Brief History of English and American Literature

E-text prepared by Al Haines
Transcriber's note:
The volume from which this e-book was prepared contains two of Beers' books, An Outline Sketch of English Literature and An Outline Sketch of American Literature, which start on pages 7 and 317, respectively.
Page numbers in this book are indicated by numbers enclosed in curly braces, e.g. {99}, to facilitate use of the index. They have been located where page breaks occurred in the original book. For its Index, a page number has been placed only at the start of that section.
Introduction and Supplementary Chapters on the Religious and Theological Literature of Great Britain and the United States
John Fletcher Hurst
New York: Eaton & Mains Cincinnati: Jennings & Pye
Copyright, 1886, 1887, by Phillips & Hunt New York Copyright, 1897, by Eaton & Mains New York
{3}
At the request of the publishers the undersigned has prepared this Introduction and two Supplementary Chapters on the Religious and Theological Literature of Great Britain and the United States. To the preacher in his preparation for the pulpit, and also to the general reader and student of religious history, the pursuit of the study of literature is a necessity. The sermon itself is a part of literature, must have its literary finish and proportions, and should give ample proof of a familiarity with the masterpieces of the English tongue.
The world of letters presents to even the casual reader a rich and varied profusion of fascinating and luscious fruit. But to the earnest student who explores with thorough research and sympathetic mind the intellectual products of countries and times other than his own, the infinite variety, so strikingly apparent to the superficial observer, resolves itself into a beautiful and harmonious unity. Literature is the record of the struggles and aspirations of man in the boundless universe of thought. As in physics the correlation and conservation of force bind all the material sciences together into one, so in the world of intellect all the diverse departments of mental life and action find their common bond in literature. Even the {4} signs and formulas of the mathematician and the chemist are but abbreviated forms of writing—the stenography of those exact sciences. The simple chronicles of the annalist, the flowing verses of the poet, clothing his thought with winged words, the abstruse propositions of the philosopher, the smiting protests of the bold reformer, either in Church or State, the impassioned appeal of the advocate at the bar of justice, the argument of the legislator on behalf of his measures, the very cry of inarticulate pain of those who suffer under the oppression of cruelty, all have their literature.