make her the subject of his most impassioned strains: and often did she listen with complacency to his numbers, which, while they gratified her love of present admiration, promised to confer upon her charms some portion of that poetic immortality which the romantic passion of Petrarch had bestowed upon Laura's. Wyatt's attachment for the Queen "as virtuous as she was beautiful "-to judge from her portraits this at least is true!-has passed into literary legend. The difficulty with it is that it is confessedly founded upon pure conjecture. Unfortunately I do not know that it can be disproved. It is possible that he did burn with love for Anne, but the facts, as given us by the State Papers, scarcely justify that conclusion. Wyatt must have been married in 1520 or 1521 to Elizabeth, daughter of Thomas Brooke, Lord Cobharn,2 that is when he was about eighteen years old. As marriages then were arranged by the parents, this does not necessarily mean that he had been in love. He must have just left college. From this date he, and presumably his wife, were at the Court, as entries show that he was employed in "the King's affairs in the north" on three occasions. And on Christmas day, 1525, he took part in a tournament. On the other hand, Anne, born 1503 and educated in France, began her life at the English Court in 1522.3 Her sister, Mary, at about this time was Henry's mistress. Her interest lay in getting 1 The Works of Surrey and Wyatt, Geo. Fred. Nott, 1816, I, xx. 2 In the inquisition on his affairs dated January 8, 1543, his son is described as being "of the age of twenty-one years and upwards." Nott, 2, lxxiv. 3 For the facts in Anne's life consult Friedman's Anne Boleyn, 1884, and Martin Hume, Wives of Henry VIII, 1905. 469 EARLY TUDOR POETRY married and in 1526 she won Henry Percy, the eldest son of the Duke of Northumberland; but the engagement was broken, perhaps by the order of the King.1 In March 1526 Wyatt accompanied Sir Thomas Cheney to France. As for the next six years Wyatt was abroad for the greater part of the time and Anne herself was occupied with the King, the love affair must have occurred either before his foreign travels, or on his return in 1532. If before, Wyatt was superseded not by one rival, but by two. To his contemporaries it would not have been the King that snatched her away; it would have been young Percy, a fact that appreciably lessens the romance. On his return he was present at the coronation. Under the date of May 15, 1534, a letter to Lord Lisle, then commandant of Calais, gives the information that Wyatt had been sent to the Fleet prison on account of an "affray" with the sergeants of London, " in which one of the sergeants was slain."2 Up to this time, so far as the records show, there is nothing to connect him particularly with Anne. He must have known her, their fathers were friends, and they were both at Court, but even that is inferential. The record shows him to have been a young married man, within the narrowest circle of the Court, and of recognized ability, but turbulent. That is all. There are two circumstances, however, that lend support to the traditional theory. The first of these is connected with the execution of Anne Boleyn. Beginning with May-day, 1536, when Cromwell wrung by torture a confession from Mark Smeaton, to May 19, when Anne herself went to her death, all England was vitally interested in the question of the extent of the guilt of the Queen. And this interest was not merely sentimental. The question affected the legitimacy of Elizabeth and the succession to the throne. Mary, the child of Katherine of Aragon, the hope of the old, the Catholic party, had been rendered illegitimate by the divorce.3 Although the law of 1534 had declared Elizabeth legitimate, a confession of Anne to Cranmer, in alleging some mysterious 1 Cavendish's Life qf Wolsey. This is easily accessible in the New Universal Library. 2 I am following here Professor Simonds identification. 3 The word divorce is, of course, misleading; neither Henry, nor Katherine, would have used it-according to the one, no marriage had taken place; according to the other, no "divorce" was possible. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 463 impediment to the marriage, rendered her status doubtful. As the Duke of Richmond died July twenty-second of this same year, and as later only the sickly Edward stood between his half-sisters and the crown, during the sixteenth century the question could never be discussed impartially. To the Catholic party Anne was the object of all abuse, and to the Protestants a belief in her pearl-like innocence was an article of faith. Nor does this stop with the accession of Elizabeth, for the claim of Mary Queen of Scots to the English throne perpetuated the discussion. Consequently the statement of every author of the sixteenth century is biassed by his party views. The question cannot be said to have been settled today. State trials were then largely a matter of form and the guilt of the accused was decided before the trial began. Hearsay evidence was admitted, back-stairs gossip, twisted scandal, casual conversations,-and the verdict was pronounced. Whether or not guilty, Anne was sacrificed in the game of high politics. The subject concerns Wyatt, since on the tenth of May he was imprisoned in the Tower. The whole problem turns on the question of the charge. There is no doubt that to the minds of his contemporaries the reason for his arrest was because, with the others, he was involved with the Queen. A correspondence of John Hussey to Lord Lisle proves this, and a note from Chapuis.1 And this belief was not confined to the Court.2 Therefore, it is not surprising to find in the partisan accounts, written about 1550 when the question of the succession was uppermost, that Wyatt is listed in the number of Anne's criminal lovers, with the actual conversations given and the circumstantial details that are characteristic of such publications, and in process of time it passed into a family tradition. Thus there is no difficulty in finding writers that believe firmly in Wyatt's love, in the last analysis based upon the fact of his imprisonment at this time. But it is quite possible that his being imprisoned at this time was merely a coincidence. As this view is not often expressed it is worth while to state it fully. In the first place this seems to have been the opinion of Wyatt himself! When in 1541 he was again imprisoned on a political charge arising from his embassies, one of the reasons given for thinking him guilty of treason was his anger on account 1 These are given in full by Simonds, op. cit., 34. 2Spanish Chronicle of Henry VIII, ed. Martin Ilume. 464 EARLY TUDOR POETRY of the imprisonment in 1536. In an "oration" to the judges, he elaborately refutes this: 1 For it is so far from my desire to revenge that I never imputed to the King's Highness my imprisonment; and hereof can Mr. Lieutenant here present testify to whom I did ever impute it. Yea and further; my Lord of Suffolk himself can tell that I imputed it to him, and not only at the beginning but even the very night before my apprehension now last... This is important because the persons whom he was addressing must have known the true cause, and must have heard the Anne Boleyn story. If, therefore, he was giving the wrong interpretation to the former imprisonment, he was making an extremely poor case. But his conception of the reason for the charge is indirectly sustained by the correspondence of his father.2 On May 7th, Sir Henry writes that, as he can do his duty to the King in this dangerous time that his Grace has suffered by false traitors, he desires his son to give the King due attendance night and day. He ends by expressing the pious hope that the false traitors be punished as an example to others. By the eleventh he has learned of the news, apparently from Cromwell: 3 After thanking him he adds: And whensoever it shall be the king's pleasure with your help to deliver him, that ye will show him that his punishment that he hath for this matter is more for the displeasure that he hath done to God otherwise, wherein I beseech you to advertise him to fly vice and serve God better than he hath done. and in a later letter to Cromwell he tells him that he has enjoined upon Thomas "the leaving of such slanderous fashion as hath engendered unto him both the displeasure of God and his master." Now, if Wyatt had been imprisoned on suspicion of complicity of adultery with the Queen of England, such expressions would entitle the correspondence to take rank among the curiosities of literature. If the crime for which four men had just been executed was in Sir Henry's mind merely "vice" and a " slanderous fashion," the mind is awed at the thought of what he would consider criminal! The rational explanation is that in 1536, also, Wyatt had en1 Nott, op. cit.,., 299-300. 2 This first letter is quoted from Simonds, op. cit., 32 note. 3Aldine ed. 1866, XX-XXII. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 465 gaged in an "affray"; this time unfortunately, instead of the mildmannered cits, he had encountered the retinue of the Duke of Suffolk, so that he found himself in the Tower. It may be thought this conjecture will help in explaining the lacunse in a badly mutilated letter from Kyngston, Keeper of the Tower, to Cromwell reporting Anne's behavior.l.... I also sayd Mr. Page and Wyet wase no than she sayd he ha... one hys fyst tother day and ys here now bot ma...... I shall desyre you to bayre a letter from me... Secretary... e hath asked my wyfe whether hony body makes theyr beddes.... y wyf ansured and sayd, Nay, I warant you; then she say... y might make balettes well now, bot there ys non bot... de that can do it. Yese sayd my wyf Master Wyett, by.... sayd trew. Following Professor Simonds, one is tempted to read: "Then she said, he had hit one (with) his fist the other day and is here now, but may soon be released..." But conjecture aside, the conversation shows on the part of Anne no appreciation of possible danger to Wyatt. Nor was there any danger, since he was shortly released, knighted, and sent on an embassy, surely a curious result to come from an arrest on such a charge and from such a king as Henry VIII. Consequently, while it is possible to explain the stories as arising from the imprisonment, it seems to me impossible to reconcile the incidental reference in the correspondence with the details of the stories. And of the two we know that the correspondence is genuine. If this be true, we must bid a long farewell to a romantic tale that has steadily held its own for three centuries. In this connection there usually follows, apparently as sort of palliation for Wyatt's presumed relations with the Queen, a statement that his marital relations were unhappy. In the Calendar of State Papers the first reference to this is on March 29, 1537, in a letter from Lord Cobham, Wyatt's brother-in-law. I beg you will be so good lord to my poor sister Wyatt as to write your favorable letters to Mr. Wyatt before his departure (appointed to be on Saturday next from Dover) desiring him to remember his poor wife and give her something reasonable towards her living, for Mr. Palmer sent her to me to Cobham Hall, saying Mr. Wyatt would not find her any longer. I used every effort to make him grant her some honest living, but he would promise nothing. I wrote 1 Quoted from Simouds, op. cit., 33 (note). 466 EARLY TUDOR POETRY to Sir John Russell to speak to him, and he said he would give her something, but soon after told my servant he would not. I also got Sir Wm. Hawte to break the matter to him, and Master Henry Wyld and his brother, but all to no purpose. It will be remembered that on his return from this embassy he was sent to the Tower "so bound and fettered that one must think ill." Marillac the writer of this, January 18th, 1541, thus continues: It is the third time Hoyet has been there, and apparently it will be the last, for this must be some great matter and he has for enemies all who leagued against Cromwell, whose minion he was. The earl of Rotellan, of the house of "Clerence," his father-in-law, will do his worst, because Hoyet treated his daughter badly, whom he took in adultery and afterwards defamed. Although he is more regretted than any man taken in England these three years, both by Englishmen and strangers, no man has the boldness to say a word for him, and by these fine laws he must be judged without knowing why. As has already been said, he was pardoned. The conditions of the pardon are told by Chapuys to the Emperor, March 2lst. The Queen,-by this time it is Katharine Howard,took occasion to ask release of Wyatt, which the King granted, though on hard conditions, viz. (1) that he should confess his guilt, and (2) that he should take back his wife from whom he had been separated upwards of 15 years, on pain of death if he be untrue to her henceforth. This may have been spontaneous chivalry on Henry's part but an entry, February 9th, of the following year, 1549, casts a rather sinister shadow: She to whom, for the time he (Henry) showed most favor and affection was the sister of Lord Coban and the wife whom Mr. Hoyet repudiated for adultery. She is a beautiful girl with wit enough, if she tried, to do as badly as the others. As this same year her son was twenty-one she must have preserved her beauty remarkably. And this same year, also, Wyatt died. In spite of his having defamed her, she married again, and died in 1560. Apparently in the opinion of the age, adultery was not a serious bar to marital relations, and Wyatt's objections to it were unusual. But under these conditions his attitude was somewhat inconsistent, if at the same time he had entered into a similar relation with the wife of his lord and master. Of course the horridness of such a story as this of Wyatt and Anne can never be INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 467 absolutely disproved. All that can be (lone is to show the balance of probability. There was then some intimacy. Margaret Wyatt, his sister, accompanied Anne to the scaffold and received from her a book of prayers. Now surely it is scarcely credible that Margaret went with the queen with the expectation shortly of accompanying her own brother to a similar scene on account of the same woman. Trifling as such an incident may seem, it is certainly worth as much in evidence as a detailed account of a conversation that took place a century before. All things considered, then, it seems as if the weight of evidence was against the traditional story. But the main argument against the tradition lies in the character of the poems themselves. Actually they do not belong to the cinquecento but to the quattrocento; they are examples, not of Petrarchismo, but of Petrarchism. Even whatever degree of actuality may be in the Elizabethan sonnet-cycles, it is not present here. This is not a scholastic distinction. It means that each poem is a separate translation, or imitation, of an Italian piece, unrelated to those that precede or follow. The importance of this as affecting the romantic tradition is evident at once. Clearly the lover, who, to celebrate the charms of his ideal, turns to translation for inspiration, is not much in love. His passion is of the head,pnot the heart. And these poems are translations. Of the one hundred and twenty pieces in the Egerton MS. his most recent editor thinks the " source " has been found for seventy-three. Although I question many of these sources-such as the Marot poems for example,-the conventionality of Wyatt's efforts is unquestionable. It does not by any means follow that the remaining third were original, that the sources for them may not yet be found. The tale of wreckage, due to finding Wyatt's innermost sentiments in a poem that often turns out to be a mediocre translation from a foreign original, is not yet told! The writers of established reputation that Wyatt found in Italy, the authors of the quattrocento, are unfortunately not well known today. Of few are there modern editions, the early editions are not accessible, and are known only to the Italian specialist. But the Italian specialist is ignorant of Wyatt. II Pistoia (d. 1505) thus lists the great poets: 1 1 Rime di Antonio Cammelli detto II Pistoia, per cura di A. Cappelli e S. Ferrari, Livorno, 1884, 51. 468 EARLY TUDOR POETRY In rima taccia ognun, che '1 pregio e dato; Dante e Petrarca e quel ch'ogn'altro affrena; Timoteo fa in un anno un verso a pena; arguto e il Tebaldeo, ma poco ornato; Serafin solo per la lingua e grato; Sasso e un flume che argento e sterpi mena; Cortese ha molto ingegno e poca vena; Vincenzo ha un stil da se solo apprezzato; II Corregia alti versi ornati e asciutti; Actio Partenopeo culto et ignudo: Jacomo un bel giardin con pochi frutti; Cosmico e come lui scabroso e crudo; Carraciol, Cariteo, son vani tutti; Bernardo e un grane d'or nel fango nudo. Tanto ch'alfin concludo, che nullo vale, e ognun la palma aspetta: ma quel sa meglio dir che piu diletta. In another sonnet he includes Lorenzo, Pierino, Poliziano, Benivieni, Baccio Ugolino, I1 Lapacino, II Franco, Bellincion, and of course Boiardo. But these are only the most prominent. As he says, II serebbe un fracasso s'io te volesse dir de tutti quanti, bisognaria rifarne un Ognisanti. Add to these lists those writers that published in his lifetime, and those also whose poems he may have seen in manuscript, and the number becomes too onerous for the scholar in English. And, moreover, the work would be futile. Even were other sources discovered, it would merely confirm the present opinion, for surely enough has been done to justify generalization. And finally it is more important for the student of English to study what he did with the poem when he got it, than to seek for other originals. Wyatt's poems then, may be divided into his short pieces, his satires, and his psalms, probably written for the most part in that order. In his manuscript these short pieces are grouped according to the form, rondeaux, sonnets, epigrams, and miscellaneous poems. Even in the first group, where purely French influence might be INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 469 expected, the subject-matter of the whole of the first rondeau is taken from Petrarch, and the first five lines of the seventh.l He seems to have had the notion that in some way the rondeau was a possible equivalent for the Italian madrigal. In the first he makes an attempt to render his author in so far as the form allows; in the second, the Italian merely gives him his start. Apparently the transformation was unsatisfactory. Perhaps for that reason he translates the sonnets in the sonnet form. And he translates them incredibly literally. Anyone who has ever written sonnets will remember the difficulty in handling the form; anyone who has ever tried to translate a sonnet will appreciate the tour de force of the following rendition. It is almost word for word. In order to illustrate this, I shall break the first sonnet into pieces and interpose the two versions.2 Cesare, poi che'l traditor d'Egitto Li fece ii don de l'onorata testa, Celando l'allegrezza manifesta, Pianse per gli occhi fuor, si come e scritto; Cesar, when that the traytor of Egipt, With thonorable hed did him present, Covering his gladnes, did represent Playnt with his teres owteward, as it is writt: Et Anibal, quando a l'imperio afflitto Vide farsi fortuna si molesta, Rise fra gente lagrimosa e mesta, Per isfogare il suo acerbo despitto. And Hannyball, eke, when fortune him shitt Clene from his reign, and from all his intent Laught to his folke, whom sorrowe did torment, His cruel dispite for to disgorge and qwit. E cost aven che l'animo ciascuna Sua passion sotto '1 contrario manto Ricopre co'la vista or chiara or bruna; 1 In Foxwell's Study, 76,-78 the original discoverers of all of Wyatt are carefully listed. To this table the reader is referred. 21 am using the Scherillo text of Petrarch, the modern edition must carefully following Cod. 3195 Vatican. 470 EARLY TUDOR POETRY So chaunceth it oft, that every passion The mind hideth, by color contrary, With fayned visage, now sad, now mery: Per6, s'alcuna volta io rido o canto, FAcciol perch'l non ho se non quest'una Via da celare il mio angoscioso pianto. Whereby if I laught, any tyme or season, It is: for bicause I have nother way To cloke my care, but under sport and play. Clearly there is no question here of vague influence, or even of imitation. It is not only translation, but surprisingly accurate translation. But of the thirty-two sonnets eighteen are practically of this character. And of the eighteen, all but one, the Sannazaro already discussed, are taken from Petrarch. And there are two more where the idea may have come from an Italian source. So far as the sonnet is concerned, there can be no question that Wyatt went to Italy. Of these sonnets there are two usually quoted for their autobiographic value. The first is a version of the CCLXIX Sonnet of Petrarch. As this is an extreme case, even at the risk of inevitable boredom, it is better to quote it entire. Rotta e l'alta colonna e'l verde lauro Che facean ombra al mio stanco pensero; Perduto ho quel che ritrovar non spero Dal borea a l'autro, o dal mar indo al mauro. The piller pearishd is whearto I lent: The strongest staye of myne unquyet mynde; The lyke of it no man agayne can fynde, Ffrom East to West, still seking thoughe he went. Tolto m'hai, Morte, il mio doppio tesauro Che mi fea viver lieto e gire altero; E ristorar nol p6 terra n6 impero, Ne gemma oriental, ne forza d'auro. To myne unhappe! for happe away hath rent Of all my joye, the verye bark and rynde; And I (alas) by chaunce am thus assynde Dearlye to moorne till death do it relent. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 471 Ma se consentimento e di destino Che posso io pil se no'aver l'alma trista, Umidi gli occhi sempre e'l viso chino? But syns that thus it is by destenye, What can I more but have a wofull hart, My penne in playnt, my voyce in wofull crye, Oh nostra vita ch'e si bella in vista, Com'perde agevolmente in un matino Quel che'n molti anni a gran pena s'acquistal My mynde in woe, my bodye full of smart. And I my self, my self alwayes to hate Till dreadfull death, do ease my dolefull state. There is practically no doubt that the Petrarchan sonnet was written on the events of 1348, when the Cardinal Giovanni Colonna died, and also Laura. The first line, therefore, opens with a pun. There is no doubt, also, that Wyatt knew this, since all the early commentators carefully explain the allusions. It will be noticed that this is not an exact translation, that all allusions to the laurel and the double treasure are omitted, and the last half of the sextet differs radically. The question then arises whether this sonnet was not written in commemoration of the fall of Cromwell, July 28, 1540. This is almost invariably answered in the affirmative. The general opinion may be illustrated by the note appended by Miss Foxwell: L1. 12-14 are original, and though less poetical than Petrarch's conclusion express Wiat's sincere feeling, and show also that he had a definite purpose in writing this Sonnet. It is evidently late, and the sentiment expressed fits in with Cromwell's fall in 1540. Since he had in no way been responsible for Cromwell's fate, it is hard to understand why he should hate himself; since Cromwell had been his protector, "whose minion he was," there was every reason for anxiety concerning his own future and his own safety. Under the circumstances if all that he could do was the frigid sonnet with its lame and impotent conclusion, —its perishing pillars and the bark and rind of joy-one cannot have a high estimation of his poetic ability. If, on the other hand, it be considered a prentice piece,-that in the sextet, for instance, he was caught by the rime 472 EARLY TUDOR POETRY "destiny" and did the best he could,-its presumable early date would excuse its lack of either art or feeling. Much the same line of reasoning applies to the other, Sonnet 3: Who so list to hount: I know where is an hynde, But, as for me: helas, I may no more. The vayne travail hath werid me so sore, I ame of theim, that farthest cometh behinde Yet, may I by no means, my weried mynde Drawe from the Der; but as she fleeth afore Faynting I folowe. I leve of therefore: Sins in a nett I seke to hold the wynde. Who list her hount: I put him oute of dowbte: As well as I: may spend his tyme in vain. And graven with Diamonds in letters plain: There is written, her faier neck rounde abowte: Noli me tangere for Caesars I ame And wylde for to hold: though I seme tame. To the modern reader the allegory seems clear; the last two lines can refer only to Anne Boleyn and the King. But, as Nott pointed out a hundred years ago Wyatt's sonnet is only a re-working of a sonnet by Petrarch.l Allegorizine the lady as a milk-white hind was usual,2 and the phrase Noli me tangere qum Caesaris sum was a proverb. Romanello, also, has a sonnet in which, like Wyatt's, both ideas are combined.3 And the interpretation of the Petrarch sonnet by Wyatt's Italian contemporaries is only that Laura is married.4 But if that be the idea Wyatt is trying to convey, it surely would not apply to Anne, unless it were written after 1532. On the other hand, if the Caesaris sum refers only to the Julian laws of adultery, as the Italian commentators aver, the Wyatt may have been written to any married woman at any time, or it may again be merely an effort at translation. The safer position, surely, is to assume in Wyatt's work no autobiographical value until that value is proved. But not only are Wyatt's sonnets for the most part translations, imitations and adaptations of Petrarch, those chosen have proven 1 Sonnet CXC. 2Cf. Boccaccio's Decamerone IV, 6. 3 Romanello's Sonnets are published together with La Bela Mano of Giusto de'Conti, ed. by Mazzuchelli, Verona, 1753. 4 Petrarca, ed. Leonardo, 1533. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 473 the least permanent in the Rime. Part of Petrarch's inheritance from the Provengal troubadours was the purely intellectual type of poem wherein a metaphor is first selected and then pursued to its last ramification. For this no poetic feeling is required; the brain is scourged to think out the analogies. And it is this type that Wyatt preferred. This was pointed out, long ago, by Warton, in a passage that has never been bettered.1 It was from the capricious and over-strained invention of the Italian poets, that Wyat was taught to torture the passion of love by prolix and intricate comparisons, and unnatural allusions. At one time his love is a galley steered by cruelty through stormy seas and dangerous rocks; the sails torn by the blast of tempestuous sighs, and the cordage consumed by incessant showers of tears: a cloud of grief envelopes the stars, reason is drowned, and the haven is at a distance. At another, it is a Spring trickling from the summit of the Alps, which gathering force in its fall, at length overflows all the plain beneath. Sometimes it is a gun, which being overcharged, expands the flame within itself, and bursts in pieces. Sometimes it is like a prodigious mountain, which is perpetually weeping in copious fountains, and sending forth sighs from its forests; which bears more leaves than fruits; which breeds wild-beasts, the proper emblems of rage, and harbours birds that are always singing. In another of his sonnets, he says, that all nature sympathises with his passion. The woods resound his elegies, the rivers stop their course to hear him complain, and the grass weeps in dew. These thoughts are common and fantastic. Of course it is at once obvious that such poems are more easily imitated. When once the original conception,-such as the lover, as hunter, chasing the loved one, as deer, who is unapproachable because another's,-is adopted, language is no bar; like a geometrical problem it may be expressed as easily in English as in Italian, and it cannot be said to have lost in the transference. Owing to the difficulty of the sonnet form certain modifications are almost inevitable, but such modifications neither detract from the poem, nor add to the originality of the poet. Such translation is a game of solitaire, played primarily for amusement, a contest between the writer and the language. For such a purpose poems expressing delicate shades of poetic feeling are too difficult; they defy translation. Perforce the writer must choose such pieces as can be transferred from one language to another. And the ornamentation will consist in balance and antithesis, 1 Warton, ed. 1840, 3, 45-46. I prefer this to the 1871 edition by Hazlitt, since in that the method of editing seems curiously eclectic. 474 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Pace non trovo, e non ho da far guerra I fynde no peace and all my warr is done. Poetry of this sort abounds in the quattrocento writers, each of whom, the center of his own particular little circle, adapted Petrarch to his own particular needs. They followed him, to be sure, but at a respectful distance. As a group they impress the reader as a serious set of men elaborately grinding out complicated conceits. Yet to speak of them as a group is a mistake; there was little communication between them. The similar literary characteristics are due to similar literary demands in the various courts, demands for short complimentary poems, poems to be set to music, light love lyrics, etc., etc. And as Petrarch's work offers models for all such composition, naturally they all accepted him as master. Probably the most popular of these writers was Serafino De'Ciminelli, called from his birthplace Aquila, Aquilano.1 During his short life (1466-1500), in contrast to most of the other writers, he stayed for some time at each of the various courts, Naples, Rome, Ferrara, Mantua, Milan, Venice,-almost all the literary centers, in fact, with the exception of Florence. Consequently these peregrinations gave him a vogue the length and breadth of Italy. During his life he was too much occupied in composition to publish;2 but immediately after his death, beginning with 1509, the press poured forth edition after edition, so that before Wyatt's arrival in Italy twenty-one editions had already appeared. I do not think it is difficult to understand the cause of his popularity. He has a distinct vein of sweetness and a lyric quality that make some of his verses charming. It is quite comprehensible, to a certain degree, what his friend Vicentio Calmeta 3 says of him: 1 The early editions always call him Seraphino; in modem indices he is listed as Aquilano; and sometimes he appears as De'Ciminelli. It may save confusion if it be realized that these are all one and the same poet. 2 The only modern edition is Le Rime di Serafino De'Ciminelli dall' Aquila by Marion Menghini, Collezione di Opere Inedite o Rare, Bologna, 1896. Unfortunately only the first volume, containing the sonnets, eclogues and epistles, appeared. Of the early editions I have used the 1508, 1539 (not listed in Vaganey), 1540 and 1550. 3This life was published in 1504 in a collection celebrating his praises. It is fortunately, given in full by Menghini, as the lives prefixed to the early editions are merely conde nsations of this, and refer the reader to it. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 475 Nel recitare de'soi poemi era tanto ardente e con tanto giuditio le parole con la musica consertava che l'animo de li asscoltanti o dotti, o mediocri, o plebei, o donne equalmente commoveva. He sang, quite literally sang, of the passing of youth and the flight of time, of lady's love and knight's despair,-most musical, most melancholy. The criticism of his work is given acutely by II Pistoia in the sonnet just quoted: Serafin solo per la lingua e grato. Unfortunately it is true, that Serafino pleases by the words alone, that there is no thought behind them. His love poems sound hollow, because they are empty. Fortunately this is not inductive; we are told so. Calmeta naively remarks: Non ebbe in soi poemi alcuno particolare amore per oggietto, perche in ogni loco dove se trovava faceva piu presto innamoramento che pigliare case a pisone. Nor does the reader feel this limited only to his love poems. Behind all the words there seems so little feeling. There is such a small quantity of thought to such a deal of words. They need the music to make us forget how little is said, to justify the constant repetition, to eke out the sense by the sound. When Serafino's immense popularity is considered, it was inevitable that Wyatt should imitate him. Not only were the sonnets set to music, but from Chariteo (according to Calmeta) he learned the strambotto, an eight lined verse in ottava rima,the form in which he achieved his greatest celebrity. These differ from the sonnet in that the restricted form allows even less space for the development of the idea, and the termination in a couplet necessarily gives an epigrammatic close. In some cases Wyatt translates very carefully:1 Oogni pungente e venenosa spina se vede a qualche tempo esser fiorita, crudel veneno posto in medicina tal uolta torna lhom da morte uita 'The text is from the 1508. Wyatt's indebtedness has been largely studied by Koeppel. The same poem, however, is assigned by Carducci to Poliziano (Rime 1912, 606). 476 EARLY TUDOR POETRY el foco che ogni cosa arde e ruina spesso resana vna mortal ferita cosi spero el mio mal me sia salute chogni cosa che noce ha pur uirtute. Venemus thornes that ar so sharp and kene, Sometyme ber flowers fayre and fresh of hue: Poyson offtyme is put in medecene, And causith helth in man for to renue; Ffire that purgith allthing that is unclene, May hele and hurt: and if thes bene true, I trust somtyme my harme may be my helth: Syns evry wo is jo) nid with some welth. In other cases only the idea, or some significant phrases, are taken. Wyatt's "Epigrams" show the country of their birth by both content and form. As has been said before, of the thirty-one epigrams all but six are in the ottava rima. It may be granted at once that all these have not been traced to their sources and that many socalled sources are extremely doubtful, yet enough that can be positively shown to be translation has been found to justify the generalization that here also Wyatt's main function was to introduce Italian methods to sixteenth century England. If we may for the moment postpone the discussion of the miscellaneous group and turn at once to the Satires, a new figure is introduced upon the scene in the person of Luigi Alamanni.1 In both life and character he forms a striking contrast to the graceful superficial Serafino. Born of a noble Florentine family, he was educated in the refinements of the time, surrounded by classic monuments of both art and letters. In particular he belonged to the group meeting at the home of Bernardo Rucellai, or rather in the shade of the Orti Oricellari,-a group of which Macchiavelli was a member and Trissino an honored guest,-in which the literary discussions recalled memories of the earlier brilliant circle of Lorenzo. The contrast between these two literary circles shows the development of the Renaissance spirit. Whereas the first was primarily interested in classic culture per se, Alamanni and his friends were primarily interested in bringing Italian culture to the classic levels. This ideal assumed suddenly a practical shape when in 1592, 1Cf. Luigi Alamanni, par Henri Hauvette, Paris, 1903. To M. Hauvette I am indebted for all the facts of the life. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 477 following the examples of Harmodus and Aristogiton, they entered the plot to restore the liberties of Florence by the assassination of Giulio de'Medici. Unhappily the Cardinal, when the plot was betrayed to him, was unable to appreciate the beauty of classical precedent, and Alamanni escaped into exile with a price upon his head. Until the middle of 1527 he lived a life of enforced leisure, indefinite waiting, and postponed hopes. In the spring of 1527 he was at Lyons, the French gate to Italy, and in all probability he was there, when Sir John Russell, with Wyatt in his train, passed through. And apparently by that time he had written his satires, which were first published in his Opere Toscane 1532-1533. On the expulsion of the Medici in 1527 he returned to Florence, but shortly, on their return, he is again driven into life-long exile and becomes a pensioner of the French Court. The events of this varied and exciting life find their poetical expression in poems that are always dignified, if somewhat ponderous. Serafino was predominantly a poet, but a poet without much to say; Alamanni has no lack of subject matter, but not very much poetical afflatus. His early training had taught him the value of classical restraint, and restraint of any kind was the last lesson he needed to learn. He takes himself so seriously! As he writes, one feels him wondering how the Orti Oricellari will like this verse, and how he may justify it. The inevitable result is negative; the absence of faults is balanced by an absence of virtues,-the type of work so distressing to critics, wherein. all rules are carefully preserved, no blemishes to be condemned, and yet without the impression of the personality to vitalize it. Of all forms of writing where such a negative becomes a positive, the chief is surely the verse-letter. Here a minor writer may be excellent merely by being himself. Consequently Italian literature of the period is flooded by such compositions, call them satires, letters, capitoli, what you will, wherein the end sought is amusement. The one thing necessary is lightness of touch. Unhappily that is the qualification that Alamanni did not possess. His satires lack both the grace of Horace, and the sting of Juvenal. They are perfectly good and perfectly commonplace. Also unhappily it is Alamanni that Wyatt chose for his model in satire. Again the simpler method will be that of quotation.1 1 The text is taken from the 1542 edition of the Opere Toscane. Satire X. 478 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Questo fa che'l mio regnio, e'l mio thesoro Son gli'nchiostri & le carte, & piu ch'altroue Hoggi in Prouenza uolentier dimoro. Qui non ho alcun, che mi domandi doue Mi stia, ne uada, & non mi sforza alcuno A gir pe'l mondo quando agghiaccia & pioue. Quando e'gli e'l ciel seren, quando e gli e bruno Son quel medesmo, & non mi prendo affanno, Colmo di pace, & di timor digiuno. Non sono in Francia a sentir beffe & danno S'io non conosco i uin, s'io non so bene Qual uiuanda e miglior di tutto l'anno, Non nella Hispagnia oue studiar conuiene Piu che nell'esser poi nel ben parere, Oue frode, & menzognia il seggio tiene, Non in Germania oue'l mangiare e'l bere M'habbia a tor l'intelletto, & darlo in preda Al senso, in guisa di seluagge fere. Non sono in Roma, oue chi'n Christo creda, Et non sappia falsar, ne far ueneni Conuien ch'A ha casa sospirando rieda. Sono in Prouenza.... This maketh me at home to hounte and to hawke, And in fowle weder at my booke to sitt; In frost and snowe then with my bow to stawke; No man doeth mark where so I ride or goo; In lusty lees at libertie I walke; And of these newes I fele nor wele nor woo, Sauf that a clogg doeth hang yet at my hele. No force for that; for it is ordered so, That I may lepe boeth hedge and dike full well. I ame not now in Ffraunce to judge the wyne With saffry sauce the delicates to fele. Nor yet in Spaigne where oon must him inclyne Rather then to be outewerdly to seme; I meddill not with wittes than be so fyne. Nor Fflaunders chiere letteth not my sight to deme Of black and white, nor taketh my wit awaye With bestlynes; they beestes do so esteme. Nor I ame not where Christe is geven in pray For mony, poison and traison at Rome,A commune practise used nyght and daie. But here I ame in Kent and Christendome,... INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 479 This is a fair illustration of Wyatt's procedure. In the first place he keeps the meter exactly.1 The difficulty of the terza rima in English, owing to the scarcity of riming words, is of course due to the triple rime. In Wyatt's attempt to render the meter, the sense of the original is apt to be lost, the value of the phrase usually goes, and sometimes his lines make no sense at all. Inevitably with so difficult a rime-scheme there is dilution. Part of the dilution may be due to a desire to adapt the original to his own individual conditions. Thus it begins, Myn owne John Poynz, and runs in occasionally local allusions, such as that to Kent in the passage quoted. Of these the most interesting is the substitution for classical reference in the two lines, Praise Syr Thopias for a nobyll tale, And skorne the story that the knyght told.. While such deception is not in accordance with modern ethics, in the sixteenth century property rights in poems were not regarded. Such additions were made for a personal application, or, as in the case of Barclay, for a moral purpose. The difficulty here is to distinguish between additional matter put in for the sake of the meter and that put in to give a more intimate tone. This difficulty is enhanced by the fact that the Alamanni original is insincere; written at a time when he was moving heaven and earth to please Francis Ier, platitudes on the wretchedness of court life strongly suggest the fable of the fox and the grapes. And it cannot be said that the facts of Wyatt's life as we know them indicate that he lived on a superior plane, untouched by the baser motives of the common courtier. His intimacy with Sir Francis Bryan 2 scarcely argues for a lonely moral isolation. The two other satires 1 Saintsbury (Hist. of Prosody, 1, 311) as quoted by Miss Foxwell (Study, 89) comments: "the best name for the metre of the remarkable poems... is probably interlaced heroic couplets".. In a note he adds: "or they may be classed as simply terza rima, unskillfully written, but Wyatt has not got the terza movement at all, indeed quatrains suggest themselves and quintets and almost everything." This remarkable pronouncement must be due to a limiting of the name terza rima to the Dantesque manner; but Wyatt's model is the terza rima of the cinquecento! 2 Cf. 377-380. 480 EARLY TUDOR POETRY follow Horace, but it must be granted that they follow at a respectful distance,-at such a distance that one is tempted to assume an unknown intermediary, which more suo Wyatt has adapted.' But whatever may have been the procedure, these satires form an instructive contrast to the first three of Barclay.2 The vigour of the early writer, due to his use of the concrete instance, has been lost in elegant generality. On the other hand, the somewhat amorphous couplets of Barclay have been replaced by the elaborate terza rima. What has been lost in force has been gained in form. Petrarch, Serafino, and Alamanni,-for, although Wyatt imitates others occasionally, these are his chief sources,-form a curious group without much in common; the final touch is to find that he has copied his version of the Penitential Psalms from Pietro Aretino.3 Aretino is one of the most interesting figures of the Italian Renaissance, because in the midst of sham and convention he dared to be himself. Preeminently he is a realist. Son of a shoemaker, hanger-on of the Papal Court, follower of Giovanni de la Banda Nera, soldier of fortune at Venice, at no period of his active life did he have leisure to learn from books. The world was his school. Although some of his work-and of course it is that that is the best known and most often associated with his name!-is outside the pale of polite conversation, the vitality of his writing, which gave him honor and riches in his own day, has remained.4 After 1530, the year in which the Doge finally succeeded in obtaining his pardon from the Pope, Aretino began composing religious works from motives of policy. The contrast between his life of open, unashamed, boastful licentiousness and these books of a sickly, pious sentimentalism is too extreme; it combines the flaunting of vice and 1 In the Third Satire, which contains the fable of the town mouse and the country visitor, curiously enough the latter mouse is apparently French. It looks very much as though Wyatt had reversed the process used in the rondeaux and put French content into an Italian form. 2 Lengthy illustrations are given from Barclay's satires, pp. 938-242. 3 Miss Foxwell attributes this discovery to Mr. Arundell Esdaile of the British Museum. 4 There is no modern edition of the works of Aretino and there is no writer more misunderstood. For a mass of misinformation the reader is referred to the article in the Encyclopedia Britannica. For a clear and brief summary of his literary position, cf. Arturo Graf, Attraverso il Cinquecento. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 481 the smirking of hypocrisy. The modern reader, as he turns the pages of the Humanitd di Cristo, is too conscious of the painted faces of the harlots grinning over his shoulder, not to experience a sensation of almost physical repugnance. The literary manner is no more pleasing. It consists in taking the scriptural narrative, or the life of a saint, and retelling it with incredible dilution. In 1534, in this way he produced I sette Salmi de la penitentia di David, a wordy prose version of the Psalms, joined together by prologues which give a stage setting. This much may be said in behalf of this production. Any rendition of the Bible into the vulgar tongue, especially if it were uncontaminated by Lutheranism, was a novelty, and the Psalms themselves are so fine that even Aretino cannot completely ruin them. As the public is apt to confuse art and morality, perhaps it is not surprising that the book proved popular; there were three Italian editions and one French translation before Wyatt's death.' Evidently Wyatt is to be numbered among the admirers of this curious production. He copies the framework of the prologues, translates some of the prologues, and parts of the Psalms themselves. As in the case of his version of Alamanni's satire, he makes no pretence at representing his author faithfully, and, it is interesting to note, it is the early part of the work that shows the most indebtedness. Later he follows the Vulgate.2 In any case, his main indebtedness to Aretino lies in his conceiving the work from a standpoint purely literary. It is this that differentiates his production from the Psalms of Coverdale, or Sternhold, or Clement Marot. Those were written to be sung. As they were sung, the tendency was to replace the authorized hymns of the Church by them. Moreover, this was the intention of the heretical authors. But there is no such purpose as this in Wyatt. His 1In 1741 Mazzuchelli thus comments: Di tutte l'Opere in prosa che scrisse 1'Aretino, questa sopra i Salmi si puo riputar la migliore, non gia perche diasi da noi fede a quel Predicator Bolognese riferito dallo stesso Aretino, il quale predicando in Venezia, chi vuol vedere, disse, in la penitentia David, leggali, e vedrallo; ma per testimonio anche del Crescimbeni, il quale le chiama degni d'esser letti, e ammirati. La Vita di Pietro Aretino, Padova, 174][, 218. 2 Miss Foxwell tries to show that he is indebted to the Psalter of 1530, because he probably composed them while travelling and the Great Bible would have been cumbersome. Apparently she forgets that Wyatt was brought up on the Vulgate. Moreover the Italian nottulo, the nycticoxax of the Vulgate, while it does mean "bat" also means owl. Wyatt's owl, therefore, does not signify anything. 482 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Psalms were written to be read. The composition is a single unit, where the prologues give the scenery for the dramatic monologues. It is dramatic, therefore, and not lyric, in conception. This is also shown by the fact that whereas the prologues are in the ottava rima, a lyric measure, the psalms themselves are in the terza rima, a purely narrative measure. To discuss the Psalms from this literary point of view is almost impossible for the modern English reader. The superbly beautiful phrasing of the Authorized Version is so familiar that the addition of rime seems cheap and the dilution impertinent. But this necessarily renders him unfair to Wyatt, for the majority of the readers of his age thought of the Psalms in terms of Latin. Any English version was still tentative. Yet it must be granted that the meter chosen was unfortunate. Terza rima is so difficult in English that he is forced to expand the simple lines of the Vulgate. Although naturally the work is better in proportion as there is less Aretino and more Vulgate, even at the best it seems diffuse. For example, the two lines of the Fiftieth Psalm (the Fifty-first in English) read: Asperges me hyssopo, et mundabor; lavabis me, et super nivem dealbabor. Wyatt's version runs: And as the Juyz to hele the liepre sore, With hysope clense,-clense me, and I ame clene; Thou shalt me wash, and more then snow therfore I shall be whight,-how foule my faut have bene. Surely no one can maintain that Wyatt has improved the Authorized Version: Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow. The meter has forced him, not only to unnecessary additions, but also to an awkward inverted order. And Aretino is not responsible here. Among the Italian authors Wyatt not only chose poor models, but he also selected poor examples of their work.1 The ques1 Miss Foxwell (The Poems, i, Introduction, vi), tells us: "At Venice, amongst other great statesmen, he met Navagero and Baldassaro Castiglione, the two INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 483 tion naturally arises, why were these particular poems chosen, when the best of the cinquecento was open to him. The answer to this question is clear from the previous analysis. The one characteristic common to all of Wyatt's translations is that the appeal in them is to the mind, rather than to the heart. The emotional sonnets of Petrarch are passed by in favor of those in which a conceit is carefully worked out; the musical strains of Serafino are ignored to translate an antithesis; the moralization of Alamanni and the sentimentality of Aretino are chosen for intellectual reasons. Each work, whether sonnet or strambotto, whether psalm or satire, is in itself a clearly defined unit. The strambotto is not an undeveloped sonnet, but, from the beginning, the author had a clear perception of exactly what he wished to accomplish; nor is the sonnet by chance a sonnet, but it was originally conceived as a sonnet. However trite this may seem to us, only a glance is needed at the works of his contemporaries to realize that it was a revolutionary conception. There is no place here for poems written "to eschew ydelnes," works that are accretions of years brought together because of a common topic, such as Skelton, or Hawes, or Barclay, or Heywood. Wyatt's works are on a different plane of literary art. This is his great contribution to literature. It is for this reason that the Elizabethans recognized in him the beginning of English poetry, why Puttenham calls him a "lantern of light." And it was perceived even in his own time. Immediately after his death in 1542 Leland, the antiquary, published a volume of Latin elegies in his honor.1 In most of them the worthy antiquary is particularly interested in doing full justice to his own classical learning, so that the result is platitudinous. But in them one can see how one man at least judged him. In one of them Wyatt is held comparable to Dante and Petrarch in the vulgar tongue. There are two others which give exactly the fact here stated. men whose influence was most felt among other nations." Consequently he came under the influence of "the grand" Navagero, Castiglione whose "own married life was ideally happy," and Trissino. While of course it is possible that he met these men on his Italian journey,:just as it is possible that he met an indefinite number of others, as a matter of fact there is no proof that he did. 1 Naeniae in mortem Thomae Viati equitis incomparabilis, Londini 1542. This is reprinted by Miss Foxwell. 484 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Anglica lingua fuit rudis & sine nomine rhythmus Nunc limam agnoscit docte Viate tuam. Nobilitas didicit te preeceptore Britanna Carmina per varios scribere posse modos. That expresses precisely Wyatt's function. In an age, when art in its narrow sense had been lost, in his work the English language did find again the art of omission, did recognize his file, and did learn to write songs in various clearly differentiated forms. For such a purpose as this, obviously, the content of the individual poems is a secondary matter. Whether or not they are autobiographical, whether or not he did love Anne Boleyn, whether or not they are translations, whether or not they express his real convictions,-none of these is particularly important. The important thing is that in his work the early Tudor found examples of a large variety of verse forms, coldly but carefully worked out.' It must be granted that a poet whose primary interest is in form, rather than in content, is not great. Poetic technique, clever phrase, witty conceit go a little way, but only a little way. On the other hand, the great emotions that have aroused poets from the beginning are not present in Wyatt's work. The nature in his poems is of the lion-and-tiger sort drawn from books; beauty apparently makes little appeal; and his love serves merely as the occasion to make far-fetched comparisons. This lack of emotion is apparently one of the reasons why critics call him "virile!" His better poems Miss Foxwell tries to show that Wyatt deduced the principles of his versification from the Pynson Chaucer of 1526. (Study, Chapter VI.) "Wyatt deliberately and conscientiously studied Chaucer with a view of carrying on his method of work, and made his exercise in versification parallel with his introduction of the Petrarchan Sonnet." From that he made rules of versification. "The rules collected from the above include the chief rules of Wiat's versification, such as the slurring of vowels,.. weak syllables ending in vowel-likes (i. e. n, r, 1, n), and slurring of verbal ending '-eth' in the body of the verse; the absence of weak stress after the cwesura, and before the strong stress of the second foot; the casura after the third syllable as in 'pailmers,' and the occasional variety of an octosyllabic line." (The Poems, Appendix D.) In regard to this there are two comments: (a) these "rules" are subjective in that they depend upon the way in which the line is read; (b) Wyatt's versification, like that of his contemporaries, including the Pynson Chaucer, was affected by the principles of the Medieval Latin. In other words, it is unnecessary to discuss Pynson, since Wyatt's versification is that of his age. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 485 are observations of the life around him. In them he has mastered the medium, he carries the structure easily, and at the same time is definite and concrete. They fle from me, that sometyme did me seke 1 suggests an actual occasion, or the epigram written to Bryan from prison.2 But the most successful are those written to be sung. Such poems as My Lute awake! 3 Fforget not yet the tryde entent,4 or Blame not my lute,5 have maintained their place in all anthologies. They deserve all the praise that has been lavished upon them. The union of strength and grace makes a rare and felicitous combination. But in spite of these, and the six or eight more like them, the proposition remains true that for his age Wyatt's value lay, not in the few pieces where the fire of his passion has amalgamated the content and the form into one perfect whole, but in the many others which may not unjustly be called experiments in stanzaforms. Not only is the rondeau, the sonnet, the terza rima, and the ottava rima to be found, he made experiments also with the monorime, the Medieval Latin types of simple triplets with refrains, of quatrains of different combinations of length of line and different rime-schemes, of quatrains with codas, with French forms in the douzaine and treizaine, and finally with poulter's meter. There are even two attempts at what will be later the Elizabethan sonnet. With the exception of the heroic couplet and of blank verse,-two very important exceptions,-most of the stanzas to be used during the century are there. Of course with our ignorance of what the other writers were doing, it is uncritical to assume that all these novelties were first imported by Wyatt,-an assumption that would make him one of the greatest verse-technicians in the history of the language,-but they prove that the minds of the men in the Poems, ed. Foxwell, I, 86. 2 Ibid, I, 62. Ibid, I, 117. This poem is almost certainly Wyatt's since it appears in the Egerton MS. with the signature "Tho". It was assigned to George Boleyn by Park in Nubae Antiquae, 1804 and also in a note to the Warton, because it "in one of the Harrington MSS. dated 1564, is ascribed to viscount Rochford." Whatever Park may have meant in the passage quoted, the Egerton MSS. would take precedence in any case. 4 Ibid.,I, 301. 5 Ibid., I, 303. 486 EARLY TUDOR POETRY circle to which Wyatt belonged were seriously occupied in studying the forms of verse. That Wyatt was a leader in this circle seems probable, not only from Puttenham's statement, but also from the number of manuscripts that have been preserved containing his poems. That he was the founder of a "school" we have no grounds for believing. The variety of his experiments seems to argue that he was still feeling his way, and the imitative nature of them does not suggest a dominating personality.1 He was a fearless diplomat and an accomplished courtier, although apparently quick-tempered. His nature seems to have been grave and sweet, meditating over moral issues.2 And his poems bear out this judgment. Tottel's phrase "the weightinesse of the depewitted sir Thomas Wyat the elders verse" is sound criticism; but that he "reft Chaucer the glory of his wit" is Surrey's exaggeration. The preceding line, however, that he "taught what might be said in ryme" explains the contemporary admiration. If this be true, the assumption may be plausible that such songs as Henry's Pastyme with good companye, Gray's The hunte is vp, Cornysshe's lyrics, etc., etc., represent the work done in the first quarter of the century. Later, George Boleyn, Lord Vaux, Henry Morley, Heywood, Anthony Lee, etc. composed after foreign models. This would explain Tottel's apology "If parhappes some mislike the statelinesse of stile remoued from the rude skill of common eares"... But this is merely an hypothesis. The authors are really little more than names! Of George Boleyn, a volume of whose rhythmos elegantissimos is listed by Bale, one song alone remains and his authorship of that is doubtful. To judge of Lord Thomas Vaux' "maruelous facillitie," 3 two short pieces are given us. Tottel's Miscellany, as we are told in the Preface gives us those poems "which the ungentle horders up of such treasure haue heretofore enuid thee." But 1 Miss Foxwell's comment (op. cit., 2, XX), "Wiat's life and work is a song of harmony. The 'music of the spheres' is here. It is a vindication of what man can become with lofty aim and set purpose," proves rather her sympathetic imagination than her critical ability. Flugel's summary, (Neuenglisches Lesebuch, Halle 1895, Band 1,376-382), is a careful statement of the case. 2 Two letters written by Wyatt while in Spain to his son have been preserved. As they partake of the nature of sermons, one wonders in what mood the son, anxious for news of his father, received these improving epistles. 3 Puttenham, op. cit., 247. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 487 the ungentle horders have done their work! Whatever may have been the "treasures," they are now lost. Of the group Wyatt alone survives. And if, from his work, we may posit conditions and characteristics belonging to the work that is gone, we must recognize that these men consciously followed Italian precedent. But whereas the court poetry of the early Tudors followed the precedent of Italian poetry, there is practically no influence of Italian prose. An occasional book, such as More's Life of Pico, appeared, but in general, so far as the lessons to be learned from the great Italians are concerned, English writers were woefully ignorant. This condition is not surprising., To copy a sonnet requires far less drudgery than to translate a folio history; in the first case, it is possible to conceive it as a pastime, while the second requires application and many leisure hours. Therefore such labor would not be usual in the caste to which Wyatt belonged, the class most open to Italian influence. But Wyatt himself with his two college degrees must have represented a stage far in advance of the majority of the English reading public. The main reason why Italian Prose was not translated is because there was no demand. It was not for half a century that the English people could appreciate the intellectual analysis of a Macchiavelli, or a Guicciardini. The first half of the period was still transitional in its character; the larger part was still medieval. There is a third factor that is scarcely independent of the other two, the introduction of printing. The fact that a book was long, as it made reproduction by hand onerous, made printing the logical solution. So Caxton, when he found that people wished copies of his Recueil des histoires de Troyes determined to learn the art of printing. But the press equally made literature sensitive to the popular demand. As the object in issuing any given publication was to make money by selling it, the inevitable desire was to issue such books as the people would buy. Since the public then was conservative, it followed logically that the early issues of the press in England would be medieval in character, that it served to project medieval conceptions into the early Renaissance. In any discussions of the works of the early printers in England, there are two facts that must be remembered. As printing was a business, the printers were neither well-born nor well-educated. They belonged to a caste very different from any of the authors al 488 EARLY TUDOR POETRY ready discussed. Before their shops they had stalls from which books were sold at retail. To the American reader this may seem to imply an impossibility of intercourse between the printers and the nobility. Actually it did not, nor do the facts support any such contention. Quite the reverse was true. Snobbery is a concommitant of democracy, because when every man is as good as his neighbor, some will think that socially they are a little better. But this self-assumed social superiority requires constant assertion to have it recognized by a careless and egotistic world. With a clearly defined caste system such a condition is impossible. In the army there is no awkwardness in the meeting between the captain and the corporal; the captain is captain and the corporal is corporal. Nor does the corporal by gesture, or speech, try to suggest that he is captain; his rank is on his sleeve and all who run may read. Therefore they meet on terms of complete understanding. The situation was the same between the prince and the printer in the sixteenth century. We are apt to forget this, because to us Caxton (or Shakespeare) is so vastly more important than the casual prince. When Caxton alludes to Skelton, unconsciously we feel that the latter must have been immensely honored! And Skelton was the tutor to the Prince! The importance of this fact, as affecting literary conditions, is that, aside from the great democracy of the Church, the social status was a pre-requisite for formal education. As the early printers did not have this prerequisite, naturally they also lacked the training of the schools. The result was that literature necessarily became popular by the introduction of the press; being popular, it was necessarily conservative. The other fact important for its literary consequences is that for the first half century of its existence in England the press was controlled to a very large degree by foreigners. Although Caxton himself was a native of England, the thirty-five years previous to the establishment of his press in Westminster had been spent upon the continent "for the most part in the contres of Braband, Flandres, Holand and Zeland." After 1476, when Caxton established the first English press, others followed but slowly; Oxford 1478,1479 (circ.) St. Albans, and 1480 John Lettou in London, "but at best the output of books in England was miserably scanty.'" 1 1 am quoting (and utilizing the facts) from A Century of the English Book Trade by E. Gordon Duff printed for the Bibliographical Society in 1905. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 489 Whether or not this was appreciated, in 1484 to the act regulating the conditions under which foreigners might trade in England was put the curious proviso: Provided always, that this act or any parcel thereof, or any other act made or to be made in this said parliament, shall not extend, or be in prejudice, disturbance damage or impediment to any artificer or merchant stranger, of what nation or country he be, or shall be of, for bringing into this realm, or selling by retail or otherwise, any books written or printed, or for inhabiting within this said realm for the same intent, or any scrivener, alluminor, binder or printer of such books, which he hath or shall have to sell by way of merchandise, or for their dwelling within this said realm for the exercise of the said occupations; this act or any part thereof notwithstanding. 1 The result of this may be stated in the words of the same authority:2 The position held by the foreigner in the English book-trade may easily be gauged from the fact that, with the exception of William Caxton and Thomas Hunte the Oxford bookseller, we find no English name in the colophon of any book printed in or for England as printer or bookseller until about the year 1516. The school-master of St. Albans was doubtless also an Englishman, but his name is not known. That there were many English booksellers and stationers at this time is certain, but for some reason or other the foreigner took the lead and the native workman lagged in the background. If this condition be true and the reasoning in the previous paragraph be sound, we should find that, in the reign of Henry VII and the early part of that of Henry VIII, the press was issuing books medieval in feeling and that many of them would be taken from foreign literatures. And as the French predilections of Henry VII are well known, the particular foreign literature drawn upon would be French. But as this favoring of the foreigner passed away,in 1523 it was forbidden for an alien to take any apprentices except English born, and to keep more that two foreign journeymen, and in 1534 foreigners were prohibited from bringing over books to retail,-the foreign influence on English would diminish. At least, that is the condition as shown by the lists of publications. Fortunately interest in the early printing has been sufficient to attract specialists, until we can be fairly certain of what 1Quoted from Duff, op. cit., xi. The original act (Statutes of the Realm, fol. 1816. Vol. ii, p. 493.) is itself in French. 2 ibid, xv. 490 EARLY TUDOR POETRY was published. Without attempting even to state the separate problems connected with Caxton's work, Sir Sidney Lee's list in the Dictionary of National Biobraphy may be taken as a working basis. He enumerates there seventy-one separate works.l Of these about forty per cent come from the French. The surprise caused by this percentage lessens when the entire list is considered. It then becomes evident that, with but an occasional insignificant publication, Caxton has printed no contemporary works, either of English, French, or Latin. There are issues of single works by Chaucer and Lydgate, Gower's Confessio Amantis, from the Latin religious tracts, and Reynard the Fox from the Dutch. Caxton is obviously looking backward. Consequently his publications scarcely concern the student of the Renaissance. They concern the student of the Renaissance only as it can be shown that they affected subsequent work. In the case of Chaucer and Lydgate this is clear. But from the French Caxton took one book that has had a marked influence, Sir Thomas Malory's Morte Darthur.2 This was issued in 1485; before the accession of Elizabeth it had been reprinted three times. The record does not show great popularity, as within a shorter interval the Pastime of Pleasure, for example, had had five editions; nor is it fair to compare the number of editions with the Chaucerian list, since one is prose and the other poetry, whose system of prosody had been forgotten. It is, of course, impossible to measure thus an author's influence by mere quantity; Flaubert's influence on the English prose of the last half of the nineteenth century certainly is not indicated by the number of editions of his translated works. On the other hand, it is certainly true that to the modern reader the value of Malory's book is enhanced by the appreciation of Spenser and Tennyson. "A national epic" Dr. Sommer calls it. But to the early Tudors, ignorant of the future, there was no national epic about it. They took it, as apparently did Caxton, at its face value. Although Caxton's preface is so well known that Duff, op. cit., 24: "The number of books actually printed by Caxton in England, counting separate editions, is ninety-six, and with the three printed at Bruges, and the Missal, he issued exactly one hundred books." 2 The scholarly edition is by H. Oskar Sommer, and published by David Nutt 1889-91. This forms the basis of all subsequent work. It is accompanied with critical apparatus, and an appreciation by Andrew Lang. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 491 it may be omitted here, I may be permitted to refresh the memory of the reader on the main points. Caxton tells us that of the three Christian worthies, the story of Charlemagne is accessible in French and English, and he himself had printed the history of Godfrey of Boulogne, but as the story of Arthur was not at hand, he was asked to print it by "the sayd noble Ientylmen," because Arthur had been "borne wythin this royame and kyng and Emperour of the same." To his reply that some believed "that there was no suche Arthur," the nobleman pointed out the many relics of Arthur then existing, "wherfor it is a meruayl why he is no more renomed in his owne contreye." Thenne al these thynges forsayd aledged I coude not wel denye / but that there was suche a noble kyng named arthur / and reputed one of the ix Worthy / & fyrst & chyef of the cristen men / & many noble volumes be made of hym & of his noble knyghts in frensshe which I haue seen & redde beyonde the see / which been not had in our maternal tongue / but in walsshe ben many & also in frensshe / & somme in englysshe but no where nygh alle / wherfore suche as haue late ben drawn oute bryefly into englysshe / I haue after the symple connynge that god hath sente to me / vnder the fauour and correctyon of al noble lordes and gentylmen enprysed to enprynte a book of the noble hystoryes of the sayd kynge Arthur / and of certeyn of his knyghtes after a copye vnto me delyuerd / whyche copye Syr Thomas Malorye dyd take oute of certeyn bookes of fiensshe and reduced it in to Englysshe / And I accordyng to my copye haue doon sette it in enprynte / to the entente that noble men may see and lerne the noble actes of chyualrye / the Ientyl and vertuous dedes that somme knyghtes vsed in tho dayes / by whyche they came to honour / and how they that were vycious were punysshed and ofte put to shame and rebuke / humbly bysechyng al noble lordes and ladyes wyth al other estates of what estate or degree they been of / that shal see and rede in this sayd book and werke / that they take the good and honest actes in their remembraunce / and to folowe the same / Wherin they shalle fynde many Ioyous and playsaunt hystoryes / and noble & renomed actes of humanyte / gentylnesse and chyualryes / For herein may be seen noble chyualrye / Curtosye / Humanyte / frendlynesse / hardynesse / loue / frendshyp / Cowardyse / Murdre / hate / vertue / and synne / Doo after the good and leue the euyl / and it shal brynge you to good fame and renommee / And for to passe the tyme thys boook shal be plesaunte to rede in / but for to gyue fayth and byleue that al is trewe that is conteyned herein / ye be at your lyberte / Modern scholarship has shown that this is an exact account of the origin of the famous book. Sir Thomas Malory,-and of him we know little more than Caxton tells us 1 —"'reduced" into English Professor Kittredge (Harvard Studies and Notes, vol. v, p. 85) has plausibly united the name to an historic Sir Thomas Mallory. 492 EARLY TUDOR POETRY prose a number of French poems dealing with the Arthur stories.1 The originals were in French, because the subject matter was composed at a time when French was the great dominant language. Of this treatment of the material, as the matter is confessedly beyond my knowledge, I can do no better than to quote in full Dr. Sommer's summary: 2 As regards the special features of Malory's compilation, I trust I have succeeded in clearly exhibiting his merits and demerits as a writer. I have shown that he sometimes added small episodes of his own composition, though as a rule, he contented himself with welding into one the diverse materials that were at his disposal, and that not infrequently he literally translated entire passages from his French, or made large transcripts from his English, sources. We owe the worthy knight a deep debt of gratitude both for preserving the medieval romances in a form which enabled them to remain an integral portion of English literature, and for rescuing from oblivion certain French versions of great value to the critical student. But truth demands that we should not rate him too highly. To put it mildly, his work is very unequal-sometimes he excels, but often he falls beneath, oftener still, he servilely reproduces his originals. Nor can his selection of material be unreservedly praised. Difficulties in procuring certain MSS. may possibly have occurred of which we have nowadays no idea; yet, giving him the full benefit of this supposition, we must still say that he left out many of the most touching and admirable portions of the French romances, and that he has incorporated others of inferior quality. The most marked and distressing instance is his preference of the trivial and distasteful version of the Merlin and Viviene episode as found in the "Suite de Merlin" to the exquisite version of the Vulgate-Merlin, which, in its mingling of wild romance and delicate sentiment, is perhaps the most beautiful and characteristic story of mediaeval literature. Be this as it may, Malory must always be counted as an English classic. As it was not an "English classic" to the early Tudors, the interesting question is how did they regard it, and other romances like it. The answer is to be found in the words of Caxton quoted. Clearly many thought that the whole story was without historical foundation. But scattered through the south of England were numerous relics, the sepulcher at Glastonbury, the seal at Westminster, the round table at Winchester, Gawain's skull at Dover, etc., the local custodians of which, unless the tribe was very different from that of today, fervently believed in their particular relic.3 1 This has all been done with great care by Dr. Sommers, op. cit. 2 Ibid. vol. iii, 294. 3 It must be remembered that the readers of that age were familiar with similar relics of the saints, relics that worked miracles, to doubt which was heresy. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 493 And it must be confessed that a skull is a convincing proof of previous existence! But whether or no Arthur actually existed, the book described the manners of a noble age, from which many lessons might well be drawn. And, lastly, it made amusing reading. In an age when Hawes dared to call his poem The Pastime of Pleasure, surely this last was not to be despised. But so far from the book pretending to import French influence, it was, from the point of view of the sixteenth century, immaterial whether the sources were English, French or Welsh. The attitude was so different from that of this sceptical age of ours that we find difficulty in comprehending it. With historical research we test each fact, scrutinize each text. Contemporary evidence is sought to refute tradition and paleography disproves the statement by the words used in making it. Tell is a myth, Tiberius a model, and the "higher criticism" has shorn the prophets of their prophecies! But in the sixteenth century men did not know, could not know, and did not very much wish to know the historical facts. "History" and "story" had not yet become differentiated. This may be illustrated by Lord Berners. In 1593-25 he translated Froissart's Chronicle at the request of Henry VII. Henry's taste must have been in advance of his age if one may judge by the limited number of editions.1 The size of the publication may have had something to do with its lack of sale, but whatever the reason, it seems clear that to Lord Berners' contemporaries Froissart did not make a strong appeal. Such a fact as this gives one pause. Froissart is such a famous book, and in his amiable accounts of battle, murder and sudden death we ourselves find so much charm, that we infer that they also must have loved it. Froissart is not analytic, and he is not hard reading, and his descriptions are those of one who knows.2 The English version is rendered simply and quaintly-naturally we picture them bending with absorption over its pages. But the fact is that they did not! By the humanists, those to whom the vivid 1 Parts 1 and 2 were printed by Pynson in 1523; 3rd and Ath, in 1524; and vol. 2 in 1525. Then Wiliam Middleton reprinted vol. 1 in two undated issues, but volume one only. As he was admitted a freemen in 1541 and died in 1547,presumably the parts of half Berners' book falls between these dates. 2 Cf. The subtile and sympathetic criticism on Froissart by Mr. William Paton Ker, prefixed to the Tudor Translation reprint of Berners 1901. 494 EARLY TUDOR POETRY presentation of a past age would naturally appeal, it was contemptuously dismissed as "gothic." The others, as yet unaffected by the new culture, had what is to us an astounding credulity, and actuality was matter of minor importance to them. Berners' geography is incredibly inexact. As he naively tells us; 1 as for the true namyng of all maner of personages, countreis, cyties, townes, ryvers, or feldes, whereas I coude nat name them properly nor aptely in Englysshe I have written them accordynge as I founde them in Frenche. Also by his own confession the distances measured in miles and leagues must be understood "acordyng to the custome of the countreis where as they be named"-in other words they mean practically nothing at all! And yet at the very time when he was translating, he was there in France presumably with opportunity to verify the French version. But to verify never occurred to him. Clearly Froissart to him was not an author writing of actual events that he knew personally or from the lips of participants; the interest lay in the narration of the events themselves. This criticism is illustrated by the ease with which Lord Berners turned from translating Froissart to translating the old romances. Incredible as it seems, those impossible adventures were accepted as statements of fact. In Arthur of Little Britain 1 even he seems to have been unable to believe; he fears that it is a "fayned mater, wherin semeth to be so many unpossybylytees." But he comforts himself that in the other "noble hystoryes" there is the same difficulty. Certainly the same difficulty is in the most famous romance that he translated, the Huon of Burdeux.2 The French prose compilation of the Huon stories was published in 1513. Berners' translation, undated, was printed by Wynkyn de Worde, who died late in 1534 or early in 1535. As in the English Huon there is no preface, the assumption is that, although finished before the Golden Book, it was not published until after the death of the translator in March 1533. The date of publication, therefore, is limited to the years 1533-34. Neither did this book have a contemporary success. The second edition is 1570(?) and the third 1601. Certainly this record is not one of overwhelming popularity. 1 For a discussion of Lord Berners and his work, the reader is requested to turn back to pp. 369ff. where the passages are cited at greater length. 2 Published in 1882 for the E. E. T. S. withan introduction by Sidney Lee. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 495 There exists today a curious tendency to overestimate both the literary value and the effect upon literature of such books as this. The scholarly question of the origins of the various stories and their mutual relation is of course fascinating,1 and equally of course it has nothing whatever to do with the sixteenth century. Their interest in the book was not in the analysis of its component parts; they accepted it as the history of an actual man and believed, or half-believed, it as a record of real experience. In other words, in Berners' mind in passing from Froissart to the romances, there was not the transition of moving from history to fiction that there is in ours. To all intents and purposes one was as true as the other, only more interesting.2 To appreciate the full import of this statement it must be remembered that Huon, having slain in selfdefense the son of Charlemagne, is ordered to go to the city of Babylon (Cairo), to the Admiral Gaudys, to cut off the head of the greatest lord sitting at his banquet, to do the same thing to the fiance of the daughter, kiss her three times in presence of the court, to demand a tribute of a thousand hawks, a thousand bears, a thousand hounds, a thousand youths and a thousand maidens, and to bring back a handful of the hair of the Admiral's beard and four of his greatest teeth. On this preposterous errand Huon meets equally preposterous adventures, aided by innumerable unknown relatives and by the fairy king Oberon. He achieves his quest, marries the daughter of the Admiral, and regains his duchy of Bordeaux. Here ends the first part. The continuation relates how, besieged in Bordeaux by the Emperor of Germany, he escapes to seek help,-by this means encountering a whole new series of adventures. It closes by his being appointed the successor of Oberon as King of Fairyland. Having seen Huon established successfully in a highly desirable position, the reader is disheartened by discovering that the romance continues with first the adventures of his daughter, Clariet, then of his grandson, Ide,3 and, finally, of his great-grandson Croissant! This genealogical collection of 1 This is epitomized in Chapters IV, V and VI in the History of the Novel Previous to the Seventeenth Century by F. M. Warren, New York 1895. 2This is outlined (not quite accurately) in Dunlop's History of Prose Fiction, revised by Henry Wilson, 1888, Vol. 1, 294 if. Only the first two parts are here given. 3 At least Ide, who in the opening of the story is a woman, at the close is promoted to manhood. 496 EARLY TUDOR POETRY "unpossybylytees" is told baldly, without poetic imagination and with no sense of humor. According to the tale, Charlemagne actually had a craving for the beard and teeth of the Admiral; it was not, as the modern reader suspects, a ruse to have Huon killed, because he has previously sent fifteen men on the same ridiculous errand! The characters are unmotivated and their actions monotonously unexpected.1 Apparently the one method to assure Huon's performance of any deed is to have it forbidden by authority and contrary to commonsense. The only virtues he possesses are that he is honest and faithful to his love. There seems no remote conception of fair play. He wins by magic, a factor which necessarily gives him an immense advantage. If a man wear enchanted armour that renders him invincible, wherein lies the prowess of his victory? Naturally fiction is not restricted to probable, or even possible, events. Granting the suppositions demanded by the author we may be carried to unknown lands and uncounted perils, and the fact that they are not true does not disturb us provided also that they seem imaginatively true while we are reading. This implies that the author must have learned the art so to treat the impossible that it seems real, that in imagination he must have preceded us, and that he has acquired the knowledge of emphasis and of the convincing detail. Whatever our reason may tell us to the contrary, we feel the tale ought to be true. But this is where Berners, or his original, fails. He does not differentiate between the credible and the incredible, and tells both in the same tone. Now, most adults would admit that the Ugly Duckling, as Anderson tells it, is incredible, yet we all feel its poetic truth. On the other hand, Jack the Giant Killer is appreciated only by children. Intellectually Huon of Burdeux is on the same plane as Jack the Giant Killer. In each case the sole basis of interest is in the 1 Ten Brink, History of English Literature, translated by Dora Schmitz, 1896 iii, 189: "For even though the French prose-version (produced about 1454) lacks strict unity of conception and construction-for, in addition to the nucleus offered by the Chanson de Geste of the twelfth century, it includes also the greater portion of the additions the "Chanson" received subsequently-still it contains so much grace in the narrative and descriptions, such happy motives for the story and the delineation of the characters, that, with some abbreviations, a reader of our day even would find pleasure in perusing it. In Berners' translation the narrative lost nothing of its attractiveness-." Is it credible that the great Dutch scholar never read the book? INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 497 belief in the reality of the events. In the author and in the reader it presupposes the ignorant credulity of the child. And that must have been the condition of Lord Berners and those for whom he wrote. He, probably, to judge from his remarks about Arthur of Little Britain did not think that the incidents were true, but he did not know that they were not true,-a mental condition that is quite different. In his mind there was a large zone of half-belief. Although this was written a dozen or more years after the Utopia, he belongs to an earlier age. To him, the stories came with the weight of tradition. The new geographic discoveries with their startling tales of Indian emperors and of cities of gold would strengthen his power of believing. Also, the action took place in an age long past, "in the tyme acountyde the yere of grace vii.c. & lvi. yere the crucyfyynge of oure Sauyour Ihf Cryst," and he had convincing authority for believing that there were giants in those days. Nor did he have any basis for comparison. Chaucer, with knights as commonplace phenomena, could say satirically 1 Now every wys man, lat him herkne me; This storie is al-so trewe, I undertake, As is the book of Launcelot de Lake, That wommen holde in ful gret reverence.... but to Berners chivalry was only a tradition. He had neither the habit of mind, nor the knowledge, to render him sceptical. How general was this condition among the readers in Lord Berners' generation it is hard to estimate.2 There are indications a plenty,-only one cannot be quite sure what they indicate. For example, in the Elizabethan literature there are numerous allusions to the old romances, but it does not follow from such allusions that the writer had ever read the romance to which he alluded. The names of their heroes had become commonly familiar, suggesting the superman, but quite probably often with no definite romance in mind, just as today in current literature you find Don Juan or Lothario. The hero had become a type. Or the allusion may have 1 The Nonnes Preestes Tale, 4400-03. 2 I heartily second Professor Crane (The Vogue of Guy Warwick, Publications of the Mod. Lang. Ass. xxx, 2.) in wishing a systematic study of the persistence of the romances during the Tudor period, and I confess my indebtedness to his informing article. 498 EARLY TUDOR POETRY been due to childish memories, as we know Jack the Giant Killer.1 An illustration of the nebulous influence of these old romances may be found in the Huon. It will be remembered that early in his adventures Huon encounters the fairy king Oberon, a personage that through two parts of the book plays the important role of deus ex machina. His function seems to be to warn Huon against certain acts and then to rescue him after he has committed them. He is a very beautiful dwarf, a fairy who is yet mortal, and with clearly defined magical powers. There is no question that he was first introduced to English readers by Lord Berners, and he made a strong appeal. When, therefore, we find Oberon as a character in Midsummer Night's Dream, we feel confident that we know one book that was in Shakespeare's library. Actually the two characters have scarcely one trait in common, except the name. Surely to assume that Shakespeare gave to his character a name somewhat vaguely associated in his mind with the King of the Fairies, is more probable than to think that he made use of Berners' work only to change the conception. To Lord Berners, however, must be granted the credit-the amount of which each may figure for himself, —of introducing the name into English literature. Another method of estimating the influence of the old romances is to consult the bibliographical records. The limitation of this method is that we do not know the number of copies to each issue, nor even whether the number was uniform. Huon of Burdeux, for example, survives in a unique copy. As it is a long work, if it had been a large edition the probability is that there would be now more copies, or at least fragments. If it were a small edition, naturally the number of possible readers would be correspondingly limited. A relative estimate may be made, as Pynson, for example, printed over three hundred books of which only three are romances. This proportion does not argue an immense popularity. And it is not surprising. During the period that Pynson was printing humanism was most active, and humanism, as we have seen, was strongly opposed to the medieval romances.2 Although humanism could never have been popular, in the early days of the press the It is probable that not one of my readers for pleasure only has read that fascinating tale since childhood, and it is equally probable that not one has failed to understand the allusion. 2 Cf. pp. 323-326. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 499 humanists must have been exceedingly influential with that part of the public that bought books. Also, with the increased facility for printing, the press would make an appeal to classes beyond the range of humanistic influence. The expectation would be, therefore, from the middle of the century to find more romances issued and at a cheaper rate. We find William Copland and Cawood printing them. Still another factor must be remembered, namely, that in the second decade of Elizabeth's reign there was a revival of interest in the earlier authors. Not only the romances but Skelton, Barclay, and others were again printed. It is from this period, I think, that the copies of medieval stories came that figure in such lists as that of Captain Cox's library. But that is at present beyond our scope. For the first half of the century, the romances do not seem to have been particularly sought after, and, even if they had been, they would have brought in only a slight degree of French influence. Aside from these romances which, as they had been originally written in French, were first reduced to French prose and then translated into English prose, a number of French books crossed the Channel. Most of these scarcely come under the head of literature. The xv Tokens, the Booget of Demaunds, the Art of Memory, the Rutter of the Sea,-books on religion, riddles, medicine, navigation, etc., etc.-they show exactly the natural intercourse between the two countries. The type of book taken may be illustrated by the Kalendar of Shepherdes, one of the most popular books of the age, and by reputation at least well-known to us because from it Spenser adapted the title to his first published work.1 The number of editions it may be worth the while to state for the sake of comparison with the number of the romances. By 1560 in the French there had been nineteen, and there had been eight different issues of the English translation. The first edition is a bibliographical curiosity, that is not without bearing on the question of French books in England and on early printing. In 1503 Antoine Verard, the Parisian printer, issued three books in English, The traytte of good living, Castle of Labour, and Kalendayr of shyppars.2 1 My statements are drawn from the very elaborate edition by H. Oskar Sommer, London, 189g. In his characteristic way Dr. Sommer has investigated the various problems so thoroughly that English scholarship will be in his debt for a long time. 2 Antoine Verard, by John Macfarland, Bibliographical Society, 1900. As has 500 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Verard, like Gerard Leeu and Jan Van Doesborgh, apparently had determined to invade the English market. So far there is nothing strange. But to translate the popular Compost et Kalendier des bergiers he employed, as seems likely, a young Scotchman who lacked the somewhat necessary qualification for such a task of possessing a thorough knowledge of either French or English. As Verard's ignorance of English prevented him from judging his assistant's work, the result appeared in a book the language of which may safely be described as unique. Ben Jonson's remark on the Faerie Queene quite literally applies here; "it was writ in no language." But the book itself seemed so valuable that it was worth rewriting. Consequently in 1506 Pynson, without translating the original French, tried to re-work the English. His reasons for this seem worth quoting: 2 Here before tyme thys boke was prynted In parys In to corrupte englysshe and nat by no englysshe man wherfore these bokes that were brought Into Inglonde no man coude vnderstonde them perfetly and no maruayll for hit is vnlekly for a man of that countrey for to make hyt Into perfyte englysshe as it shulde be. ~ Newely nowe it is drawne out of frensshe into englysshe at the instaunce & coste and charge of Rycharde Pynson and for by cause he sawe that men of other countries intermedellyd with that that they cowde no skyll in / and therefore the foresayde. Rycharde Pynson and shuche as longethe to hym hath made it into playne englysshe to the entente that euery man may vnderstonde it / that thys boke is verya profytable bothe for clerkes and laye people to cause them to haue great vnderstondyng and in espessyall in that we be bounde to lerne and knowe on peyne of auerlastinge deth. In spite of Pynson's statement, it is quite clear to us that his book is merely a new version of the Verard. It was also clear to his contemporaries since two years later, for Wynkyn de Worde, Robert Copland translated the French of 1497. Thus in six years there were three different editions in English of this one French book. Although elaborately illustrated and a mixture of prose and verse, it belongs to the purlieus of literature. The book opens with an address by the Master Shepherd comparing the stages of man's life to the months of the year. Then it is divided into five parts. been said, Mr. Gordon Duff discovered a single leaf of this edition of the Castle of Labour among the Bagford collections. Although undated, as the type also is found nowhere else but in the Kalendayr of shyppars, the date is probably also 1503. The traytte of good lyuyng and good Deyng, extant in three copies, shows the peculiarities of the Kalendar. Sommer, op. cit. i, 30. 2 Sommer, op. cit., iii, 7. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 501 ~ The fyrste of oure synes of the compot and the kalender. ~ The seconde is the tre of vyces with the peynes of hell. ~ The thyrde is the waye of helthe of man, the tre of vertues. ~ The foureth is fesseke and gouernoure of helthe. ~ The fyfte is astrology fysnomy for to vnderstonde many dysceyuynges and whyche they be by lychelyhode thewhich by nature are inclynede and can do them as ye shall rede or ye come to the ende. It needs only be said that this program is faithfully carried out. There is a perpetual calendar and complicated tables by which one can findand remember the saints' days and feast days of the Church. This part is purely practical. The second and third parts are religious. Here are to be found the translated creed, the ten commandments and the five commandments of the Church, and in addition the account of Lazarus' visit to hell, vividly pictured and luridly described, the many ramifications of the seven deadly sins, and the tree of virtues. In quite another manner the fourth discusses when a man should be bled, and where. And the fifth is an omnibus section, comprising physiognomy and astrology, a brief account of the ten Christian nations, verses on an assault against a snail, etc., etc. In this combination of the calendar with religious, medical and astrological features it suggests the old New England almanacs. Like them, too, it filled the function performed by the modern magazine. There is a little something of everything for everybody. In content, as Sommer has shown, the original French is only a compilation of medieval material. In its English form, also, it harks back to the medieval methods. The following stanza, from the Wynkyn de Worde edition, however excellent may be its contents, does not look forward to the great work of the Renaissance: 1 Fle faynt falsehode bekell foule'nd fell Fle fatall flaterers full of fayrnes Fle fayre faynynge fabels of fauell Fle folkes felawshyp frequentynge falsenes Fle frantyke facers fullfylled of frowardnes Fle foles falaces / fle fonde fantasyes Fle from fresshe fablers faynynge flaterers. Consequently in this also, the most popular of the French importations, there is nothing of contemporary France. 1 Sommer, op. cit., iii, 181. EARLY TUDOR POETRY Robert Copland, who translated the Kalendar, may be taken as an extreme example of those importing French influence. Of his life really nothing is known. In 1535 he was one of the executors of the will of Wynkyn de Worde, and in 1547 his establishment is spoken of as "old Robert Copland's the eldest printer of England." 1 In this capacity he issued only twelve books, of which the one that is interesting to literature is his own Hye Way to the Spyttel Hous. But it is worth remarking that he printed Barclay's Introductory to French and that his earliest device, 1515, is modelled after the French. As an author he prepared for the press seventeen works, twelve of which are translated from the French. He may, consequently, be considered as one of the main channels. Aside from the original poems, which have already been discussed,2 they seem well distributed between religious works, practical treatises, and books of popular appeal. There are three romances. And probably in the work of Copland one may find an epitome of the whole question. In English prose there was no definite movement to imitate French culture, as there was in English verse to imitate Italian forms, or in English thought to follow German leadership. The two nations were too nearly at the same stage of cultivation to have England follow in the footsteps of France. But this condition would render it normal that a book popular in France would be translated for the English market, no matter what kind of book it might be. And in the early efforts of the press, while English writers were still struggling with the changing language, naturally printers imported French successes. The condition then was much as it is today. A work that has created a sensation in Paris can usually be found in English on the shelves of the New York shops. It is after all a matter of business. But the books that were to be revered in the coming ages, were written neither in French nor in English, but in Latin. They were written in Latin to appeal to a public of all Europe. The obverse of this is that those books written in either French, or English, were local, to appeal especially to the less thoughtful of the two nations. Logically, therefore, as such people are conservative, the vernacular literature is retFor Robert Copland, cf. Duff, Century of the English Book Trade, H. R. Plomer, Handlists of the English Printers (both printed for the Bibliographical Society), and H. R. Tedder in the D. N. B. 2 Hye Way, pp. 225-229; Jyl of Brentford's Testament, pp. 431-433. INFLUENCE OF CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE 503 rogressive. As the two nations were in the same stage of development, so also neither had a great individual, such as Martin Luther, who used the native language as his medium. It is not until the time of Calvin that French prose has an appreciable effect upon English.1 For the early authors, the influence of French prose, like the influence of French verse, while undoubtedly existent, is undoubtedly little. 1 As Calvin's influence comes at the end of the period, it has seemed better to postpone it for a later study, when it may be treated consecutively. CHAPTER VI. HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY Up to the period of the second literary generation of the writers of the reign of Henry VIII, the literature is easy to analyze because the work has the extreme characteristics that mark all beginnings. The change in the language, due to the long continuance of civil strife, had broken the literary continuity. The works of Chaucer and his contemporaries were no longer available as precedents. Yet the social stability given by the first two Tudor kings stimulated a demand for literature. Under the circumstances those that wished to supply this demand necessarily experimented in literary forms, each choosing that form most consonant to his aims and his predilection. In this new age there was no one dominant literary tradition. Consequently there is apparent confusion. Books were written contemporaneously which yet depend upon entirely different theories and to judge which requires a knowledge of entirely different literatures. Such a statement may seem to imply that it was a critical age, an age in which there was eager discussion of literary theory. But this is untrue. Aside from the humanists there was no literary propaganda,-and with them the stress was upon morality, not upon literature. As in the time of the Judges, each man did what was right in his own eyes. Moreover, as each wrote according to his natural bent, instead of electing one literary type and spurning all the others, actually in his work he may show the result of two quite different forces. This is quite natural. They were alive, and, being alive, each was affected in varying degrees by the literary impulses of his age. Yet in each author one (and only one) impulse is major; the other impulse, (or other impulses) is definitely subordinated. For this reason it is possible, by arranging them according to the dominant impulse, to show the gradual progress and modification of the types. But by so doing a judgment is passed upon them. Great writers cannot be listed according to single traits, because they draw from 504 HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY 505 a diversified past. This age, then, will not produce great literature. With the exception of More and Skelton, the personality of the writer seems subordinated to the form in which he writes, and even Skelton cannot control his medium. The reader does not feel near to the author; the latter's voice seems faint and far away. He cannot make his form express himself. This is because the age was one of beginnings. Chaucer, at the culmination of the previous period, can say what he wishes; Spenser, at the culmination of this period, can say what he wishes; but these men in the rude beginnings of art necessarily stammer. It is the inevitable penalty of youth. The age does not reach its intellectual maturity until the writers of the second half of the reign, writers represented for us by Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey. The uncertainty so characteristic of all our knowledge of this period finds another illustration in the poems of Surrey. Of these, not counting the translations of Vergil, the publication of which was separate, there are fifty-nine pieces. These are preserved to us by Tottel and by seven manuscripts.1 Only two of the manuscripts are pre-Elizabethan and those two have but one poem each. All told, there are thirty-four poems in the manuscripts. Unhappily the manuscripts do not completely agree with one another for the text, nor does any one completely agree with Tottel. In them there are found poems not in Tottel, and one in Tottel that is assigned to "Uncertain Authors." It is to be remembered that as Tottel in 1557 printed the contents of a commonplace book, probably like that in the British Museumn Add. 36529, the authority of his text depends upon the accuracy of an entirely unknown compiler. On the other hand, as the manuscripts that furnish the majority of the poems are late, they equally depend upon unknown compilers. By comparison with the autograph manuscript of Wyatt we know that Tottel's text is far from being accurate. Therefore the presumption is that the same is the case with his text of Surrey. The manuscripts which contain poems of Wyatt and may therefore be tested are only slightly more accurate than Tottel. The result is that in Surrey's text we have only an approximation. Each poem, consequently, requires careful discussion. But however faulty may be the text of Tottel, it will 1 Tottel's Miscellany we have in Arber's Reprint. The manuscript poems have been reprinted by Professor Padelford in Anglia, xxix, 3. 506 EARLY TUDOR POETRY always be important because through it the Elizabethan age knew Surrey. It was reprinted nine times before the end of the century. It may be even due to Tottel's publication that in the last half of the century Surrey was regarded as the great poet of the former age. The title-page of the Miscellany reads Songes and Sonettes, written by the ryght honorable Lorde Henry Haward late Earle of Surrey, and other. Although the only other author named in full in the second edition is Wyatt, apparently he is considered secondary. They are usually bracketed together, and Surrey is usually given the precedence,-so often in fact that the curious error arose that Wyatt was Surrey's disciple. The most extreme illustration of Wyatt's eclipse by Surrey is given by Sidney: 1 For there being two principall parts, Matter to be expressed by words, and words to expresse the matter: In neither, wee use Art or imitation rightly... Chawcer undoubtedly did excellently in his Troilus and Creseid: of whome trulie I knowe not whether to mervaile more, either that hee in that mistie time could see so clearly or that wee in this cleare age, walke so stumblingly after him. Yet had hee great wants, fit to be forgiven in so reverent an Antiquitie. I account the Mirrour of Magistrates, meetly furnished of bewtiful partes. -And in the Earle of Surreis Lirickes, manie thinges tasting of a Noble minde. The Sheepheards Kalendar, hath much poetrie in his Egloges,.. Besides these, I doo not remember to have seen but fewe (to speak boldly) printed, that have poeticall sinnewes in them. Chaucer, Surrey, presumably Sackville and Spenser, those four names to Sidney are the only ones that have poetical sinews. The list is extraordinary for its omissions. As to him Chaucer is the sole representative of Middle English, Surrey is the only survivor of the literature of the first half of the century.2 It is a fair statement that where Wyatt is remembered, as in Ascham and Puttenham, he is subordinated to Surrey, and that very many did not remember him at all. Surrey is the principal figure of the past age. As the respect for caste was great in the time of Elizabeth, such valuation of his poetry may have been due, to some extent at 1 The Defence of Poesie. By Sir Philip Sidney, Knight. Printed at the University Press, Cambridge, 1904, p. 71. 2 Wyatt is also omitted from the list of writers given by Webbe, A Discourse of English Poetrie, 1586, Arber's Reprint, 33. HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY 507 least, to his rank. He belonged to the family which in Pope's lines was to become synonymous with noble blood.1 The fortunes of the family were founded early in the fifteenth century by the marriage of Robert Howard with the Lady Margaret Mowbray, in whose veins was blood royal. By her father, she was descended from Edward the First and Margaret of France; by her mother, from Edward the First and Elinor of Castile. On the extinction of the Mowbrays, John, the son of Robert, was created Duke of Norfolk by Richard III in 1483. He married twice. By the first wife he had Thomas, the second Duke of Norfolk, and four daughters who all married; by the second, one daughter Catherine, who married John Bourchier, Lord Berners., the translator. This Thomas, the second Duke of Norfolk, the grandfather of Surrey, married twice and had eleven children. As these intermarried with the great noble families, Surrey was thus closely related to many in the English court. Of these the important ones are (besides his father): Edward, the English admiral whose gallant death in 1513 is celebrated by Barclay in the Fourth Eclogue; Edmund, the father of Catherine, the fifth wife of Henry VIII; and Elizabeth, the mother of Anne Boleyn the second wife of Henry VIII. Surrey's father, Thomas, the third Duke of Norfolk, married first the Lady Anne, the daughter of Edward IV and sister of Elizabeth the Queen of Henry VII. On her decease he married Lady Elizabeth Stafford, the daughter of the Duke of Buckingham, who bore him three children; Henry the poet, Thomas, and Mary. Thus on his mother's side he was descended from Edward III; his grandmother was a daughter of the Percys; his uncle had married the daughter of Margaret Pole, countess of Salisbury; one aunt, Ralph Neville, earl of Westmorland, and the other, George Neville, Lord Abergavenny. In fact he was so close to the throne that it was rumored that he was to marry the princess Mary, daughter of Henry VIII and Katherine of Aragon, who later became queen. He was the close friend of Henry, Duke of Richmond, the King's illegitimate son, who married his sister Mary. By his descent and by his family connections he was the greatest noble of his generation, and his ancestry compared very favorably even with that of the prince of Wales, whose descent on the father's side was scarcely 1 What can ennoble sots, or slaves, or cowards? Alas! not all the blood of all the Howards. Essay on Man, Epistle IV. 508 EARLY TUDOR POETRY better than Surrey's own and whose mother was the comparatively obscure Jane Seymour. An appreciation of the state of life to which Surrey was called by his birth is all important in understanding his character and the events of his life. There is no necessity of recounting the latter here.1 It is enough to state that we know a very great many facts concerning his various actions through the years, and from them can infer fairly accurately his character. Another factor, however, must be mentioned. The Howards were in somewhat straightened circumstances. Naturally, as the first Duke of Norfolk and his son had fought on the side of Richard III at Bosworth Field, the survivor, the second Duke, was promptly lodged in the Tower and his goods attainted. Although Henry VII pardoned him, freed him, and eventually restored him to his rank, he did not restore the property that went to sustain the rank. Although Henry VIII was much more lavish in their regard, yet as their expenses increased proportionally to their honors, the family was financially embarrassed. In 1515 the Duke of Norfolk, admittedly the ablest general in England and the victor of Flodden Field, was forced to retire from court to recuperate. This condition explains the financial negotiations which they dignified by the name of marriage. Love was no more a factor in the marriage of the sixteenth century than in the royal alliances of today.2 Surrey's mother, for example, who brought a dowry of 1500 pounds, had previously been engaged to Ralph Neville (who afterwards married her sister,) was much attached to him, and their wedding day had been announced.3 All this was not allowed to interfere with her nuptials with the Duke of Norfolk. Such a beginning would scarcely argue for happy connubial relations. And historical events did not tend to increase the chance. In 1523 her father, Duke of Buckingham, was condemned for high treason by a panel of peers, of which her father-in-law the Duke of Norfolk was chief judge. The fact that 1 Owing to his high rank Surrey figures largely in the State Papers, which have been published. Basing upon those entries and supplementing them by outside reference, M. Edmond Bapst has constructed a detailed life of Surrey, in Deuz Gentilshommes-Poetes de la Cour de Henry VIII, Paris 1891. This is the authority for Sir Sidney Lee's article in the D. N. B. There is an excellent digest in FlUgel's Lesebuch, op. cit., 382. 2Cf. pp. 0-2l1. 3 Letter to Cromwell, Calendar of State Papers, October 27, 1537. HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY 509 "the Duke of Northfolke wept" 1 probably did not compensate for the triviality of the charges on which her father was put to death, nor for the fact that the presiding judge was recompensed by part of the sequestered property. But at this time she had, also, a more personal grievance against her husband. He took to himself a concubine, an Elizabeth Holland, a relative of Lord Hussey. In spite of the fact that "she was butt washer of my nursery VIII yeres," 2 when the Duchess objected,3 "They bound me and pynnaculled me and satt on my brest tyll I spitt blod, which I have ben worse for ever syns; and all for speking gainst the woman in the Courte, Bess Holand. Therefore he put me out at the doors and kepys the bawd and the harlots styll in his house." In a later letter she is still more explicit: 4 "He sett hys women to bynde me, tyll blod came out att my fingars endes, and (they) pynnacullyt me and satt on my brest tyll I spett blod and he never ponyshed them, and all thys was done for Besse Holond's sake." It is quite possible, as Bapst suggests,5 that the Duchess in these accounts is drawing the long bow. She seems to have been an extremely high-spirited lady, much given to speaking her mind very frankly. Her remarks to Anne Boleyn, when the favorite opposed the marriage of Mary Howard to the Count of Derby, were such that she narrowly avoided being banished from the Court.6 In 1534 the definite rupture came, because she discharged from her service the father of the lady in question and all connected with her. As the Duke took the part of the servants, the Duchess retired to Redbourn on a pension. That she was justified from the modern standpoint is clear, since in 1537, until the imprisonment of the Duke, Elizabeth Holland was installed at Kenninghall under I Hal's Henry VIII, ed. Whibley, op. cit., 1, 225. 2Letter to Cromwell, December 30, 1536. 3 Letter to Cromwell,October 24, 1537. 4Letter to Cromwell, June 26, 1538. 6 Bapst, op. cit., ~07: "Les scenes de violence dont, A en croire ses lettres, la Duchesse aurait 6te victime A ce moment de la part de ses domestiques, ne se sont tres probablement jamais pas6es que dans son imagination, ou tout au noins, s'il y a dans ses recits une part de verite, elle est assez restreinte." 6 Chapuis to the Emperor, October 15, 1530, quoted by Bapst, op. cit., 199 (note). 510 EARLY TUDOR POETRY the pretext of being lady-in-waiting to Mary Howard, at that time the widowed Duchess of Richmond. It is interesting to note that Surrey and his sister took the side of their father, the Duke, in this family quarrel, even to the extent of receiving the cause of it in the place of their own mother. Whatever may be the difference of opinion in regard to the principals in the affair, there can be no question of the unfortunate results to the children. The "homelife" at Kenninghall could not have been conventionally "sweet." Later it bore its inevitable fruit. One of the most telling witnesses against Surrey, when he was accused of high treason, was his own sister, the widow of his best friend. She deposed,-and it was confirmed by another witness,-that, when it was a question of her marriage with Sir Thomas Seymour, Surrey had advised her to use the marriage as a step to becoming the mistress of the king.' " Cette sanglante ironie" Bapst calls it.2 Perhaps it was irony,at least one wishes to believe it,-but the previous events in the family life scarcely tend to make one confident. At least her further testimony that Surrey had placed a cipher upon his coat-ofarms that resembled HR shows that she for one placed the worst interpretation and bore him a bitter hatred.3 In our necessary ignorance, it seems rather useless first to impute motives and then to explain by them. Yet surely the inference is justifiable that the family life of the Howards was not happy. In spite of the Duke's experience, gained from his own mercenary marriage, acting by the direction of Anne Boleyn he married Surrey, February 13, 1532, to Lady Frances de Vere, daughter of the Count of Oxford, for 2500 pounds. In Surrey's case, however, the union seems to have been productive of happiness. The additional money was gratefully received. This union of very high rank and comparative poverty accen1 Froude (Chapter XXIII, The Reign of Henry the Eighth) gives the deposition in full. 2 Bapst, op. cit., 339. 3 Miss Foxwell, op. cit., 2, 76 notes on Wyatt's poem A face that shuld content me: "This description of a woman is the only one in Wiat. Constant to his rule, he gives us no portrait, but rather a character sketch. Honest and sincere himself, with a deep scorn of anything false or inconstant, his ideal of a woman is displayed here in strength of character and gravity of thought, a cheerful, sympathetic and graceful woman. Mary, Duchess of Richmond, 'Maiden-wife, and widow', possessed the qualities he admired." Comment would be unkind! HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY 511 tuated in Surrey the arrogance inherited from his mother. He was "the most folish prowde boye that ys in England." ' When he was accused by Sir Richard Southwell, his answer was an appeal to the judgment of God by means of a boxing match! 2 He refuted another witness by merely saying "I leave it to yourselves, Gentlemen, to judge whether it were probable that this man should speak thus to the Earl of Surrey, and he not strike him." Holinshed comments "had he tempered his answers with such modesty as he shewed token of a right perfect, and ready wit, his praise had been the greater." 3 But such a temperament is very rarely modest, and it does lead to blows. In 1542 he had quarreled with an unknown John a Leigh, and he was released only on a bond that he would not molest that gentleman. But he figures in another scrape that has some literary importance. On the second of February, 1543, Surrey in company with Sir Thomas Wyatt the younger, the son of the poet, and a William Pickering anticipated the eighteenth century Mohocks by a night raid upon London. As the citizens failed to find amusement in the performance, inquiry led to a certain Mistress Arundel of St. Laurence-Lane. On being summoned before the Privy Council she confessed that Surrey and other young noblemen used her house.4 Further, she saith, how at Candlemas they went out with stone bows at nine o'clock at night, and did not come back, till past midnight, and the next day there was a great clamour of the breaking of many glass windows both of houses and churches, and shooting at men that night in the street; and the voice was that those hurts were done by my lord and his company. Whereupon she gave commandment unto all her house that they should say nothing of my lord's going out in form specified. Item, she said, that that night or the night before they used the same stone bows, rowing on the Thames; and Thomas Clear told her how they shot at the queans on the Bankside. Mistress Arundel also, looking one day at Lord Surrey's arms, said the arms were very like the king's arms, and said further, she thought he would be king, if aught but good happened to the king and prince. The inquiry dragged along until the first of April.5 1 A Memorial from George Constantyne to Thomas Lord Cromwell, Archaeologia, xxiii, 62. 2 Lord Herbert of Cherbury's account is based on documents now lost. 3 Both quoted from Nott, op. cit., cii. 4 These passages are accessible in Froude, op. cit., Chapter XX. 6 Acts of the Privy Council, Bapst, op. cit., 268. 512 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Att Saint-James the first day off aprill... Th'erle of Surrey being sent for t'appere before the Cownsell was charged as well off eating off flesshe, as off a lewde and unsemely manner of walking in the night abowght the stretes and breaking with stonebows off certeyne wyndowes. And towching the eating off flesshe, he alleged a license, albeitt he hadde nott so secretly used the same as apparteyned. And towching the stonebows, he cowlde nott denye butt he hadde verye evyll done therein, submitting himselff therefore to such ponissement as sholde to them be thowght good. Whereapon he was committed to the Fleet. Clearly we have here a drunken frolic in which the opposition of the City and the Court comes to the fore. It is the sort of senseless vandalism common half a century ago in our American colleges and manifested in the town and gown riots. But however objectionable may have been this lewd and unseemly manner of walking, it is impossible to regard it seriously. Rightfully he was sent to the Fleet to realize that the London citizen also had rights. Presumably while there, he composed his absurd explanation of the affair.1 London, hast thow accused me Of breche of lawes the roote of stryfe, within whose brest did boyle to see (so fervent hotte) thy dissolute lief that even the hate of synnes that groo within thy wicked walles so rife ffor to breale forthe did convert soo that terrour colde it not represse the which by wordes syns prechers knoo what hope is le(f)t for to redresse by vnknowne meanes it liked me my hydden burden to expresse wherby yt might appere to the that secret synn hath secret spight ffrom Iustice rodd no fault is free but that all such as wourkes vnright In most quyet are next ill rest In secret sylence of the night this made me with a reckles brest to wake thy sluggardes with my bowe A fygure of the lordes behest whose scourge for synn the sc(r)eptures shew that as the fearfull thonder clapp 1 The text is given in MS. Add. 36529. It is also found in Add. MS. 98635, but not in Tottel. HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY 513 by soddayne flame as hand we knowe of peoble stones the sowndles rapp the dredfull plage might mak the see of goddes wrath that doth the enwrapp that pryde might know from conscience free how loftye workes may her defend and envye fynd as he hath sought how other seke him to offend and wrath tast of eche crewell thought that iust shapp hyer in the end and ydell slouthe that never wrought th heven hys spirite lift may begyn & gredye lucre lyve in dred to see what haste ill gott goodes wynn the lechers ye that lustes do feed perceve what secrecye is in synne and gluttons hartes for sorow blede awaked when their faulte they fynd In lothsome vyce eche dronken wight to styrr to godd this was my mynd thy wyndowes had don me no spight but prowd people that drede no fall clothed with falshed and vnright bred in the closures of thy wall but wrested to wrathe in fervent zeale thow hast to strief my secret call endured hartes no warning feale Oh shameles hore is dred then gone by suche thy foes as ment thy weale Oh membre of false Babylon the shopp of craft, the denne of ire thy dredfull dome drawes fast vppon thy martyres blood by swoord & fyre In heaven & earth for Iustice call the lord shall here their iust desyre the flame of wrath shall on the fall with famyne and pest lamentablie stricken shalbe they lechere.s all they prowd towers and turretes hye enmyes to god beat stone from stone thyne Idolles burnt that wrought iniquitie when none thy ruyne shall bemone but render vnto the right wise lord that so hath iudged Babylon Imortall praise with one accord ffynis H. S. 514 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Whether the Fleet served its purpose in causing repentance is open to question. Surrey could not deny but he had very evil done,but remained an unrepentant sinner. To him the psalm-singing money-loving citizen was beneath contempt. So his poem from the point of view of the injured party is insulting both in matter and in manner. He defends himself by attacking. London is so evil that it should be shocked to an appreciation of its sins. And this paradox is phrased in a careful parody of the reforming manner. Oh member of false Babylon! The shop of craft! The den of ire! Thy dreadful doom draws fast upon! Thy martyr's blood by sword and fire In Heaven and earth for justice call! Of course, a jeu d'esprit must not be taken too seriously; it betrays a lack of humor. Yet, the piece is distinctly clever. As the City by its trade relations with the continent was the stronghold of Lutheranism, to apply to it the opprobrious name applied by the Lutherans to the Roman Church is a neat distortion.1 And the "martyrs" were the poor courtiers, such as Surrey himself and young Wyatt, persecuted by the demons in the City, merely because they shot at them with cross-bows! But the literary significance of this is great. At once the reader is conscious of a note that has not been sounded in English poetry since Chaucer. There is a lightness of touch in the fooling that implies a mastery of the medium, that tells that the long apprenticeship of English literature is now over. The last lines of this satire are also important since they have been quoted to show that Surrey was at heart in favor of the Reformation.2 Irony is a dangerous tool that is apt to turn in the wielder's hand and cut him. So Defoe found in the Shortest Way with Dissenters. So with Surrey here. He naturally by his birth beOf course there is no parallelism with Petrarch's sonnets against Avignon, as Nott suggests, because Petrarch was not attacking the city of Avignon but the papal court located there. Petrarch's "Babylon" and Surrey's "Babylon" are two entirely different things. By 1542 London had no connection with the papacy. 2 There is also an ambiguous remark of George Barlow, Dean of Westbury, quoted by Constantyne (op. cit.), and the fact that Surrey translated the Psalms, a proof that Aretino also was a Protestant. HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY 515 longed to the other party, of which his father the Duke of Norfolk was the recognized leader.' It was Norfolk who introduced the Bill of Six Articles to the House when not even Cranmer dared argue against it. The whole political complexion of the reign is determined by the opposition of the party of the old nobility, of which Norfolk was necessarily a member, and the "new men," due to the influence of the various queens. Each queen may be regarded as a counter signifying what political party had at that moment the control, although Anne Boleyn, as a niece of the Howards, confuses the issue; in general, as through her Henry was led to break with the Papacy, she may be considered as representing the Protestants. Still more Protestant was Jane Seymour, and her relatives. As uncles of the heir to the throne, in spite of their lack of high rank, they naturally became important. Also they were antagonists of the older order. This is the explanation for the Howards' hatred of Cromwell. His downfall was a triumph for them,-a triumph which they consolidated by the marriage of Katharine Howard to the King, a triumph which was fleeting and fatal. Towards the last, across the body of the King, the two parties glared at each other. The King was dying. The question uppermost was who should control the young Prince. Surrey naturally thought that his own father was the proper person, but he was imprudent in giving expression to his thought. Passion was running high. When Surrey told one of the other faction that Norfolk should be the governor, he was answered "rather than it should come to pass that the prince should be under the governance of his father or you, I would bide the adventure to thrust this dagger in you." 2 Norfolk was playing safe, but Surrey had the reckless spirit of youth. Of course the end came. On the trivial charge of quartering the arms with his own, Surrey was tried and found guilty of high treason. There is no need to go into the evidence of the trial. The technical indictment was merely technical. If it had not been that charge it would have been another. Nor is it of value to discuss it in terms of murder and bemoan Surrey's innocence. With the morality of the age it is quite possible that the Howards on their side had contemplated some such move. The sixteenth 1See the quotation from both Romanists and Reformers cited by Bapst, op. cit., 161. 2 Froude, Chapter xxiii. There is some slip in the use of the pronouns. 516 EARLY TUDOR POETRY century is the sixteenth century; it is useless to apply twentieth century conceptions as explanations of events then. The fact is that on the 19th of January, 1547, there was beheaded on Tower Hill the most brilliant, the most spectacular, the most cultivated noble in England, in the last analysis because he was descended from kings. By the facts of his life Surrey is a romantic figure; it needed very little to make of him a figure in a romance. Two generations later this was done by Thomas Nash in his novel The Unfortunate Traveller, or the Life of lacke Wilton.' The hero, encountering the Earl of Surrey in Holland, where Cornelius Agrippa shows him a likeness of his love Geraldine in a mirror, travels to Italy with him and enjoys the tournament held by the Grand Duke of Tuscany, in which Surrey sustains the honor of his lady against all comers. This yarn apparently was made up out of whole cloth.2 Nash's novel has had the exceptional record of having been accepted as fact by scholars of repute for two centuries. It was accepted by Drayton and endorsed by Warton. When Nott published his great edition of Surrey in 1815, as in the case of Wyatt, he was strongly stirred by the whole romantic story. From Nott inevitably it spread broadcast. It may be disproved, as does Courthope, by showing the inconsistencies in the dating,-very large inconsistencies,-or as does Bapst by proving that in Surrey's record there is no time-interval sufficient to allow any series of such events. Today, surely, there is no necessity for more than a bare statement. The basis of the story is to be found in the sonnet. Ffrom Tuscan cam my ladies worthi race faire fflorence was sometime her auncient seate the westorne lie (whose pleasaunt showre doth face wylde Chambares cliffes) did geve her lyvely heate ffostred she was with mylke of Irishe brest her Syer (an) erle, hir dame, of princes bloud from tender yeres in britaine she doth rest with a kinges child where she tastes gostly foode honsdon did furst present her to myn eyen bryght ys her hew and Geraldine shee highte 1 Entered in the Stationers' Register xvii mo die Septembris (1593). 2 Mr. Berthold Clifford was unable to find any growth of such a legend in English, when he made the search for me. HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY 517 Hampton me tawght to wishe her furst for myne and windesor alas doth chace me from her sight bewty of kind, her vertues from a bove happy ys he, that may obtaine her love. S. H. 1 "Geraldine," the Lady Elizabeth Fitzgerald, the daughter of the Earl of Kildare, was born 1528 (?) in Ireland. In 1533 she was brought to England and in 1537 she is listed among the attendants of the Princess Elizabeth at Hunsdon. In the spring of the same year she accompanied the little princess to Hampton Court. At this time she could not have been more than ten years old. Surrey certainly was then in attendance on the Court, because his quick temper involved him in a quarrel, of which we have the record. In spite of the fact that he had joined his father in suppressing the rebellion, called "The Pilgrimage of Grace," Lord Darcy before his execution had intimated that Surrey was favorable to the rebels.2 When a courtier 3 repeated this rumor, Surrey struck him, forgetting that, as he was within the royal precincts, he rendered himself by so doing liable to the amputation of one hand. Although the motive of the trouble is doubtful, the correspondence between Norfolk and Cromwell leaves no doubt of the fact. The pleading of his father was successful; Surrey was punished only by being paroled to Windsor,-a very great mitigation to the punishment as he must have been released before November 12th, when he was present at the funeral of Jane Seymour. On March 10th, 1538, his first son, Thomas, was born and on February 24th, 1539, his second son, Henry. And according to the records this is the only time after 1537 when the twelfth line of the sonnet is applicable. Under the circumstances it is quite clear that we have here the fancy of a lively lad of nineteen pleasuring a little girl. To read in it the history of a great passion posits an abnormal precocity on the part of Geraldine.4 Aside from the romantic tradition there are no facts to support it. 1 Add. MS. 86529 and in Tottel. 2This is Bapst's interpretation of Norfolk's letter to Cromwell (Calendar of State Papers, xi, no. 21). 3 If this were one of the Seymours, as Bapst suggests, it would partly explain Surrey's hatred of them. 4 The ninth line of the sonnet, The golden gift that nature did thee give, in the first edition of Tottel (and it is found no where else) reads "Now certesse Ladie;" in the second edition this phrase was changed to "Now certesse Garret," the 518 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Another misconception, of quite a different type, is the close association of the names Wyatt and Surrey, the "Dioscuri of the dawn," "the twin stars of the Reformation." So far as the latter phrase be applied to Surrey, whatever evidence there is points in entirely the opposite direction. Religion was then joined with politics, and the party of the reformers found in Surrey an active antagonist. Sir Edward Knyvet deposed that when he learned of Cromwell's fall, he exclaimed: "Nowe is that foul churl dead so ambitious of others blode; nowe is he stricken by his owne staffe" and this in spite of the fact that it was by Cromwell's intercession that he himself had escaped mutilation only three years before. The feeling for his caste obliterated the sense of the merely personal obligation. But such sentiments would scarcely commend him to Wyatt, who did belong to the other party and who was one of the "minions" of Cromwell. The political differences, moreover, were not compensated for by a similarity in age. Wyatt was fifteen years older than Surrey, and, as at the time of his death Surrey was but twenty-nine, this difference was marked. Surrey belonged to a younger generation. He was but little older than Wyatt's son, and in fact it was in company with the latter that he scandalized London. It is Wyatt the younger that he takes with him on his French expedition. Consequently the usual implication in discussing the relationship between them, that they were intimates, needs careful revision. That they were acquaintances, however, is equally clear from the same facts. But it does not rest alone upon inference. We have three poems by Surrey referring to Wyatt; one is in praise of the translations of the Psalms, and two are elegies on his death. Of these three the two Elizabethan sonnets are conventional. The third is worth quoting in this connection.1 W. resteth here, that quick could neuer rest: Whose heauenly giftes encreased by disdayn, And vertue sank the deper in his brest. Such profit he by enuy could obtain. family name of the Fitzgeralds. Bapst's suggestion that Garret is a diminutive from Margaret is not plausible. I am unable to conjecture why Tottel made this alteration, unless this poem belongs, or he thought it belonged, to the same period and related the same affair. This is found only in Tottel. HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY 519 A hed, where wisdom misteries did frame: Whose hammers bet styll in that liuely brayn, As on a stithe: where that some work of fame Was dayly wrought, to turne to Britaines gayn. A visage, stern, and myld: where bothe did grow, Vice to contemne, in vertue to reioyce: Amid great stormes, whom grace assured so, To lyue upright, and smile at fortunes choyce. A hand, that taught, what might be sayd in ryme: That reft Chaucer the glory of his wit: A mark, the which (unparfited, for time) Some may approche, but neuer none shall hit. A toung, that serued in forein realmes his king: Whose courteous talke to vertue did enflame. Eche noble hart: a worthy guide to bring Our English youth, by trauail, unto dame. An eye, whose iudgement none affect could blinde, Frendes to allure, and foes to reconcile: Whose persing loke did represent a mynde With vertue fraught, reposed, voyd of gyle. A hart, where drede was neuer so imprest, To hyde the thought, that might the trouth auance: In neyther fortune lost, nor yet represt, To swell in wealth, or yeld unto mischance. A valiant corps, where force, and beawty met: Happy, alas, to happy, but for foes: Liued, and ran the race, that nature set: Of manhodes shape, where she the molde did lose. But to the heauens that simple soule is fled: Which left with such, as couet Christ to know, Witnesse of faith, that neuer shall be ded: Sent for our helth, but not receiued so. Thus, for our gilte, this iewel haue we lost: The earth his bones, the heauens possesse his gost. Whatever may be the criticisms on the stereotyped expressions in this piece, or the inventory nature of its structure, the allusions show that the poet knew his subject, although the frigidity of the treatment suggests that this knowledge was of the head rather than of the heart. But at least it is certain that he admired him. Presumably it was on account of this poem that Leland dedicated his Naeniae in mortem Thomae Viati equitis incomparabilis to Surrey.1 In the dedicatory poem to th's volume ]Leland tells Surrey that 1 This has been reprinted as Appendix B, Vol. Q of! Miss Foxwell's edition. 520 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Nominis ille tui dum vixit magnus amator. The phrase suggests the friendly interest of the older poet in the younger, an interest that was repaid by the formal elegy just quoted. This hypothesis seems borne out by another epigram.l Although naturally much trust cannot be placed in verses in which the author aims to flatter, the conjunction of the two names seems to indicate that Surrey was recognized as the logical successor to Wyatt's poetical position, and at the least it does show that Surrey took his own verses seriously enough to make Lcland feel that he would be flattered by such a conjunction. The inference from this is that he must have regarded Wyatt's work with admiration and respect. Under the circumstances a comparison between the work of the two poets is inevitable. Both translated Sonnet CXL of Petrarch. In order that the reader may have the documents in evidence the three will be given. Amor, che nel penser mio vive e regna E'l suo seggio maggior nel mio cor tene, Talor armato ne la fronte vene; Ivi si loca, et ivi pon sua insegna. Quella ch'amare e sofferir ne 'nsegna, E vol che '1 gran desio, l'accesa spene, Ragion, vergogna e reverenza affrene, Di nostro ardir fra se stessa si sdegna. Onde Amor paventoso fugge al core, Lasciando ogni sua impresa, e piange, e trema; Ivi s'acsonde e non appar piit f6re. Che poss' io far, temendo il mio signore, Se non star seco in fin a l'ora extrema? Che bel fin fa chi ben amando more. This is a typical sonnet in Petrarch's conceited manner, a metaphor ridden to death for the purpose of closing with an epigram. The last line is marked by conscious alliteration,-c-b-f-f-c-b-m-m-. It is a purely intellectual ooncept worked out like a puzzle. With 1 Miss Foxwell's Wiat, 2, 285. Una dies geminos phcenices non dedit orbi Mors erit unius vita sed alterius Rara avis in terris confectus morte Viatus Houardum heredem scripserat ante suum. HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY Wyatt's predeliction for this sort of sonnet no explanation is required why he chose it.1 The longe love that in my thought doeth harbar: And in myn hert doeth kepe his residence: Into my face preseth with bolde pretence; And therein campeth spreding his baner. She that me lerneth to love and suffre; And willes that my trust and lustes negligence Be rayned by reason, shame, and reverence; With his hardines taketh displeasur. Where with all unto the hertes forrest he fleith: Leving his enterprise with payn and cry: And ther him hideth and not appereth. What may I do when my maister fereth? But in the feld with him to lyve and dye? For goode is the liff, ending faithfully. Wyatt here has succeeded in giving an almost literal translation, at the same time preserving the form of the Italian sonnet, with the exception of the ending in a couplet. It is unnecessary again to stress the amount of verbal ingenuity such a performance requires. Also it must be granted that in the accomplishment of this feat he has sacrificed whatever poetic value the original may have. Nor is the scansion without difficulties. If the first line be read as a normal pentameter, The 16nge love that in my thought doeth harbar, every stress falls upon a weak syllable. But Wyatt, following the Medieval Latin tradition, composed by ear. Thus there is a syllabic value given to the probably unsounded final e and a dactyl is substituted for a trochee. The line then reads The l6nge l6ve // that in my thoaght doeth harbar. But to shift the accent to so great an extent is not freedom but license, and presupposes the accompaniment of music. The explanation is that thelanguage was still in so unsettled a condition that the Romance accent upon the second syllable, where modern English accents the first, was allowable. Consequently he ac 1 The reading is from the Egerton MS. given by Miss Foxwell, 1, 14. 522 EARLY TUDOR POETRY cepts rimes based alone on the final syllable,-harbAr, baner, suffre, displeasfr, although by no system can they be accounted pure rimes. Wyatt is clearly hampered both by an unsettled technique and an unsettled language. Surrey's version shows the advance.' Love that doth raine and liue within my thought and buylt his seat within my captyve brest clad in the armes wherein with me he fowght oft in my face he doth his banner rest But she that tawght me love and suffre paine my doub(t)ful hope & eke my hote desire with shamfast looke to shadoo and refrayne her smyling grace convertyth streight to yre And cowarde Love then to the hart apace taketh his flight where he doth lorke and playne his purpose lost, and dare not shew his face. for my lorde's gilt thus fawtles byde I payine; yet from my Lorde shall not my foote remove sweet is the death that taketh end by love. Although this version is as literal as the other, by abandoning the rime-scheme of the Italian sonnet, the difficulty of the rendition has been greatly decreased. It is unnecessary here to apologize for the so-called "Elizabethan sonnet"; the form used by Shakespeare needs no defense. For, whereas the frequency of rimes in Italian makes the Italian sonnet normal in that language, in English, except in the hands of the greatest masters, it tends to degenerate into mere verbal ingenuity. It is always an exotic. Certainly Wyatt's experiments in the Italian form would not encourage imitators. Surrey here shows, then, both his independence and his critical ability in preferring a form more consonant with the genius of the language. And his use of it was carried over into the next generation. The two forms of the sonnet produce quite different effects. The Italian sonnet, as Petrarch uses it, automatically breaks into the octave and the sextet, the octave stating the general condition and the sextet giving the concrete application. As the Elizabethan sonnet consists of three quatrains and a couplet, there is no such mechanical break; the idea, therefore, is developed 1 Add. MS. 86529, as quoted by Padelford. It must be remembered that whereas the Wyatt text being probably autographic represents Wyatt's final work, the Surrey is derived only from a copyist. HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY through twelve lines, closing with an epigrammatic couplet. The difference is obvious even in the translations from Petrarch. Wyatt's couplet is not complete in itself:, whereas Surrey's may be detached as a quotation. That this form originated with Surrey is very doubtful, since it was used by Wyatt, although with a slightly different rime-scheme, by Grimald, and by several of the Uncertain Authors; Surrey's use of it, however, in all probability gave it currency. It was Surrey's fortune to be accepted as the representative of the age,-the age when for the first time since Chaucer, the language had become relatively fixed in the forms of the words, and when the poetic technique had passed beyond the obviously experimental stage. Owing to this advantage of position, Surrey seemed to Sidney to be the first modern poet. Whereas the language of Skelton or Wyatt was archaic, Surrey's English was current for the next two centuries. As the archaic effect in the previous quotations is due primarily to the spelling, his translation of the forty-seventh Epigram of the Tenth Book of Martial will be given, with the Latin and with two later versions. The Martial is as follows: 1 Vitam quoe faciant beatiorem, Iucundissime Martialis, haec sunt: Res non parta labore, sed relicta; Non ingratus ager, focus perennis; Lis numquam, toga rara, mens quieta; Vires ingenuae, salubre corpus; Prudens simplicitas, pares amici; Convictus facilis, sine arte mensa; Nox non ebria, sed soluta curis; Non tristis torus, et tamen pudicus; Somnus, qui faciat breves tenebras: Quod sis, esse velis nihilque malis; Summum nec metuas diem nec optes. Surrey renders this as follows: 2 Martial, the things that do attain The happy life, be these, I find: The riches left, not got with pain; The fruitful ground, the quiet mind: 1 Ad Julium Martialem, Martialis Epigrammaton, Liber X, Epig. xlvii, von Ludwig Friedlaender, Zweiter Band, 134. 2 The Poems of Henry Howard Earl of Surrey, London, William Pickering, 183f 57. 524 EARLY TUDOR POETRY The equal friend, no grudge, no strife; No charge of rule, nor governance; Without disease, the healthful life; The household of continuance: The mean diet, no delicate fare; True wisdom join'd with simpleness; The night discharged of all care, Where wine the wit may not oppress: The faithful wife, without debate; Such sleeps as may beguile the night. Contented with thine own estate; Ne wish for Death, ne fear his might. Fortunately this same epigram was translated by R. Fletcher in 1656:1 Most pleasant Martial these are they That make the happyer life and day, Means not sweat for, but resign'd, Fire without end, fields still in kinde, No strife, no office, inward peace, Free strength, a body sans disease, A prudent plainesse, equal friends, Cheap Cates, not scraped from the world's ends, A night not drown'd, but free from care, Sheets never sad, and yet chast are, Sleep that makes short the shades of night, Art such thou would'st be, it there might A choice be offer'd, nor dost fear Nor wish thy last dayes exit here. Nearly fifty years later, in 1695, the same epigram was translated again:2 What our Lives render most at ease, My dearest Martial, they are these: A 'State that's left, not got with Toil; A constant Fire, a fruitful Soil; A quiet Life, from Law-Suits free; But seldom that the Gown doth see; 1 Ex otio Negotium, or Martiall his Epigrams. By R. Fletcher, London 1656; 93. 2 Epigrams of Martial, Englished... London, 1695, E36. It was likewise translated by Charles Cotton, Poems on Several Occasions, 1689, 561. I have preferred the one in the text merely because the date of publication is nearer the end of the century. HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY 525 Ingenuous Strength, a Body sound; Prudent Plainness, Friends equal found; An artless Board, with easie Fare; A Night not Drunk, yet void of Care; A Bed not sowre, and yet that's Chaste; Sound Sleep, that makes Night seem to haste; Nought else, but what thou art, to wish to be, The last Hour not to fear, or haste to see. Of these three, certainly (with the modern spelling) Surrey shows his age the least! There is nothing that suggests the peculiarities of the epoch as does the line A Night not Drunk, yet void of Care! Aside from the obvious fact that Surrey is by far the greatest poet of the three, it is worthy of note that there is scarcely one of his phrases that is not today in common usage, whereas in both of the others some phrases seem strained. Clearly in his time it was possible to write standard English. And the fact is obvious that Surrey is giving poetic value to his version of the Latin. The objection may be raised that the effect is gained by the easy device of comparing him with inferior writers. Fortunately the same piece has been translated by the well-known Clement Marot.1 Marot, voici, si tu le veux savoir, Qui fait a l'homme heureuse vie avoir: Successions, non biens acquiz a peine, Feu en tout temps, maison plaisante et saine, Jamias proces, les membres bien dispos, Et au dedans un esprit a repos; Contraire A nul, n'avoir aucuns contraires; Peu se mesler des publique affaires; Sage simplesse, amys a soy pareilz, Table ordinaire et sans graus appareilz; Facilement avec toutes gens vivre; Nuict sans nul soing, n'estre pas pourtant yvre; Femme joyeuse, et chaste neantmoins; Plus haut qu'on n'est ne vouloir point attaindre; Ne desirer la mort ny ne la craindre. Voyla, Marot, si tu le veux scavoir, Qui faict a l'homme heureuse vie avoir. 1 Oeuvres de Clement Marot, ed. Jannet, 3, 89. De soy mesme. EARLY TUDOR POETRY For precision and felicity of phrase Surrey need not shun comparison even with the great French poet of his age. The documents in evidence have here been given the reader, that he may form his own judgment. It will be a matter of surprise, however, if the verdict, to some measure at least, does not justify the Elizabethans in their estimate of Surrey. That this ability was not reached at a bound, either by Surrey, or the poets of his age, is shown by the translations from Horace. The three separate renderings of the same ode, the Tenth Ode of the Second Book,l may be regarded as studies in English versification. This must argue either that Surrey and two of his friends translated this ode in rivalry, or that independently each of the three turned to Horace, as the exemplar of the art of poetry, to learn poetic technique. That it is the latter alternative may be assumed from the widely separated positions of the translations in Tottel. Surrey's version is on page twenty-seven; the second, by one of the "Uncertain Authors," on page one hundred and fiftyseven; and the third was included in the thirty-nine additional poems of the second edition. If indeed the Miscellany does represent the combination of two or more commonplace books, the probability is strong of a diverse authorship. Such a possibility at once lends a peculiar interest to the poems themselves. In order that the reader may be able himself to make the necessary comparison, the Latin will be first cited and then the three English translations in the order given above. Rectius vives, Licini, neque altum semper urgendo; neque, dum procellas cautus horrescis, nimium premendo litus iniquum. Auream quisquis mediocritatem diligit, tutus caret obsoleti sordibus tecti, caret invidenda sobrius aula. Sapius ventis agitatur ingens pinus, et celsse graviore casu decidunt turres, feriuntque summos fulgura montes. Noted by Nott, Works of Surrey, op. cit., 329. HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY 527 Sperat infestis, metuit secundis alteram sortem bene prseparatum pectus. Informes hiemes reducit Iuppiter, idem Summovet. Non, si male nunc, et olim sic erit. Quondam cithara tacentem suscitat Musam, neque semper arcum tendit Apollo. Rebus angustis animosus atque fortis appare; sapienter idem contrahes vento nimium secundo turgida vela. Surrey's version is headed Praise of meane and constant estate. Of thy lyfe, Thomas, this compasse well mark: Not aye with full sayles the hye seas to beat: Ne by coward dred, in shonning stormes dark, On shalow shores thy keel in perill tfreat, Who so gladly halseth the golden meane, Voyde of dangers aduisdly hath his home Not with lothsom muck, as a den vncleane: Nor palacelyke, wherat disdayn may glome. The lofty pyne the great winde often riues: With violenter swey falne turrets stepe: Lightninges assault the hye mountains, and cliues. A hart well stayd, in ouerthwartes depe, Hopeth amendes: in swete, doth feare the sowre. God, that sendeth, withdrawthe winter sharp. Now ill, not aye thus: once Phebus to lowre With bow vnbent shall cesse, and frame to harp.1 His voyce. In straite estate appere thou stout: And so wisely, when lucky gale of winde All thy puft sailes shall fil, loke well about: Take in a ryft: hast is wast, prose cloth finde. The poem of the First Edition is entitled The meane estate is to be accompted the best. Who craftly castes to stere his boate and safely skoures the flattering flood: He cutteth not the greatest wanes for why that way were nothing good. I The punctuation, although clearly in error, has been retained. 528 EARLY TUDOR POETRY Ne fleteth on the crocked shore lest harme him happe awayting left. But wines away between them both, as who would say the meane is best. Who waiteth on the golden meane, he put in point of sickernes: Hides not his head in sluttishe coates, ne shroudes himself in filthines. Ne sittes aloft in hye estate, where hatefull hartes enuie his chance: But wisely walkes betwixt them twaine, ne proudly doth himself auance The highest tree in all the woode is rifest rent with blustring windes: The higher hall the greater fall such chance haue proude and lofty mindes. When Iupiter from hie doth threat with mortall mace and dint of thunder The highest hilles ben batrid eft When they stand still that stoden vnder The man whose head with wit is fraught in welth will feare a worser tide When fortune failes dispaireth nought but constantly doth stil abide For he that sendeth grisely stormes with whisking windes and bitter blastes And fowlth with haile the winters face and frotes the soil with hory frostes Euen he adawth the force of colde the spring in sendes with somer hote The same full oft to stormy hartes is cause of bale: of ioye the roote. Not always il though so be now when cloudes ben driuen then rides the racke Phebus the fresh ne shoteth still sometime he harpes his muse to wake Stand stif therfore pluck vp thy hart lose not thy port though fortune faile Againe whan wind doth serue at will take hede to hye to hoyse thy saile. The version in the Second Edition is labelled merely Of the golden meane. The wisest way, thy bote, in waue and winde to guie, Is neither still the trade of middle streame to trie: HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY 529 Nz (warely shunnyng wrecke by wether) aye to nie, To presse vpon the perillous shore. But clenely flees he filthe: ne wonnes a wretched wight, In carlish coate: and carefull court aie thrall to spite, With port of proud astate he leues: who doth delight, Of golden meane to hold the lore. Stormes rifest rende the sturdy stout pineapple tre. Of lofty ruing towers the fals the feller be, Most fers doth lightenyng light, where furthest we do se. The hilles the valey to forsake. Well furnisht brest to bide e~he chanses changing chear. In woe hath chearfull hope, m weal hath warefull fear, One self Ioue winter makes with lothfull lokes appear, That can by course the same aslake. What if into mishap the case now casten be? It forceth not such forme~ of luck to last to thee. Not alway bent is Phebus bow: his harpe and he, Ceast siluep sound sometime doth raise. In hardest hap vse heipe of hardy hopefull hart. Seme bold to bear the brunt of fortune ouerthwart. Eke wisely when forewinde to full breathes on thy part, Swage swellyng saile, and doubt decayes. Even a casual reading of these poems in comparison with the Latin shows that we are dealing with prentice pieces of low grade. Not one of them would excite the enthusiasm of a modern schoolmaster. The problem was to transpose the Sapphic strophes of Horace into an analogous English form without dilution. As the three are here given to the reader, he may judge the results for himself. Surrey is trying to render the six strophes of the Latin into five pentameter quatrains. To translate the ninety-two words of the original he has used only one hundred and fifty-seven, in spite of the fact that his rime-scheme required a superfluous last line. On the other hand to gain such condensation his sentences are distorted out of the English order. once Phebus to lowre With bow vnbent shall cesse, and frame to harp His voyce.. is comprehensible only upon a second reading. It may be assumed that this is an early piece; if so, it, with the other two, is an interesting proof that the poets of the age turned to the Latin to learn 530 EARLY TUDOR POETRY their art. The very crudity of the work becomes eloquent. And if much of the work produced then has been lost, these pieces are important, not for themselves but as types. For such poems as these there may be posited a background of classical Latin. But clearly so far as Surrey is concerned, this classical background is limited to the contents of the poems. He makes no attempt to suggest classic forms. Thus, in the three poems just quoted, while the third author endeavors to imitate the Sapphic strophe by three riming hexameter lines and a half line, Surrey contents himself with pentameter quatrains. The simplicity of the rime-scheme, abab, recalls the precepts of the Medieval Latin. The practice of the medieval writers is also evidenced in the desire to introduce the very obvious classical allusion.' I that Vlisses' yeres have spent to seeke Penelope fynde well the foyle I have ment to say yat was not soo Sins Troilus' cause hathe caused me from Crised for to goo and to repent Ulisses' truthe in seas and storme skyes of raginge will & wanton youthe, wherewith I have tossed sore from Cilla's seas to Carribes' dives vppone the drowninge shore. Such stanzas as these might well have been written in the fifteenth century before the introduction of Greek. No distinction is made between the stories of the Odyssey and the Troilus; to the writer both are equally authoritative. The objection may be made that this poem is at best only doubtfully attributed to Surrey. But the same is true of the poem assigned him by Tottel, When ragyng loue.2 The second and third stanzas of this are: I call to minde the nauye greate, That the Greekes brought to Troye towne: And how the boysteous windes did beate Their shyps, and rente their sayles adowne, Harl. Misc. 78, given by Padelford, op. cit., 41. By Tottel it is listed among the poems of the "Uncertain Authors," Arbers Reprint, 241. 2Arber's Reprint, 14; not given in any manuscript. HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY 531 Till Agamemnons daughters bloode Appeasde the goddes, that them withstode. And how that in those ten years warre, Full many a bloudye dede was done, And many a lord, that came full farre, There caught his bane (alas )to sone: And many a good knight ouerronne, Before the Grekes had Helene wonne. Lines such as these are more like the medieval treatment of Grecian "knights" and of "Duke Hannyball," and the rime-scheme, ababcc, is that used, according to Gascoigne, in the Ballade,1 and serving "beste for daunces and light matters." The very word comes from the Medieval Latin ballare. All this reminds one that besides the obvious classical strain there is the other, the Medieval Latin strain, in Surrey. It must be remembered that he was brought up with a knowledge of poets following medieval precedents. It was for his uncle, the Admiral, that Barclay wrote the Tower of Honour and Virtue, and,-what is much more importantSkelton was in some sort an attache of the Howards.2 It will be remembered 3 that the Medieval Latin scanned by the number of accents rather than the number of syllables in a line. So in the second, third and fifth lines of the second stanza of the last passage quoted, there is an extra syllable. For instance, in the line, Full 'many a bloudye dede was d6ne, the second foot is an anapest. Quite clearly this is not due to a desire to copy classic meters; it is due to medieval precedent. This gives the point of view necessary to understand Gascoigne's remarks in the next age: 4 For furder explanation hereof, note you that commonly now a dayes in english rimes (for I dare not cal them English verses) we use none other order but a 1 Certayne notes of Instruction in The Posies, ed. by John W. Cunliffe, 1907, 471. 2 I have myself overstated the relationship in saying that Surrey was a" pupil" of Skelton,-Surrey could not have been more than four or five when Skelton wrote the Garland of Laurel at Sheriff Hutton,-but that there is a definite influence of the older poet upon the younger is not open to question. 3 Cf. pp. 145-147. 4 Gascoigne, op. cit., 467. The diagram there given is omitted. 532 EARLY TUDOR POETRY foote of two sillables, wherof the first is depressed or made short, & the second is elevate or made long: and that sound or scanning contineuth throughout the verse. We have used in times past other kindes of Meeters: as for example this following: No wight in this world, that wealth can attayne, tnlesse he beleve, that all is but vyne. Also our father Chaucer hath used the same libertie in feete and measures that the Latinists do use: and who so ever do peruse and well consider his workes, he shall finde that although his lines are not alwayes of one selfe same number of Syllables, yet beyng redde by one that hath understanding, the longest verse and that which hath most Syllables in it, wil fall (to the eare) correspondent unto that whiche hath fewest sillables in it: and likwise that whiche hath in it fewest syllables, shalbe founde yet to consist of woordes that have suche naturall sounde, as may seeme equall in length to a verse which hath many moe sillables of lighter accentes. And surely I can lament that wee are fallen into suche a playne and simple manner of wryting, that there is none other foote used but one: wherby our Poemes may justly be called Rithmes, and cannot by any right challenge the name of a Verse. Gascoigne here is lamenting that the progress of humanism has restricted the freedom of English verse. Although, as a matter of fact, the practice was not in accord with the theory, yet the theory is significant, especially for the development of blankverse. The origin of this has been discussed elsewhere.1 It is Surrey's treatment of the measure that is the problem here. The difficulty consists in the fact that during the first half of the century two distinct theories of versification were advocated, and the practice was a compromise between them. In the rimed verse the Medieval Latin theory is certainly perceptible; the confusion arises in the unrimed verse,-where we with our intensive knowledge of the classics expect a quantitative value. To clear the issue, take first the unrimed translation of the Fifty-fifth Psalm, the Fifty-fourth of the Vulgate. Forty-one lines in the English follow fairly literally the Latin of the Vulgate. Then follows an interpolation entirely original friowr whose harme and tounge presents the wicked sort of those false wolves with cootes which doo their ravin hyde that sweare to me by heauen the fotestole of the lord who though force had hurt my fame they did not touch my lyfe such patching care I lothe as feeds the welth with lyes 1 Pp. 352-360. HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY 533 but in thother p(s)alme of David fynd I ease Iacta curam tuam super dominum et ipse to enutriet.1 The Latin line with which the poem ends is that in the Vulgate immediately following the one translated; the Psalm then continues for five more verses. Surrey's version is then truncated; forty-one lines are translated, an original passage is interpolated, a line of the original is given, and the conclusion omitted. The explanation of this anomaly is purely hypothetical. It will be remembered that the witnesses all comment upon the fact that during his trial Surrey's attitude was one of defiance,2 to such an extent that Holinshed insinuates that it prejudiced his judges against him.3 If this passage means what it says, Surrey had been told by a friar, suborned by his enemies, that the accusation concerned merely his reputation, not his life.4 Consequently instead of the expected humble confession, such as was his father's later, he played into the hands of the Seymours by defending himself. After his conviction, therefore, Iacta super Dominum curam tuam, et ipse te enutriet! If this hypothesis be accepted as plausible, the passage becomes interesting, since it is the last work of the author. To the end, then, he scans his lines by the number of accents, not by the number of syllables. The third line of the passage quoted reads that sweare to me by heauen the f6testole 6f the l6rd; and the fourth line is still more irregular in beginning with an anapest, who though f6rce had hfrt my fAme they did not t6uch my life. Clearly he avails himself of an unacademic freedom. 1 Padelford, op. cit., 53. Of course "to" in the last line of the passage should read te. The poem is the last of Surrey's in Add. MS. 36529 and is found in Add. MS. 28635. 2 Cf. p. 511. 3 Herbert of Cherbury, (The Life and Raigne of King Henry the Eighth, London, 1649, 565) who had access to documents now lost, gives the same impression. 4 Nott (Surrey, op. cit., 398) sees in this passage a "presumption that Surrey's attachment to the Reformation had drawn upon hir the anger of the supporters of Popery." The documents do not support such an interpretation. Bapst, 158, 534 EARLY TUDOR POETRY This has been a long approach to the question of Surrey's version of the Second and the Fourth Books of the AEneid. The question has been complicated because it happened to be a classic author, Vergil. But for a long sustained effort in translation Vergil was the inevitable choice for author and the AEneid for subject. This is shown by the fact that during the first half of the century translations of the AEneid appear in almost all the vernaculars. In 1529 was published the French version in rimed couplets by Octavien de Saint-Gelais; in 1553 the Gawin Douglas version in Lowland Scotch; and in 1539-1544 the Italian rendition of the first six books, done by a group of men. As there is little probability of imitation between the French, Italian, and the Scotch, it is evident that we are dealing with a phenomenon not limited to a single country or to a single author. There was during the first half of the century a desire diffused throughout Europe to reproduce classic authors in the vernacular, and this desire surely is due to humanism. The relation of Surrey's translation to those of the members of the group requires a detailed analysis. Yet, even in the stating of the problem, the inherent difficulties in the way of a satisfactory solution become manifest. We have no data. Of necessity hypothesis piles upon hypothesis, until the result is as complicated and as fragile as a spider's web! On June 21, 1557, Tottel issued Surrey's translation of the Second and Fourth Books of the AEneid,-but by 1557 Surrey had been dead already ten years. Therefore the date of the Tottel publication is of no value in deciding the date of composition. Nor is it definite for textual criticism, since there is little probability that Tottel had a better text for the LEneid than he had for the poems. Moreover, for the Fourth Book there are two other issues, that of the Hargrave MS. 205, and that of the John Day impression1 and the text as given by the manuscript interprets this passage as a reference to the betrayal of the Duke of Buckingham by the Monk Hopkins. But surely both Surrey was too young at that time, and the passage was written too much later, to make that explanation plausible. 1 The first is in the British Museum, and has been studied by Fest ()ber Surrey's Virgiliibersetzung, nebst Neuausgabe des vierten Buches, von Dr. Otto Fest, Palaestra XXXXIV, 1903) and by Imelmann (Zu den Anfdngen des Blankverses: Surrey's XEneis IV in ursprunglicher Gestalt. Von Rudolf Imelmann, Jahrbuch der Deutschen Shakespeare-Gesellschaft, 1905, p. 81. The second is the John Day issue previously discussed (pages 355-356 note) at Britwell Court. To my knowledge this has never been either reprinted or collated. HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY 535 differs markedly from that given by Tottel.1 Whether this difference in the readings be due to Surrey himself, or whether in the versions we have are derivatives from a single lost original, and, if so, which of the two more nearly represents that lost original, are questions at present impossible of solution.2 The fact to be kept constantly in mind in discussing Surrey's treatment of blank verse is that the fundamental requirement, an authoritative text, is lacking. Therefore the relation of the unknown Surrey version to the various translations, when one remembers the highhanded methods of the sixteenth century editors, may be expressed as an algebraic formula where all the quantities are unknown! The value of x may be expressed only in terms of y and z. Since no one has ever claimed Surrey's dependence upon SaintGelais, the question narrows down to the relation between his version and that of Douglas and the Italian. Actually of course, it is not one question here, but two quite different problems. Although the Douglas version was not published until 1553, six years after Surrey's death, as Douglas had died in London in 1524, for a quarter of a century his translation had been in existence in manuscript or manuscripts. Now there is nothing inherently improbable in the assumption that at some time Surrey had had access to one of these manuscripts. Nott collected the passages in which the two versions were verbally similar, of which there are 1 An extreme example is given by Imelmann. (op. cit: 98.) Continuo invadit: "Tu nunc Karthaginis altoe Fundamenta locas, pulchramque uxorius urbem Exstruis? heu regni rerumque oblite tuarum! Tottel's version is: Thus he encounters him: oh careles wight Both of thy realme and of thine owne affaires; A wifebound man now dost thou reare the walles Of high Cartage, to build a goodly town.... The Hargrave MS. renders it: Then thus he sayd: Thow that of highe Cartage Dost the foundaciouns laye,to please thie wife, Raising on height a passing fayer citie, But oh! for woe, thine owne things out of minde. 2 confess that I am not much impressed by arguments where the chief reliance is placed upon rhetorical questions. 536 EARLY POETRY TUDOR ninety-seven in the Second Book alone. Now although it may be granted that two men translating the same poem tend to use the same expressions even in cases where the verse-form requires a dilution of the original, yet so large a number can scarcely be explained upon the theory of coincidence. If we were but sure of our text, the question might be considered answered. But the curious fact is that the version of the Fourth Book, given by the unpublished Hargrave MS., is clearly much more like the Douglas translation than is the version given by Tottel. What this signifies is not very clear. Apparently, after 1553, Surrey's work was edited with the Douglas translation in mind. Therefore the case rests merely upon the fact that there are similarities between the two versions, whether due to Surrey or to another, and must rest there until more data be given. In comparing Surrey with Douglas, at least we have the identity of phrase to guide us; in the case of the Italian even that help is withdrawn. In 1539 the Second Book appeared in Italian in versi sciolti.1 Hippolito, the natural son of Giulano, had been raised to the cardinalate in 1529. He gathered around him a court of scholars as was the fashion, among whom was the writer Molza. As the book professes to be by him, it must have been'composed before 1535, the year of his death, whether or not he actually wrote it. Later, others joined in translating separate books, of which the Fourth is by Bartolomeo C. Picholomini. Surrey's translation, then, if taken from the Italian, would be dependent upon the work of two writers, and each book must be considered separately. Dr. Fest feels that there is no doubt but that Book Two is drawn from the Italian and Dr. Imelmann that at least the Hargrave MS. version, the "older" version, shows equal dependence upon Book Four.2 To prove his position each cites numerous lines where both the Italian and the English agree in diluting the original. For, since both translations are in verse, a certain amount of dilution is inevitable. As it is stated, with the long array of confirmatory passages, the conclusion seems inevitable. But 11 secondo di Virgilio in lingua volgare, volto da Hippolito de Medici Cardinale. (Citta di Castello.) M. D. XXXVIIII: again in 1540, 1541, and 1544 as parts of the collected work. 2 This supposition was originally suggested by Nott (op. cit. CC.) but denied by him. It owes its present form to the German scholars. HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY 537 a priori such a conclusion is surprising. To the sixteenth century boy Latin was almost as familiar as his mother-tongue, and of all writers in Latin Vergil was probably the most familiar.' To find a writer of that age turning for help to a translation in a foreign vernacular is curious. One would expect him to use the Latin to interpret the vernacular. That Surrey in particular knew Italian, although he had never been in Italy, is always assumed from his renditions of Petrarch; but that he understood Italian with anywhere near the facility with which he understood Latin is an idea that needs very careful proof before it should be accepted. On the other hand the correspondence between the Surrey and the Italian are evident, and it is within the bounds of possibility that he might have seen the Italian. The fact to be explained is that the correspondences are there. The first and most obvious explanation is that they are due to coincidence. Two men, translating the same piece into verse will be apt to amplify in much the same way. Thus when the meus Hector of the Second Book of Vergil (522) is amplified respectively into il nostro figlio and Hector my son, on the assumption that each translator needed an extra foot in the verse, it is not necessary to assume a dependence of one upon the other as the additional matter, son, is implicit in the Latin meus. This is typical of many of the correspondences collected by the German scholars. The undoubted effect produced by their work is due to the accumulation of such minute details, any one of which is in itself negligible. Numerous as they seem when so carefully listed and classified, the total effect is also negligible upon the translation as a whole since they are scattered through it at long intervals.2 Yet however negligible they may seem, the fact that it is possible to frame such a list requires an explanation other than mere coincidence. We are forced to the dilemma, that either Surrey was familiar with the Italian versions or there was a common source. This common source, I think, is to be found in the annotated editions of Vergil.3 Very early such edi1The reader is referred back to Chapter IV. 2 This is the explanation of Nott's remark: "But as there is no similarity whatever in style or turn of expression between the two translations, I am disposed to think that Surrey's adoption of blank verse originated wholly with himself.". Op. cit. CC. 3 They appear almost every year. 538 EARLY TUDOR POETRY tions began to appear. Moreover, as each editor tended to preserve such annotations of his predecessors as seemed to him valuable, around each Vergilian phrase was gathered a mass of commentary. Such commentary would be followed in any doubtful interpretation by both the Italian and Surrey.1 At least that would be the usual course. Particularly would it be true of a man of the sixteenth century. And although it is conceivable that before undertaking his translation Surrey assembled versions in other languages, such a proceeding would be more characteristic of the scholarly pedant than of a high-spirited young poet and man of the world. Consequently until all the various commentaries of Vergil published before the composition of Surrey's translation be examined, his indebtedness to the Italian should be received with great caution. Supposing that by this means Surrey's indebtedness to the Italian be proved, the result would not be commensurate with the labor. As the poem is clearly mature work, the result of the effort would be merely to confirm what has always been assumed. Yet until that is done, the as1 The edition I have used is that of Venice 1531 with the comments of Donatus, Landinus, and Servius Maurus. For example, to the passage quoted above the comment is: "Non si ipse meus, sub audi filius posset defendere." Another illustration, Surrey's version of the lines 63-4: Undique visendi studio Troiana iuventus Circumfusa ruit, certantque inludere capto, is (81-82) Near him, to gaze, the Trojan youth gan flock, And strave who most might at the captive scorn. Nott notes (op. cit., 403) "To scorn, is to insult at, to make a mock of." The Hippolito version is La gioventu Troiana d'ogn' intorno Sparsa corre a verderlo a fanno a gara, Chi plu faccia al prigion vergogna e scorno. Pest black-leads this with the comment: "Es ist durchaus unwahrscheinlich, dass H. und S. unabhang ig zur Wiedergabe des Infinitives durch Fragesatz, die sich fast wSrtlich deckt, gekommen sind. 'Scorn' mit Nott 1403 als Verb aufzufassen, ist unrichtig" (op. cit., 57). The comment, in this case of Servius, is: "Circtfusa ruit. Figura hypallage, ruit & circtfusa est. Illudere capto. Et illudo tibi dicim, vt hoc loco & illudo te. vt verbis virtuta illude supbis (superbis) & in te sil'e (simile) est a isulto. It is quite clear it is not Nott that is here " unrichtig." HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY 539 sumption of Surrey's indebtedness to the Hippolito version is hypothetical. However unsatisfactorily vague may seem the discussion of the problem of the Second Book, the outlines are clearly drawn in comparison with the questions involved in the problem of the Fourth. For the Second Book we have a text admittedly inferior, because there is very little doubt that it has been edited; for the Fourth we have three texts, which do not agree among themselves and the value of any one of which depends upon its similarity to an unknown original. These are (a) the Tottel edition of 1557, reprinted by the Roxburghe Club in 1814, and the Fourth Book alone by Fest; (b) the Hargrave MS. version, never printed at all, but very carefully collated by Imelmann; and (c) the printed edition of John Day, which exists today in an unique copy at Britwell Court, and which has never been either reprinted or collated.1 In the two accessible texts, the Tottel and the Hargrave MS., there are certain curious differences. Imelmann has shown that the second is more like the Douglas translation, and also the Italian version of Picholomini, than is the Tottel.2 Granted that this be true, it is not clear what it signifies. Either Tottel changed the text, or the copyist of the Hargrave MS. changed the text, or (what is more probable) both edited the manuscripts that they received. The case is still more complicated by the fact that, as Imelmann shows, there are apparent reminiscences of the Hargrave MS. version in Phaer's translation, finished in April 1556. But there is no proof that the copyist of the Hargrave MS. did not improve his author in reference to Phaer! And these verbal similarities are not more numerous than would happen by the doctrine 1 Clearly, until this last be published, no results can be considered definite. 2 The following is a fair sample of the variants: IV. 427. Nec patris Anchisse cinerem Manisve revelli... Tottel, 560-1. Nor cynders of his father Anchises Disturbed have, out of his sepulture. Hargrave MS. 561-2 Nor cynders of his father Anchises Disturbed/ ne pulled/ out oil his sepulture. Picholomini 12b. Ne'l cener del suo padre Anchise o l'ombre Trassi fuor del sepolcro. But thene pulled is superimposed upon an aye crossed out. Imelmann, op cit., 116 540 EARLY TUDOR POETRY of chance. We are asked to accept hypothesis piled upon hypothesis, that Surrey knew the unpublished Douglas and the accessible Italian, and that Phaer knew the unpublished Surrey (unless the Britwell copy be like the Hargrave MS.). It seems to me that this theory breaks of its own weight. The correspondences in the various versions are not sufficiently striking; you read, but you remain unconvinced. The one dominant idea you gain from the whole discussion is of the uncertainty surrounding Surrey's text. Until that be determined any discussion of the relation between the different versions is necessarily futile. The importance of this discussion lies in the fact that it involves the early treatment of blank verse. Upon analysis, the peculiarities of blank verse may be resolved into (a) the omission of rime; (b) the use of pentameter; and (c) the use of the feet within the line. The first seems clearly due to the influence of humanism.1 The second, on the other hand, is due to the dominance in English of the pentameter line. There is no inherent reason why the five-accented line should have been preferred to that having six accents, especially as the hexameter was the meter of Vergil. At least so thought Surrey himself as shown by his version of the Fiftyfifth Psalm. But the pentameter line was that used in both the rime-royal and in the heroic couplet. It therefore had the sanction of all the great writers. Logically, then, both Grimald and Surrey adopted it. This represents the working of the English tradition. But for the treatment within the lines Surrey especially claimed the full measure of freedom in the placing of his accents. As in the case of the Fifty-fifth Psalm, here also, he writes by ear. So long as there be the five stresses in the line, the feet may take care of themselves. One of the favorite openings is a stressed syllable, followed by two unaccented syllables: 2 C'6ldest thou h6pe? Unurst to 16ve my land? Usually after such an opening the line becomes iambic, but it may be as irregular as 3 F6r to prepare, and drive to the sea c6ast. If this be the reading, it is clear that the number of syllables, while usually ten, is of minor importance. This explains Nott's 1 See ante 356 ff. 2 Bk. IV, 397 (Fest). 3 Bk. IV, 374 (Fest). HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY 541 hypothesis that Surrey left the work unfinished, because a number of the lines do not scan according to the strict iambic measure.1 But this is in consonance with the principles of the Medieval Latin as practiced in English.2 The danger of this method is at once obvious;the freedom may degenerate into license, and lines be produced that are verse by courtesy only.3 Consequently under the lead of humanism there was exerted a steady pressure to make the lines more "regular." The humanist critics objected to Surrey's feet that they lacked "true quantities." Their position may be best illustrated by Ascham, who, it will be remembered, desired unrimed iambic verse in imitation of the "perfect Grecians." 4 The noble Lord Th. Earle of Surrey, first of all English men, in translating the fourth booke of Virgill: and Gonsaluo Periz that excellent learned man, and Secretarie to kyng Philip of Spaine, in translating the Vlsses of Homer out of Greke into Spanish, haue both, by good iudgement, auoyded the fault of Ryming, yet neither of them hath fullie hit(t)e perfite and trew versifying. Indeed, they obserue iust number, and euen feete: but here is the fault, their feete: be feete without ioyntes, that is to say, not distinct by trew quantitie of sillabes: And so, soch feete, be but numme (benummed) feete: and be, euen as vnfitte for a verse to turne and runne roundly withall, as feete of brasse or wood be vnweeldie to go well withall. And as a foote of wood, is a plaine shew of a maifest maime, euen so feete, in our English versifying, without quantitie and ioyntes, be sure signes, that the verse is either, borne deformed, vnnaturall and lame, and so verie vnseemlie to looke vpon, except to men that be gogle eyed them selues. This passage must mean that, while the number of syllables in the line is normally correct, the placing of the stress is such that feet in the classical sense cannot be formed from them.5 But this freedom in placing the stress is characteristic of all our great blank verse. And the reason why in the history of the literature blank verse is so late in developing is because it thus combines in itself 1Some of them certainly read like alexandrines. 2 Ante 145 ff. 3 Some of the authors of the Mirror for Magistrates, Cavyl for instance, wrote lines that defy any known rules for scansion. 4 Ascham's Scholemaster, Arber's Reprint, 147-8. 5 This may be the explanation for the divergence of the texts of Surrey, that each editor in varying degrees tried to remodel the work along humanistic lines. 542 EARLY TUDOR POETRY so many utterly diverse and antagonistic elements. Before it could be written an author must have arisen who in himself combined the movements of the English tradition, the Medieval Latin, and humanism. Logically such a combination was not possible until the second generation of the reign of Henry VIII, the generation of the Earl of Surrey. It is this union of the separate influences that makes Surrey's work so important. It is possible, even, to choose single poems in which any one of the various movements seems to dominate. For example, a characteristic of the English tradition, inherited from Chaucer, is to be found in the feeling toward nature, shown by concrete allusions. Surrey's Description of Spring may be cited in illustration: 1 The soote season, that bud and blome furth bringes With grene hath clad the hill and eke the vale; The nightingale with fethers new she sings: The turtle to her make hath tolde her tale: Somer is come, for euery spray nowe springes, The hart hath hong his olde hed on the pale: The buck in brake his winter cote he flinges: The fishes flote with newe repaired scale: The adder all her sloughe awaye she slinges: The swift swalow pursueth the flyes smale: The busy bee her honye now she minges: Winter is worne that was the flowers bale: And thus I see among these pleasant thinges Eche care decayes, and yet my sorow springes. Here even the language shows its dependence upon the earlier English writers; such words as soote (sweet), make (mate) and ming (remember) 2 prove Surrey a student of English. This is not an imitation of Chaucer or Lydgate, but one feels that, had they not written, the poem would have been quite different. The same is true also of its content. It is a catalogue of the signs of an English spring. For the sake of comparison to bring out this very important point the corresponding sonnet of Petrarch is here given: 3 1 Tottel's Miscellany, Arber's Reprint, 4. 2 It may be worth while to correct the old Aldine edition of Surrey on the authority of the N. E. D. Ming does not mean "mingle." 3 Sonnet CCCX. HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY 543 Zefiro torna, e'l bel tempo rimena, E i fiori e 1'erbe, sua doice famiglia, E garrir Progne e pianger Filomena, E primavera candida e vermiglia. Ridono i prati, e'l ciel si rasserena: Giove s'allegra di mirar sua figlia; L'aria a l'acqua e la terra e d'amor piena: Ogni animal d'amar si riconsiglia. Ma per me, lasso!, tornano i piit gravi Sospori, che del cor profondo tragge Quella ch'al ciel se ne port6 le chiavi; E cantar augelletti, e fiorir piagge, E'n belle donne oneste atti soavi, Sono un deserto, e fere aspre e selvagge. These two poems lend themselves perfectly to the comparison; they are identical in both length and subject. Yet the dissimilarity is striking. The conventional generalizations of the Italian, the classical reminiscence in Progne, Filomena, and Giove, and the conceited close, contrast markedly with the concrete detail in the English, such detail, be it noted in passing, as would come to the eye of a young Englishman, fond of the out-of-doors. This characteristic trait, to embody within the verse observations of nature, was learned surely of his English predecessors, and not from the Italian poet; one has but to visit Vaucluse to realize how inadequate an impression of the spectacular beauty of the place is given by Petrarch's enamelled phrases. In Surrey the content surely is English. But if in the preceding poem the content be English, the form surely is not. The elaborate simplicity of the rimescheme, three quatrains abab with a final couplet cc, recall rather the Medieval Latin. Consequently in Surrey's works careful analysis can show the traces of all four of the great dominating impulses of literature. It is this union of forces which have appeared in the earlier writers that makes the poetry of the generation exemplified in Surrey so important. It is this factor, rather than mere verse-technique, that caused the esteem in which Surrey was held by the Elizabethans. For one reason, the language had settled into its modern form. Whereas, even in Wyatt, the romance accent was still current, it is rare in Surrey. To assume that the romance accent disappeared because of his dislike, is to attribute much more influence to his writings than the facts seem to warrant. Actually it is more logical to as 544 EARLY TUDOR POETRY sume that he wrote the language as he found it, and the innovations attributed to him belong equally to all his contemppraries.' It was chronology, rather than genius, that rejected the older forms. But much the same reasoning applies to verse forms. In Surrey's work are first developed several of the forms used later, such as the Elizathan sonnet, and his use of others than new, such as poulter's measure, probably gave them currency. Yet here again he was following the lines of least resistance. It was Surrey's fortune, rather than his merit, that in his work are crystallized the beginnings of modern English literature. And it was equally the good fortune of the age that it found in Surrey a writer that could so crystallize them. Because of the junction of the time and the man, the result is that Surrey's work marks an epoch, the line of cleavage between the old and the new. This is primarily because in Surrey we find for the first time the author clearly transcending his medium. He writes what he wishes to write as he wishes to write it,-not because he is constrained to any given form inherited from the past, or borrowed from Europe. For the first time since Chaucer the reader feels the personal note. Even Skelton's powerful personality dashes to pieces against his acquired forms, and he remains unread, and Wyatt's innate nobility petrifies in the Italian formula. But in Surrey, as in Chaucer, there is a light touch. When Lady Hertford refused to dance with him, he describes the scene with details that are intentionally comic.2 The idea of personifying the participants by their armorial animals gives the ridiculous picture of the lion rampart "prancing" and beating his tail. Or, another example is his charming poem that childhood is the happiest period of a man's life,-with the ironic pathos added that to our modern eyes the author himself was still a young man at his death, in spite of the "white and hoarish hairs" "the messengers of age." His pieces to his wife seem of genuine lyric quality, without the Petrarchan conventionality and hackneyed phrasing. It is easy to believe that in his time of trial she remained faithful to him. The famous illustration is of course the poem written from Windsor. Without accepting the superlative 1 These innovations have been carefully analysed by Courthope, History of English Poetry, London 1904, 92-100. Therefore I shall not repeat them here. 2 cannot take this poem seriously as does M. Bapst, op. cit., 371-4, although certainly Surrey was distinctly irritated by the incident. HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY 545 employed by Professor Courthope,1 the charm is at once apparent. This charm, however, arises not from the splendor of the verse nor from the easy handling of a conventional situation, but it is due to the use of such detail that the reader is convinced of the actuality. While the lads below are playing tennis on the green courts, the girls are watching them from the leads of the Maiden's Tower. Such a scene must have occurred many many times, or the tournaments, On foaming horse, with swords and Friendly hearts. For the moment you breathe the air of merry England in the reign of bluff King Hal! But of what other writer of the age may this be said? Others may interest us by the quaintness of their sentiments or the power of their verse, but they are dead. Surrey alone lives. Surrey's poetry, therefore, shows the culmination of forces that had been at work for nearly three quarters of a century. Unconscious of his place and blind to the law, each writer had contributed his part to the making of English literature. Each had written as seemed good to him, limited by his particular past and conditioned by his own personality. Each had written, as we write, for the vital present; no more than we, had they power to foresee the future. Nevertheless, each in his own way, had laid the foundations for the great literature of the coming age. Poetry was ready for the master's hand, because the prentice work had already been done. Early Tudor literature is primarily interesting, therefore, because it is prentice work,-because in this period, more clearly than in any other, is to be seen the working of literary law. 1 "I know of few verses in the whole range of human poetry in which the voice of nature utters the accents of grief with more simplicity and truth; it seems to me to be the most pathetic personal elegy in English poetry." Op. cit., 2, 85. INDEX Abel, Walter, 402 Abelard, 121, 124 Abingdon Abbey, 322 Academy, 333 Act of the Six Articles, 387 Act regulating printing, 488 Addison, J., on ballads, 325; on Paradise Lost, 324 Ad Herennium, 141; quoted, 131 (note) Aeneas Silvius, see Piccolomini Alamanni, Luigi, 476477; II Diluvio Romano, 353; satire, I vi diro, quoted, 478; on blank verse, quoted, 354 (note); mentioned, 480, 483 Alberti, Leon Battista, 322 Albertus Magnus, 121 Alcock, John, mentioned by Barclay, 245, 246, 247; reputed author of Castle of Labour, 426 Alcuin, 128 Aldus, 260, 263 Aliene dictionis introductio, 137 Allegory, erotic, 62-74; moral, 74-92 Allen, H. Warner, Celestina, 365 Allen, John, 427, 429 Allen, P. S., Age of Erasmus, 19; Erasmi Epistolae, 279 Ammonius, 27 Andersen, Hans C., 413, 496 Andrd, Bernard, 418, 419 Andrelinus, Faustus, 282 Andrews, Laurens, 128, 409 Anglia, 150 Anne of Cleves, 383 Anonymous, What our lives render, 524; Who craftily casts, 527; The wisest way, 529 Apollo of Corinth, 172 Apuleius, 262 Aquinas, St. Thomas, 121, 295 Arber, Edward, 78, 89, 128, 150, 207, 208, 212, 344 (note) Arber's Reprints, 344, 530 d'Arc, Jeanne, 434 Architectural development in Renaissance, 6 Aretino, Pietro; his life, 480; Humanitd di Cristo, 481; I Sette Salmi, 481; Raggiarnenti, 17; mentioned, 236, 380, 483, 514 Ariosto, Ludovico, quoted, 66; influenced Wyatt, 456-457 (note); mentioned, 456 Aristophanes, sold by Dome, 281 Aristotle, Ethics, 263; sold by Dome, 281; mentioned, 141 Aristotle, the senile, 83 Armonye of Byrdes, 149 Arnold's Chronicle, 153 Ars Rithmica, 125 Art, development, 6 Art of Memory, 499 Arthur, Thomas, 201 Arthurian Legend, 325 Arundel, Mistress, 511 Ascham, Roger, friend of Elyot, 306; tutor, 306; knows Fourth Book of Aeneid, 356; description of Elizabeth, 339-340; description of Lady Jane Grey, 20, 339; origin of Scholemaster, 330; influenced by Cheke, 305; gives theory of the humanists, 307; his apology for writing in English, 332; his opinion on archery, 315; on blank verse, 356; on classic culture, 317; on dancing, 316; on exercises, 314; on Greek, 318; on immorality, 18; on morality, 310; on purism in speech, 327; on reading, 323, 324; on sports, 315; on style, 144; on teaching, 327; 547 548 INDEX on Surrey, 541; on writing in English, 268; mentioned, 20, 305, 506. Asconius, 262 Assembly of Ladies, 65-68; added by Thynne, 65; feminism displayed, 65; French mottoes, 65; gorgeous costumes, 67; plot, 65; rejected by Tyrwhit, 65 Assertio Septem Sacramentorum, 386 Athenae Cantabrigienses, 93 Athenae Oxonienses, 75 Athletics, 314 Aulus Gellius, sold by Dome, 281; mentioned, 157 Aureate language, 139; used by Skelton, 162 Ausonius, 344 Awdeley, J., 153 Babington, Churchill, 168, 169 Bacon, Francis, compared to Vives, 303; Henry VII, 418 Bacon, Roger, 2 Bailey, N., 310 Bale, John, Index Britanniae Scriptorum, 427; Scriptorum Illustrium Maioris Brytanniae, 209 (note); method of compilation, 350; Barclay's authorship of Castle of Labour, 426 -427; omits Bryan, 378; on Grimald, 351; on Hawes, 75; on Roye, 209; on Skelton, 94; mentioned, 158, 260, 379, 390 Baliol, 236 Ballad-literature omitted, 39 Ballard's Memoirs of Several Ladies, 339 Balue, Cardinal, 192 Bandello, 17, 406 Bapst, Edmond, Deux Gentilshommes Poetes de la Cour de Henry VIII, 509, 510, 511, 515, 516, 517, 533, 544 Barbican, The, 226-227 Barclay, Alexander, 237-256; A Lover's Confession, 54; Castle of Labour, 51, 426-427; Eclogues, 147, 238-248, 252, 253; Towre of Vertue and Honour, 247, 531; Ship of Fools, 248-250; quoted, 39, 131, 172 (note); mentioned, 52,130, 228, 382, 436; Barclay on disordered love, 249; e final, 51; French vocabulary, 420-421; universities, 382; verse-forms, 249; voyages, 33; compared with Elyot, 309; Skelton, 99-100, 170; Villon, 438; Wyatt, 480; mentioned 171, 217, 259, 281 (note), 479, 483, 499 Barlow, George, Dean of Westbury, 514 (note) Barlow, Jerome, Rede me and Be nott Wrothe, 208-212, 400-401 Barlow, William, 210 (note) Barnes, 207, 389 Battle Abbey, 322 Beatus Rhenanus, 261 Belief in Future Life, Greek, 5 Bembo, Cardinal, 380 Benivieni, Girolamo, 318 Bennet, James, 268 Benson, Rev. R. H., 307 Berkeley, Thomas Lord, 168 Bernard, Saint, 121 Bernsdorf, Cornelia, 301 Berners, Lord, see Bouchier Bertaut, Rene, 373 Bible, Coverdale's, 401; objections to in English, 392 Bibliot6que Erasmiana, 280 Bijvanck, W. G. C., 431 Bilney, Thomas, 201, 207 Black Death, 28 Blank verse, origin, 353-360; Grimald's, 355; Surrey's, 354, 534-542 Bloch, Dr. Ivan, 28 Boccaccio, Giovanni, his theory of poetry, 76; mentioned, 157, 472 Boethius, 157 Boileau, 421 Boleyn, Anne; life, 461-462; attacked by plague, 27; relations with Henry VIII, 265, 388; with Wyatt, 461-467; French influence, 444; mentioned, 29, 383, 418, 484, 509, 515 Boleyn, George, Lord Rochford, 29, 345, 486 INDEX 549 Boleyn, Mary, 27, 216, 461 Boleyn, Thomas, Earl of Wiltshire, 29, 362 Bond, R. W., 373 Bonner, Edmund, 362, 402 Booget of Demands, 499 Borgia, Cesare, 16 Bosworth Field, Battle of, 48 Bouge of Court, 14 Bourbon, Connetable de, 456 Bourchier, Henry, Earl of Essex, 29 Bourchier, John, Lord Berners, 369 -377; Ambassador to Spain, 362; portrait, 871; his geography, 494; style, 374; dating of his works, 371; his works, 369, 493-498; Arthur of Little Britain, 370, 494; Castle of Love, 372; Golden Book of Marcus Aurelius, 373-377; Froissart, 372, 493-494; Huon of Burdeux, 494-498; mentioned, 417, 447 Bradley, Henry, 175, 177 (note) Bradshaw, Henry, 118, 254, 255 Brandon, Charles, 266, 388, 465 Brandt, Sebastian, 248; mentions universities, 382; see Narrenschiff Brant6me, 17 Brewer, J. S., History of the Reign of Henry VIII, 8, 26, 27, 193, 198; see Calendar of State Papers Brie, F. W. D., Eulenspigel in England, 405, 410, 411 (note); Gaguin, 171 (note); Hundred Mery Tales, 406 (note); Skelton-Studien, 92 (note), 101, 173 (note), 201 (note), 417 Bromyard, 406 Brooke, C. F. Tucker, 103 Brown, Rawdon, Calendar of State Papers... in Venice, 44; Four Years at the Court of Henry VIII, 38 Browning, E. B., 91 Brunetiere, F., 422 Bruno, 24 Bruyant, Jean, 426, 429 Bryan, Sir Francis, 377-8; "Vicar of Hell," 377; his reputation, 378; friend of Wyatt, 479; account of in Hall, 377; French influence, 442; poetry, 345; Dispraise of the Life of a Courtier, 379; Wyatt's satire to him, 378; the Golden Book suggested by him, 369; mentioned, 69 Buckingham, Duke of, Henry, Earl of Strafford, his dinner, 14; his wardrobe, 12; execution, 508; mentioned, 348 Buckingham, Duke of, George Villiers, Dryden's satire on, 174 Budaeus (Bude), 302, 364 Buffon, 401 Bullein, Wm., 195 Bullock, Henry, 284 BurckhardLt's Diary, 17 Burgos, Martinez de, 379, 380 Burkart on Hawes, 75, 89 Burns, Robert, 326 Burrows, M., 260 Busch, Wilhelm, 39 Byron, George, 174 Caesar, 262, 263 Caius, Dr., quoted, 26 Calembour, origin of word, 410 Calendar of State Papers, ed. Brewer, 187, 180, 207, 210, 446 Calmeta, Vicentio, 474-475 Calvin, John, 36, 503 Cambridge History of English Literature, 104 (note), 154 Camden's Remains, 256 Camden Society, 369 Cammelli, see Pistoia Campeggio, Cardinal, 388 Capella, Martianus, 82, 92 Capelli, A., 467 Capitoli, 18 " Captain Cox's Library," 499 Carew, 442 Carew, Lady Elizabeth, 369 Carmina Clericorum, 149 Carthusians, 390 Cary, William, 27 Castle of Labour, see Barclay Casuum mutatio, 138 550 INDEX Catullus, 213, 261, 262, 319, 348 Caveat or Warning for Common Cursitors, 227 Cavendish, George, Life of Wolsey, 14, 420 Cavyl, 541 Cawood, 499 Caxton, William, works printed by him, 490; Book of Curtesye, 55; quoted 56; Aeneid(?), 281; Eneydos, quoted, 52, 201; his version of Image du Monde, 82; Mirrour of the World, quoted, 83; Longer Accidence, 409; Morte Darthur, 490-493; Polychronicon, 169; Recueil des histories de Troye, 487; Reynard the Fox, 384 (note); his opinion of Chaucer, quoted, 55; of Lydgate, quoted, 56; his address to Skelton, 93; opinion of Skelton, 156, 233; echoed by Skelton, 160 (note); his social position, 488; his literary position, 262 Celestina, 365-8; editions of, 365 (note); date, 365 Cellini, B., 456 Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles, 406, 412 Chalcondylas, 236 Chalmer's English Poets, 139 Chandler, 259 Change in pronunciation, 50 Chappell, Popular Music, 98. Chapuis, 463, 466, 509 Chariteo, 475 Charles V of Spain, 264, 266 Charles VIII of France, 17, 416 Chatelain, Henri, 439 (note) Chaucer, Geoffrey, works read, 56; editions of, 59, 116-117; Canterbury Tales, Prologue, 50, 231; Clerkes Tale, 154; Tale of Melibeus, 497; Nonnes Preestes Tale, 497; meeting with Petrarch, 236; used as model, 50; not sold by Dome, 281; his reputation, 116; his versification lost, 54; casual mention, 130 (note), 155, 157, 160, 214, 231, 255, 324, 325, 416, 505, 506, 523, 542, 544 Chaucer, derivatives from, 416 Chaucerian apocrypha, 59 ff. Cheke, Sir John, 305, 318 Cheney, Sir Thomas, 462 Chertsey Abbey, 322 Chevy Chase, 325 Child, H. H., 358 Chivalry, 91 Christening of Queen Elizabeth, 29 Churchyard, Thomas, 345 Cicero, 157, 262, 263, 281, 351 Ciceronianism, 328 Clement VII, 266 Cleveland, John, 251 (note) Clewners, 227 Clifford, Berthold, 516 (note) Cobham, Lord, 465 Cock Lorell, historicity of, 225 (note) Cock Lorrelles Bote, 222-225; quoted, 228; compared with Hye Way, 228 Coleridge, S. T., 264 Colet, John, 158, 236, 259, 260, 264, 280, 285; "Gratian Pullus," 294; Barclay's allusion to, 236; founds St. Paul's School, 300 Colin Clout, see Skelton Collectanea, Oxford Historical Society, 260 Colleges, Tudor, 301 Collier, J. P., 410 (note) Colonna, Giovanni, 471 Colores, 130 ff. Columbus, 32 ff. Comparetti, 235 Comets, medieval interpretation of, 24 Comperta, 390 Compositio, 136 Compton, Sir William, 27 Conde Jean de, 73 Confessio Goliardi, 149 Conflictus, 128, 155, 206, 398, 407 Conon, 317 Constantinople, 236 Constantyne, George, 511, 514 Consultatio Sacredotum, 129 Conti, Giusti de', 472 Contrarii positio, 137 INDEX 551 Contrast between Christian and pagan ethics, 3 Cook, A. S., 395 Copernican theory, 23 Copland, Robert, Hye way to the Spittal Hous, 228; Jyl of Brentford, the prologue, 433; Kalendar of Shepherds, 500; prints Howleglas, 410; French influence of, 502 Copland, William, 499, 433 Cornish, Thomas, 427 (note) Cornysshe, 135, 165, 345, 419, 486 Cortez, 34 Cotton, Charles, 524 Courthope, W. J., 82, 104 (note), 516, 545 (note) Courtney, Henry, 29 Court of Love, 68-74; architectural details, 70; attitude toward religion, 71-72; dating, 68; forgery, 68; imitation of Chaucer, 70; literary value, 74; Matins of the Birds, 73; morality, 71; plot, 69; mentioned, 92, 115, 254 Court of Sapience, 81 Coverdale, Miles, 401-404; his Bible, 401; Gostely Psalms, 401, 481 Cranmer, Archbishop, 29, 462, 515 Crane, Professor, 324, 497 Cretin, 422, 423 (note) Crofts, H. H. S. L., 304, 307 (notes 1, 2) Cromwell, Oliver, 22 Cromwell, Richard, 117-118, 305, 348, 383, 385, 388, 464, 465, 471, 508, 509, 515, 517 Croy, Henri de, 422 Cuer d'amours epris, 82 Culinary art, 15 Culture, Greek, 16 Cum consonatia sequente immediate, 151 Cunliffe, John W., 531 Dancing, 315-16 Daniel, Samuel, 460 Dante, 77, 235, 456, 457, 483 Darcy, Lord, 29, 517 Debat du Seigneur du cour et du Seigneur des champs, 243 Deffense et illustration de la langue franfaise, 17, 442 Defoe, Daniel, 514 (note) Della Crusca, 333 Derby, Count of, 509 Deschamps, Eustace, 422, 431 Dialogue between Lupset and Pole, quoted, 21 Dibdin, T. F., f64 Dictionum debita derivatio, 136 Dictioni similtudinis adjunctio, 137 Diotrephes, 400 (note) Divorce, 462 (note) Doesborgh, Jan van, 409, 500 Dome, J., sales, 281; sales of Erasmus, 281; Arnold's Chronicle, 154; Nutbrowne Mayd, 154 Douglas, Gawin, 416, 534, 535 Douze triomphes de Henry VII, 418-419 Dragon, Hawes' description of quoted, 85 Drake, Raff, 135 Drayton, M., 378, 460, 516 Dreves, 124 Droyn, 382 Dryden, John, Absalom and Achitophel, 173; Preface to Fables, quoted, 51; Flower and the Leaf, 325; Hind and the Panther, 106; Mac Flecknoe, 226 -227; rentioned, 333 DuBellay, French ambassador, 26 DuBellay, Joachim, 451 Duemler, Ernestus, 123 Duff, E. Gordon, Castle of Labour, 426; Century of the English Book Trade, 488, 502; Caxton's works, 490 (note); Salomon and Marcolphus, 408 Dunbar, 416, 417 (note) Dunlop, 495 Duns Scotus, 295, 302 Dyce, Alexander, 162 Dysart, Lord, 76 e final, 50 Early English Drama Society, 256 Edmonc, J. P., 222 Education, 49, 295, 299 552 INDEX Education of women, 333-341 Edward VI, 463 Elizabeth, Queen, Ascham's description of, 339; learning of, 339; legitimacy of, 462; mentioned, 517 Elyot, Sir Thomas, 304-305; studied with Linacre, 305, 305 (note); relations with More, 305; compared to Barclay, 309; reasons for authorship, 308; The Gouernour, Croft's edition, 38, 304; origin of Image of Gouernance, 306; Elyot's opinion of dancing, 316; of exercise, 313; of expurgated works, 320; of Greek, 318; his method, 304; on reading, 317; on sports, 314; on teaching, 326, 329; on the vernacular, 331; mentioned, 337, 375. Emerton, Ephraim, 279, 310. English Poets, A. Chalmers, 134; S. Johnson, 134 English Sweating Sickness, 26 Envoy of Alison, 130, 139 Epitaffe of Jasper Duke of Bedford, 129 ff. Epistola ad Herennium, see Ad Herennium Epistolae Obscurorum Virorum, 167, 218, 281, 295, 364, 382 Equivocaio, 136 Erasmus, Desiderius, 279-294; his visit to the royal household, 43, 234; Elyot, 307; Skelton, 181, 185, 234; Vives, 302-303 (notes); his relation with the humanists, 236, 260; editions, 280; sales, 281, 282; popularity of separate works, 282; Chiliades, 305; Colloquies, 288-291, 206, 881, 399; Adulescens et Scortum, 283; Diversoria, 283; IXOvoIWvyua, 310 (note), Naufragium, 283; Copia, 816; Dialogus de Pronunciatione, 299; Enchiridion, 285; Epistles, 259; Julius Exlusus, 282 (note); De laudibus Britanniae, 234; New Testament, 283, 392; versions used by Tyndale, 392; Praise of Folly, 286-287, 296-299; translated by Margaret Roper, 336; his opinion of Church abuses, 287; his Catholicism, 291; cosmopolitanism, 279; on confession, 289-290; character of his humanism, 385; intellectual freedom, 276; description of Montaigu College, 311; moral reform, 285; rationalism, 290; reform, 292; on sanitation, 25; his sceptical spirit, 287; his scholarly instinct, 283; mentioned, 122, 158, 211, 246, 259, 263, 264, 302, 328, 364, 390, 405 Esdaile, Arundell, 480 (note) Espieglerie, 410 Eudaimonism, 5 Eulenspiegel, cf. Howleglas Euphuism, 373-374 Exempla honestae vitae, 125, 130, 132 Exercise, 312 Faber, Jacobus, 281 Fabri, 422, 439 Faerie Queene, 78, 92 Fall of Princes, 64 Farmer, John S., 256 Fatality of the age, 29 Faukes, Richard, 176 Federn, Karl, 5 Feilde, Thomas, 128, 150 Ferrari, G., 467 Fescennine verses, 122 Fest, Otto, 356, 534, 536, 538 (note), 539 Ficino, 318 Fictio, illustrated, 138 Field of the Cloth of Gold, 417 Fifteen Tokens, 409, 499 Figliucci, Felice, 354 Finzi, Guiseppe, 429 Fish, Simon, 388, 391, 396 Fiske, John, 32 Fitzgerald, Lady Elizabeth, 517 Fletcher, A. R. L., 281 Fletcher, R., quoted, 524 Flodden Field, 416 Flower and the Leaf, 63-64; added by Speght, 63; not by Lydgate, 64; doubted by Tyrwhit, 63; Skeat's INDEX 553 hypothesis, 64; the plot, 63; translated by Dryden, 63; Keat's sonnet on, 63 FlUgel, Ewald, 44, 135, 343, 419, 486 (note) Formal literary tradition, 60-61 Forrest, 386 Fortini, 406 Fountains Abbey, 322 Fowler, Mary, 457 (note) Fowler, Thomas, 246 Fox, Richard, Bishop of Winchester, 246 Foxe, John, 389, 390, 390 (note), 402 (note), 415 Foxwell, A. K., 343, 378, 445, 446 (note), 448 (note), 450 (note), 469, 471, 483 (note), 484 (note), 486, 510 (note), 520, 521 Francis, I, 189 Fratrasie, 167 Frederick of Jennen, 409 French alliance, 8 French influence on poetry, 415-444 French influence on prose, 490-503 du Fresnoy, 449 (note) Friedlaender, Ludwig, 523 Friedmann, Paul, 461 Frith, John, 207, 386, 389, 392 Froben, 382 (note) Froebel, 330 Froissart, 493-494 Frottola, 167 Froude, J. A., History of England, 511, 515; Life and Letters of Erasmus, 45, 229 (note), 264 (note), 292 (note); The Pilgrim, 21; conception of Henry VIII, 266; "Chelsea tradition," 275 Fuchs, Eduard, Das Erotische Element, 46; Sittengeschichte, 16 Fuller, Thomas, 256, 2f60, 301 Furniss Abbey, 322 Furnival, F. J., 117, 432 (note) Gaguin, Robert, 157, 171 Gairdner, James, Paston Letters, 49; English Church in the Sixteenth Century, 199, 387 Galen, Linacre's translation of, 260, 314 Galileo, '2, 23, 24 Games, 314 Gammer Gurton's Needle, 155 (note) Gardiner, Stephen, 256 Garlandia, John of, 125, 131 (note), 147, 1 18, 232 Garnesche, 171, 234 "Garret," 517-518 (note) Gascoigne, George, 356 (note), 531-532 Gasquet, F. A., 397 Genealogye of Heresye, 205 Geography, increased knowledge of, 30 German influence, 381-415 Germany, sixteenth century knowledge of, 3828 Germany, trade with, 383 Gesualdo, S. A., 459 (note) Gibbon, Edward, 375 Gibbons, Cardinal, 386 Giles, Rev. Dr., 307 Giotto, t3 Giovanni della Banda Nera, 480 Glastonbury Abbey, 322 Gladstone, W. E., 22 Gnapheus, 381 Gobilive, Godfrey, 83 Golden age, 321 Goliardic Poetry, 124 Gothic,;21 Gower, 454, 116, 157, 160, 214, 251, 252, 265, 281 Graf, Aituro, 460, 480 (note) Grammar Schools, 301 Grand rhetoriquers, Les, 422, 424 Gray, Thomas, 215, 324 Gray, or Grey, William, 345, 486 Greek, revival of, 3; study of, 317-319; Ascham's emphasis on, S28 (note), in Court of Love, 70 Greg, W. W., 406 Grey, Henry, Duke of Suffolk, 29 Grey, Lady Jane, 20, 339 Grimald, Nicholas, 350-352; Archipropheta, 351; Christus Redivivus, 351; Tottel's Miscellany, 344; blank verse, 355, 358-9; Death of Zoroas, 355; 554 INDEX Marcus Tullius Ciceroes death, 355; mentioned, 69, 445, 523 Gringoire, 426, 429 Griselda, the Patient, 154 Grocyn, William, 158, 236, 259, 260, 262 Guest, 353 Guevara, Antonio de, 373-380; origin of the Relox, 374; Menosprecio de Corte, 378; imitates Aretino, 380; is imitated by Bryan, 378 Guiccardini, 456 (note), 487 Guistinian, 187 Gummere, F. B., 154 GUnther, Rudolf, 303 Gunpowder, invention of, 2 Guy, Henricus, 441 Habel, Edwin, 125 Haber, Jacob, 105 Hague, Arthur, 165 (note) Hall, Edward, 8, 198, 278, 383, 442, 444 Hallam, Henry, 341 Halliwell, J. 0., Debate between Somer and Wynter, 128; Sack Full of News, 406 Ham House, 76 Hamlet, 35 Hammond, Elinor P., 220 Hampton Court, architecture, 66; furniture, 66; History of, 7 Hanford, J. H., 128 Hardy, Sebastian, 379 Harleian Miscellany, 208 Harman, 227 Harrison, William, 104 Harvey, Gabriel, 256, 353, 410 (note) Hastings, Lord George, 369 Hauvette, Henri, 354, 476 Hawes, Stephen, 74-92; his life, 74-76; "groom of the Chamber," 75; death, 75; his works, 76; editions, 76; Example of Virtue, date, 76; a conflictus, 128; plot, 78; King of Love, 79; verses on Prince Henry, quoted, 43; A Joyful Meditation, quoted, 88; Pastime of Pleasure, date, 59; Mor ley's epitome of, 79; comparison between Example and Pastime, 80; Godfrey Gobilive, 83; pronunciation of final e, 51; published by Tottel, 343; quoted, 57, 77, 85, 89, 140; Mirror of Good Manners, 250-253; Conversyon of Swerers, quoted, 78, 90; mentioned, 79, 88; Comfort of Lovers, 76 (note), 86-88; Hawes compared to Bunyan, 86; his knowledge of Chaucer, 55; compared to Chaucer, 86; his "colores," 130; use of dialogue, 128; attitude toward Henry VII, 75; his inventiveness, 81; eulogy of Lydgate, quoted, 57; imitates Lydgate, 84; his sources, 82; relation to Spenser, 91; his general significance, 91; not sold by Dome, 281; his theory of poetry, 76; his text, 89; his vagueness, 92; mentioned, 116, 120, 216, 370, 371, 405, 418, 444, 483, 492 Hawkins, John Sidney, 164 (note) Hazlitt, W. Carew, Early Popular Poetry, 128, 149, 150, 155, 156 (note), 226, 432; Shakespeare's Jest Books, 275, 406; edition of Warton, 219, 473 (note) Henry VII, French influence on, 418 -419, 453; his literary tastes, 42; his policy, 41; his right to the throne, 40 Henry VIII, his accession, 45; the Assertio, 386-389; celebrated by Hawes, 43; his culture, 44; Defensor Fidei, 386; description of, 45; the divorce, 266, 388; French influence, 419; suggests Froissart, 369; his humanism, 44; his knowledge of foreign languages, 44; his loveletters, 18; his love of music, 44; his morality, 46; the paradox of, 46; Pastyme with good companye, 486; his physique, 44; popular conception of, 43; reasons for his success, 47; success of his reign, 47; tutored by Skelton, 234 Henry, Duke of Richmond, 265, 463 INDEX 555 Henry, Earl of Strafford, see Buckingham Henryson, 416 Herbert of Cherbury, Lord, 511, 533 Herenc, Baudet, 422 Heresy defined, 389 Herford, C. H., 100 (note), 211 (note), 224 (note), 381, 384, 399, 400, 402 (note), 405 (note), 407 (note), 411 (note) d'Hericault, 438, 441 Hero and Leander, 147 Heron, A., 422 Hesiod, 157 Heywood, John, 102-116; alliteration, 114; French influence, 102-103; personality, 102; sense of humor, 107; use of dilemma, 108-114; Epigrams, 103, 256, 257; Epigram on Himself, 102; Proverbs, 90, 103, 254, 256, 257; Spider and the Flye, interpretation, 105-106; dating, 105; animal characters, 103; critical opinion, 104; quoted, 107, 108-114; Spenser's method, 106; mentioned, 256; Tottel's Miscellany, 245, summary of Heywood, 115; mentioned, 483, 486 Higden, 168 Holbein, paints scenery, 11; portrait of More, 278 Holinshed, 511, 533 Holland, Elizabeth, 509 Holle, Fritz, 366 Homer, 157 Hopkins, John, 404 Hopkins, the betrayer of Buckingham, 534 (note) Horace, meters used, 232; influence of, 262; sold by Dome, 281; in Tottel's Miscellany, 346-348; model for Renaissance, 848; imitated by Wyatt, 345, 480; mentioned, 14, 123, 133, 158, 173, 218, 302, 319, 477; ode quoted, 526 Horstmann, Carl, 254, 255 Howard, Sir Edward, 245, 247 Howard, Henry, see Surrey Howard, Katharine (Catherine), 466, 515 Howard, Mary, Duchess of Richmond, 509, 510 Howleglas,, Tyll, 410-415; given to Spencer, 410 (note); contents, 411; object, 412; satire, 413; mentioned, 407 Hugo, Victor, 415 Humanism, definition of, 230; educational theory, 295; education of women, 333-341; the goal, 307; morality, 261-262; the Reformation, 22, 294; the sterility of the humanists, 262 Hume, Martin, Spanish Chronicle, 373, 463; Wives of Henry VIII, 365, 461 Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, 208, 36, 259 Hundred Mery Talys, 405 Hunn, Richard, 211 Hussey, John, 29, 463 Hutten, Ulrich von, see Epistolae Obscurorum Virorum Huxley, T. H., e2 Hye Way to the Spittal Holus, 25-228, 502 Hymns, Latin, 124 Hyrde, 315, 323 (note), 336, 338 Image du Monde, 82-83 Image of Ipocrysy, 205 Imelmann, Rudolf, 355 (note), 534, 536, 539 Immorality of Renaissance, 16 Ink horn terms, 140 International Manuscripts, 348 Introductio, 138 Islip, Abbot, 232 Italian influence on English poetry, 454-486 Italian influence on English prose, 487 Italian Relation, The, 12, 13, 14, 18, 19, 25, 38, 39, 41 Jack the Giant Killer, 496 James IV, of Scotland, 131, 316 556 INDEX Jamieson, T. H., 171 (note), 249, 250, 254 Jannet, ed. of Marot, 448 (note), 525 Jardin de Plaisance, 422, 439 Jerome, Friar, see Barlow Jest Books, 405-415 Johnson, Sam, 333 Jonson, Ben, 333, 500 Jusserand, Ambassador, 416 Justes of the Monethes, 151 Juvenal, 133, 157, 173, 193, 232, 26t, 319, 477 Jyl of Brentford, 432 Kalendar of Shepherds, 499-501 Kalendar of Shyppars, 499 Kalendier des bergiers, 500 Kastner, L. E., 451 (notes 1, 2) Katharine (Katherine) of Aragon, 265, 339, 362, 363, 388 Kemble, Salomon and Saturn, 408 Kepler, 23 Ker, W. P., 369, 370, 373, 493 King Arthur, 325 Kingsley, 117 Kingston, 465 Kittredge, G. L., 491 (note) Knight, Samuel, 286, 301 Knight's Tale, The, 479 Knyvet, Sir Edward, 518 Koelbing, A., 100 (note) Koeppel, Emil, 406 (note), 452 (note), 456 (note), 475 (note) Kuypers, Franz, 303, 331 (note), 313 (note) La Belle Dame, 50 Laborinthus, 125, 133, 148 Laing, D., 75 Lamentation of Mary Magdalen, 134 Lamentatio Oedipi, 148 Lando, Ortensio, 354 Lane, Dr. J. E., 28 (note) Lang, H. R., 125 Lanthorne of Light, 389 (note) Latimer, 259 Latin, Classical and Medieval contrasted, 127 Law, Ernest, 7, 196 Lawrence, John, 210 Lazarillo, 410 (note) Lecky, W. E., 389 Lee, Anthony, 486 Lee, Dr. Edward, 362, 386 Lee, Sir Sidney, Caxton, D. N. B., 488; Elizabethan Sonnets, 448, 460 (note); French Renaissance in England, 353 (note), 416 (note), 456 (note); Great Englishmen of the Sixteenth Century, 271; Huon of Burdeux, 369, 374, 379, 494 Leeu, Gerard, 408, 500 LeForestier, Jacques, 426 Lehmeyer, Fred, 431 (note) a Leigh, 511 Leland, John, 456 (note), 483, 519, 520 LeMaire de Belge, 422 Leo X, 264 Letter in ink horn terms, 142-143 Lettou, John, 488 Life of Saint Werburge, 254-255 Lily (Lilly), William, 158, 171, 218, 236, 259, 260 Linacre, Thomas, 158, 201, 236, 259, 260, 263, 305, 314 Lindsay, Rev. Dr., 282 Lindisferne Abbey, 322 Lisle, Lord, 462, 463 Livy, 157, 262 Locher, Jacob, Stultitiae Navis, the change from the Narrenschiff, 228, 248, 249; mentioned, 382; list of universities, 382 Lollardism, 389 London Chronicle, 33 London Lickpenny, 220-222 Long Meg of Westminster, 268 Longnon, Auguste, 432 (note) Lorenzo, 236 Louis XII of France, 266, 388, 417 Lounsbury, T. R., 68, 118, 160 Lover and a Jay, see Feilde Lowell, J. R., 59 INDEX 557 Lucan, 157, 281 Lucian, 281, 398, 399 Lucillius, 157 Lucretius, 262 Lupton, J. H., 260, 264 (note) Lusty Juventus, 152 Luther, Martin, opposed by More, 268; denounced by Henry VII, 387; dominant in Germany, 385; compared with Eulenspiegel, 415; mentioned, 264, 293, 391, 392, 396, 403, 503 Lycidas, 148 Lydgate, John, Devotion of the Fowles, 73; Court of Sapience, 81; Fall of Princes, 343; London Lickpenny, 220; Order of Fools, 226; Temple of Glas, 62, 71, 83 (note); Stans Puer, 281; literary channel, 60; influence on Hawes, 89; his imitators, 62; his reputation, 56; Ritson's opinion of, 61; his style, 62; imitated in Court of Love, 69, 70; "broken-backed line," 62; use of Latin, 133; mentioned, 40, 48, 55, 59, 74, 116, 139, 149, 157, 160, 255, 264, 542 Lyly, John, 340 (note) McConaughy, J., 351, 381 Macaulay, G. C., 369 Macchiavelli, 16, 385, 476, 487 Macchiavellianism, 16 MacCracken, H. N., 61, 64, 81, 133, 281 Macfarlane, John, 422, 499 Mac Flecknoe, 226, e22' Machado, Roger, 419 Mackenzie, 412 Macrobius, 157 Maidment, James, 222 (note) Mair, G. H., 140 Major, Prince Henry the Navigator, 31 Malherbe, 421 Malory, Sir Thomas, 490-493; not sold by Dome, 281; mentioned, 84 Mancinus, 250 Mantuan, Baptista Spagnola, 243, 244, 246, 247 Manuel, Der krankheit der Messe, 450 Mapes, Walter, Poems of, 169 Mappamondo at Pisa, 23 Marat, 266 Margaret Tudor, 416 Marillac, 466 Mari, Giovanni, 125, 130 (note), 132, 133, 136, 145, 146, 148, 151, 152 Marlowe, C., 147, 442 Marot, Clement, edited Roman de la Rose, 441, Villon, 436, 441; editions, 438; L'Adolescence Clementine, 447; the preface quoted, 447 (note); A Anne, 449; En un rondeau, 440; Marot, vici, 525; S'il es ainsy, 448 (note); court poet, 438-442; poems conventional, 448; his style, 442; influence on Wyatt, 447-450; poem similar to one by Wyatt, 448 (note); mentioned, 17, 432, 435, 444, 454, 481 Marot, Jean, 422, 439 Marshe, Thomas, 175, 219 Martial, 256-258; Bk. X, Ep. 47, 523; various versions of it, 523-526; mentioned, 173, 232, 319 Martin Marprelate, 22, 400 Martinus Dorpius, 284 Marullus, Michael Tarchaniota, 261, 262 Mary Tudor, her learning, 339; the legitimacy of, 462; mentioned, 266, 417 Mary of Burgundy, 361 Mary of Nemmengen, 361 Mary Stewart, 463 Matilda, Queen, 266 Maximianus, 157 Mayor, J. E. B., 310 Maze at Hampton Court, 66 Mazzuchelli, Giammaria, 481 (note) Mearns, 402 (note) Meauties, John, 191 (note) Medieval attitude toward this life, 3 Medieval hymnology, 4 Medieval Latin, 121 Medieval rhetorical devices, 125 Medici, Giulio de, 477 Medici, Hippolito de, Cardinal, 354, 586 558 INDEX Menendez y Pelayo, 365 Menghini, Marion, 474 Meres, Francis, 219, 378 Mery Tales of Skelton, 406 Meschinot, 422 Meung, Jean de, 430 Middleton, William, 493 (note) Milanessi, Carlo, 456 Milton, John, 325, 398, 435 Ming, 542 (note) Mirror for Magistrates, 541 Mitchell, A. F., 402 (note) Mock wills, 431-434 Modern Language Notes, 177 Modern Language Association, Publications of, 177 Modern Language Review, 248 Molinet, 422 Molinier, H. J., 243 Molza, 354, 536 Montaigu College, 310, 311 Montmerque-Didot, 422 Monumenta Germaniae Historica, 128 Morality in English Literature, 18 Morality in Renaissance, 15 More, Sir Thomas, works sold by Dome, 281; works, 343; Confutation, 399; Dialogue of Images, 294; Epigrammata, 261; In Anglum Gallicae Linguae Affectorem, 442; Life of Pico, 487; Lucian, 399; Supplycacyon of Soules, 208, 397-398; Utopia, editions of, 269; Robison's translation, 270; Sampson's edition, 269; characteristics of, 268; fundamental conception of, 270; letter about, 277; origin of, 269; modernity of, 271-272; mentioned, 29, 205, 381, 496; More's character, 267-268; friend of Erasmus, 281; Heywood, 106, 256; his household, 338; his opinion of translating the Bible into English, 207, 392, 393; allowed to read heretical books, 391; debate with Tyndale, 392; interpretation of terms, 394; intellectual freedom, 276; mentioned, 158, 171, 211, 236, 246, 256, 259, 260, 261, 263, 348, 364, 386, 389, 400, 405, 444, 505 Morley, Henry, the poet, 486 Morley, Henry, the scholar, 79 Morlini, 406 Morton, Archbishop, 40, 171, 45, 246, 247, 274 Mountjoy, Charles, 280, 326 Moyen de Parvenir, 406 Mullinger, J. Bass, Athenae Cantabrigienses ed., 93; Alcock in D. N. B., 426 (notes i, 3) Murison, William, 80 Mustard, W. P., 243, 244, 246 Narrenschiff, characteristics of, 222; in English prose, 100; Locher's version and Barclay's, 226; illustrations, 224; universities mentioned, 382; see Brandt Nash, Thomas, Harvey controversy, 400; "lascivious rhymes," 18; Unfortunate Traveller, 516 Nature, man's relation to, 24ff. Neilson, W. A., 29 New Nut Brown Maid, 156 (note) Newman, John Henry Cardinal, 274 Nichols, F. M., 43, 259, 277, 279, 284 Noels, 134 Norfolk, Duke of, conservative, 515; correspondance with Cromwell, 517; financial straits, 508; letter to Wolsey, 21; negotiates a marriage, 21; presides at Buckingham's trial, 508' mentioned, 386 Norfolk, Duchess of, her character, 509; difficulties with the Duke, 509 -510 North, Sir Thomas, 373 Nott, George Frederick, 336, 346, 460, 472, 511, 514, 516, 533, 535, 537, 540 Nove dictionisfictio, 137 Nucius Nisancer, 420 Nutbrowne Mayde, 153-156; a conflictus, 129; mentioned, 444 Nutter, Dr. Hans, 82 INDEX 559 Oberon, 495, 498 Observants, 390 Occam, 295 Occleve, 40, 55, 281 O'Donovan, Louis, 386 Oesterley, Herman, 405, 406 (note) Oldcastle, Sir John, 208 Orcagna, 23 Order of Fools, 226 Oriel College Library, 35, 36 Orpheus, 5 Orti Oricellari, 476, 477 Osney Abbey, 322 Ouvry, Fred, 410 (note) Ovid, 71, 157, 281, 346 Oxford, 236, 259 Oxford Historical Society, 260 Oxford Reformers, 267 Padelford, F. M., Anglia, 505, 522, 532; Early Sixteenth Century Lyrics, 445 Palgrave, 381 Pandulpho, 344 Paris, Gaston, 434 Park, Nugae Poeticae, 211, 432 Parker Society, Ridley, 350 Parr, Catherine, 380 Parson of Kalenborow, 384 (note), 407, 410 Paston Letters, 12, 21, 48 Paston, Sir John, 49 Pastoral, 325 Patrizi, Francesco, 307 Paynell, Thomas, 335 (note) Peele, George, 415 Percy, Henry, 462 Persius, 157, 173, 26t, 281 Pestalozzi, 330 Petrarch, Francesco, 456-560; his comments on his sonnets, 458-459; condemned by Ascham, 324; his humanism, 234-236; master of quattroento, 474; model of Renaissance, 457; sonnet form, 522; influence on Wyatt, 469; his Africa, 547; Codex 3195, 458 (note); the Rime, 457; Sonnet, CII, 469; CXXXIV, 474; CXL, 520; CXC, 472; CCLXIX, 470; CCCX:, 543; mentioned, 77, 155, 157, 480, 483, 523 Petrarchuism, 460 Petrarchismo, 460 Petronius, 319 Phaedo of Plato, 5 Phaer, Thomas, 539 Piccolomini, Aeneas Silvius, Pope Pius II, De Curalium Miseriis, 237, 247, 379; Euryalus and Lucretia, 409; mentioned, 30 Picholomini, B. C., 536 Pickering, William, 511 Pico della Mirandola, 318 Picot, Emile, 128 Pi6ri, Marius, 460 Piers Plowman, 122, 146 Pigouchet, Philippe, 426 Pilgrim The, 21 Pilgrimage of Grace, 386, 517 Pilgrim's Progress, 78, 326 Pilgrim's Tale, 117 Pisander, 157 Pistoia, 11, 468, 475 Pius II, see Piccolomini Pizarro, 22 Plato, the: Phaedo, 5; the Republic, 274.; use of dialogue, 398 Platonic conception oi beauty, 312 Platonists, The early, 318 PIautus, 157, 262, 351 Pleiade, 421, 442 Pliny, 281 Plomer, HE. R., 502 Plowman's Tale, 117 Plutarch, 157 Poetae Latini Aevi Carolini, 123 Poggio's tales, 17, 157, 406 Pole, Reginald Cardinal, 21, 386 Polemic dialogue, 206, 398-401 Politian, Italian humanist, 236, 261; sold by Dome, 281; recommended by Elyot, 3:17; Aristotle's Analytics, 262; mentioned, 363 Political situation, 39 560 INDEX Pollard, A. F., England under Protector Somerset, 349; Henry VIII, 44, 46 Pollard, A. W., Castle of Labour, 425, 427, 429; mentioned, 355 Polychronicon, 168 Pontano, Giovanni, 261, 262, 302 (note), 307, 317 Pope, Alexander, 147, 174, 219, 292, 325, 333, 415 Population of England, 30 Potter, A. K., 74, 76, 82, 89 (note) Priapeia, 16 Prince Henry the Navigator, 31 Printing, 35ff. Printers, early, 487-489 Prior, Mathew, 154 Proclus, De Sphaera, 260 Proctor, Robert, 408, 409, 410 (note) Proksch, J. K., 28 (note) Proper Dialogue, A, 207 Propertius, 157 Ptolemaic system, 23 Pulci, Luigi, 32 Puritans, 22 Puttenham, Arte of English Poesie, 102, 219, 256, 258, 342, 389 (note), 456, 483, 506 Pynson, Richard, 203, 246, 248, 254, 262, 408, 426, 495 (note), 498, 500 Renaissance paradoxes, 37 Reni, Guido, 216 Repeticio, 131; in Skelton, 163; in Cock Lorrelles Bote, 222 Retrograd verses, 132 Reuchlin, 264 Rey, A., 100 (note), 101 (note) Reynard the Fox, 384 Rhetoriquers, 441 Richard II, King, 208 Richard III, King, 268 Ridley, Bishop Nicholas, 350 Rimbault, Ed. F., 222 (note) Rime-royal, 60 Rithm, 145 Rithmus cum duplici differentia, 152 Ritson, 61, 164 (note) Riviere, 249, 250 Robbery, 39 Robin Hood, 281, 409 Rome, sack of, 456 Romanello, 472 Roman de la Rose, 425, 430, 433, 441 Rondeau, 439-441 Rood, the printer, 263 Roper, Margaret, character, 338; Tennyson's verse on, 268; translated Erasmus, 336; chooses Ascham, 306; mentioned, 338 Roper, William, Life of More, 387 Ros, Sir Richard, 50, 51 Roscoe, 215 (note) Rosenbach, A. S. W., 368 Rousseau, 266 Routh, H. V., 431 Roy, William, 207, 208, 400 Royas, Ferdinando de, 364-365 Rumming, Elinor, 229 Ruscellai, 353, 354, 476 Russell, Sir John, 477 Rutter of the Sea, 499 Sack Full of News, 406 Sackville, Thomas, 69, 330, e06 St. Albans Press, 488 Saint Alexis, 4 Saintsbury, George, Cambridge History Quintilian, 157, 327 Quintus Curtius, 157 Raine, James, 38 Rastell, John, 11, 256, 268, 368, 405 Raynaud, Gaston, 439 Reading Abbey, 322 Recuydl of the Histories of Troye, 84 Rede me and Be not Wrothe, 208-212, 400 Reformation and Humanism, 294 Reformers, difference in beliefs, 391-392 Reich of Freiburg, 82 Rembrandt, 414; Religion and Science, 23 Remedies for plague, 27-28 Remedy of Love, 139 INDEX 561 of Literature, 64; The Earlier Renaissance, 280; History of English Prosody, 353; quoted, 429 (note), 256, 257 Saint-Gelais, Melin de, character of his verse, 441; influence on Wyatt, 450 -453 Saint-Gelais, Octovien de, 243, 534, 535 St. Paul's School, 300 St. Thomas' Shrine, 13 Salesbury, William, 52 Sallust, 157, 281 Salomon and Marcolphus, 407 Salsbury, John of, 232 Sampson, George, 269 Sanitation, 25 Sannazaro, Jacopo, 372, 451, 470 San Pedro, Diego de, 372 Saturnian verses, 122 Schick, J., on Court of Love, 69; on Hawes, 84, 91; on Temple of Glas, 62 Schroeder, Karl, 274 Schultz, J. R., 420 Scipio Africanus, 317 Scoggin, Tales of, 407, 415; given by Spenser to Harvey, 410 (note) Scott, J., 156 (note) Scott, Walter, 84, 174 Scottish State Papers, 21 Scrope, Stephen, 21 SeBoyar, G., 204 Seebohm, H., 286 Seneca, 157, 263 Sensuousness in English literature, 17 Serafino, 474-476, 448, 476, 477, 480, 483 Servatius, 286 Servius Maurus, 538 (note) Settle, E., 174 Seymour, Jane, 515, 517 Seymous, Sir Thomas, 510 Shadwell, Thomas, 174, 226 (note) Shaftesbury, Earl of, 174 Shakespeare, William, 123, 223, 248, 324, 498 Shakespearean sonnet, 522 Sharman, Julian, 257 Ship of Fools, see Barclay Sidney, Sir Philip, 203, 506, 523 Silver in London, 12 Silvius, Aeneas, see Piccolomini Simonds, W. E., 446 (note), 462, 463, 464, 465 Sir Thopas, 479 Skeat, Bertha M., 134 Skeat, W. W., 65, 68, 117 Skelton, John, his life, 92-95, 92 (note); associated with the Howards, 531; attack on Wolsey, 185ff.; attitude toward Church, 180ff.; Barclay, 99-100; humanist, 232-234; knowledge of Italian, 157 (note); learning, 93; loyalty, 177; not a national leader, 454; opinion of Court, 99; "Orator Regius," 94; Poet Laureat, 94; his reading, 157, 299; Reformation, 183-184; his social caste, 488; Ancient Acquaintance, 160; Bouge of Court, 92-101; dating, 101 (note); interpretation of, 101; plot, 95; School of Lydgate, 96; mentioned, 156, 160; Colin Clout, interpretation, 179-186, 194-201; dating, 194; Bullein's account, 195; Thynne's account, 118, 194; dating, 194; mentioned, 158; Earl of Northumberland, 161; Epitaph, 171; Fiodden Field, 171; Garland of Laurel, 158, 170; Garnesche, 94; Magnyjycence, 158, 444; Manerly Margery, 161, 164; Mistress Anne, 161; My darling dere, 160, 161; Phillip Sparrow, 158, 212-215; Replycacion, 201-205; Speke, Parrot, 176; Tunnyng of Elinor Rumming, 215-217; Ware the Hawk, 162; Why Come Ye Not to Court, 190-194; his alliteration, 160; aureate language, 162; concentric plan of satires, 218; concreteness, 97; dating of satires, 175-177; Greek, 158-159; "Harvy Hafter," 97; humanistic Latin, 160; lost poems, 172; music to the songs, 98; not sold by Dome, 281; obscurity, 174; pronunciation, 53; repeticio, 163; satire, 171-205; scansion, INDEX 163; scholarly knowledge of Chaucer, 53; theory of poetry, o20; tradition, 268; use of French, 420; mentioned, 116, 120, 229, 328 (note), 332, 389, 407, 444, 483, 499, 505, 544 Skelton, Merry Tales of, 410 (note), 415 Skeltoniads, 166 Skeltonic Verse, 166-170 Smeaton, Mark, 462 Smerte, Epitaph of the Duke of Bedford, quoted, 129, 131, 132, 135, 138, 139 Smith, Gilbert, 351 Somerset, Edward, 349 Sommer, H. O., Kalendar of Shepherds, 499, 501; Morte Darthur, 490, 492 Sommers, Will, 415 Songs and Carols, 152 Sortes Vergilianae, 3 Southwell, Sir Richard, 511 Southey, Robert, 89 Spanish influence, 362-381 Spenser, Edmund, Amoretti, 460; Four Hymns, 312; Faerie Queene, 78, 92; Mother Hubbard's Tale, 106, 226 (note); note to Harvey, 410 (note); America, 34; Chaucer, 56, 116; combines the four types, 116; mentioned, 78, 416, 499, 505, 506 Spenser Society, 256 Spingarn, J. E., 77 Standish, Henry, 187, 211 Stapleton, 305 Starkey, 21, 27, 399 Statius, 157 Statutes of Love, 69 Steen, Jan, 216, 414 Steevens, 359 Sternhold, Thomas, 404, 481 Stirgonia, Archbishop of, 242 Stokes, F. M., 295 Sudor Anglicus, 26-28 Suetonius, 262 Suffold, Duke of, see Brandon, Charles Sulpitius, 281 Surrey, Henry Howard, Earl of, 504 -545; the MSS., 505; Aeneid, 344; Fifty-fifth Psalm, 532, 540; From Tuscan came, 516; I that Ulysses, 530; London, hast thou, 512-513; Love that doth reign, 522; Martial the things, 523; Of thy life, Thomas, 527; The golden gift, 577 (note); The soote season, 542; Tottels Miscellany, 344; translation from Horace, 526-530; Where raging love, 330; on Wyatt, W. resteth here, 518; ancestry, 507; birth of children, 517; blank verse, 354, 534; disliked by sister, 510; Elizabethan reputation, 506; family difficulties, 509; final couplet, 523; financial condition, 508; humanism, 523-530; legend of Geraldine, 516-517; his manners, 510-514; his marriage, 510; marriage to Mary Tudor rumored, 504; Medieval Latin influence, 530-535; Pickering edition, 523; political affiliations, 515; relation to Wyatt, 518-523; Vergil, 534; mentioned, 59, 69, 348, 386, 445, 456 Sweating Sickness, 26-28 Swift, Jonathan, Battle of the Books, 106; Conduct of the Allies, 398; Gulliver's Travels, 398; Tale of a Tub, 398 Syllogism, attack on, 295-296 Symonds, J. A., 235, 255, 272 Syphilis, 28 (note) Tacitus, 262, 281 Taft, A. I., 391, 392, 397 Tailebois, Lady, 265 Tales of Poggio and Valla, 17 Tarleton, 415 Tedder, H. R., 409, 502 Tempio of the Malatesta, 322 Ten Brink, B. E. K., 81, 104 (note), 496 (note) Terence, 157, 263, 281 Testament of the hawthorne, 434 Theocritus, 157, 243 Theodulus, 133 The traytte of good lining, 499 Theuerdank of Maximilian, 82 Thomas, William, 21, 399 Thomas, Lord Vaux, 69, 345, 486 INDEX 563 Thrush and the Nightingale, 128 Thiimmel, A., 93 Thynne, Francis, 117, 194 Tibino, Nicolo, 130, 136 Tilley, A., 451 (note) Tintern Abbey, 322 Titian, 17 Toscanelli, 32 Tottel, Richard, publications, 343; quoted, 486 Tottel's Miscellany, 343-344, 434, 445 -446, 486-487, 505 Trade routes, 31 Transumptio, 137, 139 Travellers' tales, 34 Travelling, 38 Treitschke, 385 Trissino, 353, 354, 476 Trevesa, J., 168, 169 Trollope, A., 67 Tudor conceptions; attitude toward children, 19; authorship, 42; homelife, 20; marriage, 19-20; pretenders, 41; punishments, 27; streets, 25 Tudor, Margaret, 388 Tuke, Bryan, 27, 191 (note) Tunstall, Gilbert, 362, 386, 392 Tyndale, William, Obedience of a Christian Man, 395; New Testament, 36, 207, 390-396; its burning, 208, 211, 394; Wicked Mammon, 208, 394; debate with More, 268, 391, 392; mentioned, 22, 206, 382 (note), 389, 391, 401 "Uncertain Authors," 330 (note), 345, 434, 445, 453, 523 Underhill, J. G., 362 Unius partis orationis pro receptio, 137 Usque ad aras, 305, 305 (note) Usury forbidden, 12 Utopia, see More, Thomas Valerius Maximus, 157, 262 Valla, 17, 281 VanDyke, 187 Vaux, see Thomas. Lord Vaux Vellutello, 459 Vergil, medieval conception of, 3; the enchanter, 83; copy of in Milan, 459; edition of in 1531, 538; translations of, 534; Fourth Book of the Aeneid, 355 (note); the Bucolics, 263; Grimald's translation of the Georgics, 351; Addison's standard, 324; mentioned, 14, 157, 235, 243, 262, 281, 318, 319 Verard, Antoine, 299, 419, 422, 426, 500 de Vere, Francis, 510 Villon, Frangois, ed. by Marot, 441; Ballade des Dames, 435; Ballade des Seigneurs, 437; compared with Barclay, 4:38; mock will, 432; mentioned, 435 Vincentits, 157 Vitelli, 259 Vives, J. L., his works, 303; De Institutione Foeminae Christianae, 334; De Oficio Mariti, 308, 335, 337 (note); De Tradendis Disciplinis, 331; Exercitatio Linguae Latinae, 313; Instruction of a Christian Woman, 315; Satdlitum, 316; on classical authors, 337; early Christian writers, 317; medieval education, 299; educational aims, 303; education of women, 333; expurgation, 319; on Greek, 318; pedagogy, 302; Spanish influence, 363-364; on the vernacular, 330; on vernacular literature, 323; compared with Erasmus, 302-303 (note); his mother, 338; letter to Mountjoy, S28; stay in England, 303; tutor of Mary Tudor, 362 Vostre, Simon, 426 Vox Popdi, 205 Waddington, S., 541 Waller, A. R., 104 Ward, F. N., 105 Warham, Archbishop, 280 Warren, F. M., 495 Wars of the Roses, 236 Warton, Thomas, History of English Poetry, 54; his opinion on Geraldine, 564 INDEX 516; on Grimald, 356; on Heywood, 104; on Rastell, 368; on Skelton, 93, 233; on Tottel, 345; on Wyatt, 473 Washington, George, 61 Watson, Foster, 299, 315, 316, 317 (notes 1, 2), 322, 330, 324 (note) Watson, Henry, 100,Wealth of England, 13 Webbe, William, 506 West, John, 210 Westminster Abbey, 322 Wever, 152 What our lives render, 524 Whibley, 198 "Whip of Six Strings," 386 Whitby Abbey, 322 Whitington, Robert, 93, 233 Whittingham, Charles, 208 Who craftly castes, 527 Wilson, Thomas, Arte of Rhetorique, 140; Rule of Reason, 127 Winchcomb, Abbot of, 187 Windet, John, 404 (note) Wingfield, 362 Wisest way, The, 529 Wolsey, Cardinal, attacked by plague, 27; attacked by Reformers, 211; attacked by Skelton, 185 ff.; Barclay's allusion to, 246; as chief spider, 106; his entertainments, 14; his household at Hampton Court, 7-8; his foreign policy, 191; French influence, 444; German policy, 383; The Pilgrim's Tale, 117-118; reasons for his state, 8; mentioned, 348, 388 Wonderful Shape, 409 Wood, Anthony, 75, 256 Worde, Wynkyn de, 76, 223, 262, 426, 500 Wordsworth, Christopher, 36 Worth, R. N., 38 Wright, Thomas, 89, 133, 134, 135, 169, 210 (note) Wyatt, Sir Henry, 464 Wyatt, Margaret, 467 Wyatt, Sir Thomas, his life, 446-447; ambassador to Spain, 362; first imprisonment, 462; second imprisonment, 463; third imprisonment, 463; Italians he may have known, 482 (note); letters to his son, 486 (note); love for Anne Boleyn, 461-477; his marriage, 461; oration to his judges, 464; relation to Surrey, 518; travels in Italy, 455-456; Blame not my lute, 485; Caesar, when that, 467; Forget not yet, 485; I find no peace, 474; Like unto these, 450-452; The long love, 521; Madame withouten, 451; My lute awake, 485; My own John Poyntz, 478; The pillar perished, 470; Tagus, farewell, 381; Thenmy of liff, 450; They fie from me, 485; To seke eche where, 499; Whoso list to hunt, 472; Wyatt compared to Marot, 448 (note), 450; to Surrey, 518-523; conventionality, 448; humanism, 344 -345; final couplet, 448; influence of Saint-Gelais, 450-453; Petrarchism, 467; principles of versification, 484 (note), rimes, 522; scansion, 521; verse-forms, 485; Egerton MS., 447 (note); Tottel, 344, 445-446; edition by Miss Foxwell, 378; Third Satire, 378; Penitential Psalms, 480-482; mentioned, 445, 543, 544 Wyatt, Sir Thomas, the younger, 511 Wydville, Anthony, 150 Printed in the United States of America THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN GRADUATE LIBRARY jEsb I A- 4119-9 m MPNN* -- *I Form 9584 Form 9584 In _,. - T - APP rdf 6 i G '- 1 4 198: L 1s 741 I t. I, I AUNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN i Ill3 9015 00404 4379ll ll 3 9015 00404 4379 r I