A history of English literature

by Edward Albert

THE RETURN TO NATURE

In the last chapter we noted the beginnings and development of the new feeling for nature. This chapter sees the full effects of the movement, and the subsequent reaction that followed.

1. Abundant Output. Even the lavishness of the Elizabethans cannot excel that of this age. The development of new ideas brings fresh inspiration for poetry, and the poetical sky is bright with luminaries of the first magnitude. In prose we may note especially the fruitful yield of the novel, the rejuvenation of the essay, and the unprecedented activity of critical and miscellaneous writers. This is the most fertile period of our literature.

2. Great Range of Subject. The new and buoyant race of writers, especially the poets, lays the knowledge and experience of all ages under a heavy toll. The classical writers are explored anew, and are drawn upon by the genius of Keats and Shelley; the Middle Ages inspire the novels of Scott and the poems of Coleridge, Southey, and many more; modern times are analyzed and dissected in the work of the novelists, the satires of Byron, and the productions of the miscellaneous writers. This is indeed the return to nature, for all nature is scrutinized and summed up afresh.

3. Treatment of Nature. If for the moment we take the restricted meaning of the word, and understand by “nature” the common phenomena of earth, air, and sea, we find the poetical attitude to nature altering profoundly. In the work of Cowper, Crabbe, and Gray the treatment is principally the simple chronicle and sympathetic observation of natural features. In the new race of poets the observation becomes more matured and intimate. Notably in the case of Wordsworth, the feeling for nature rises to a passionate veneration that is love and religion too. To Wordsworth nature is not only a procession of seasons and seasonal fruition: it is the eye of all things, natural and supernatural, into which the observant soul can peer and behold the spirit that inhabits all things. Nature is thus amplified and glorified; it is to be sought, not only in the flowers and the fields, but also in

the light of setting suns,

And the round ocean and the living air,

And the blue sky, and in the mind of man.

4. Political and Periodical Writing. The age did not produce a pamphleteer of the first class like Swift or Burke, but the turbulence of the period was clearly marked in the immense productivity of its political writers. The number of periodicals was greatly augmented, and we notice the first of the great daily journals that are still a strong element in literature and politics. The Morning Chronicle (1769) and The Morning Post (1772) were started by Henry Bate, The Times (1785) by John Walter. Of a more irresponsible type were the Radical Political Register (1802) of Cobbett and The Examiner (1808) of Leigh Hunt. A race of powerful literary magazines sprang to life: The Edinburgh Review (1802), The Quarterly Review (1809), The London Magazine (1817), Blackwood’s Magazine (1817), and The Westminster Review (1827). Such excellent publications reacted strongly upon authorship, and were responsible for much of the best work of Hazlitt, Lamb, Southey, and a host of other miscellaneous writers.

5. The Influence of Germany. The increasing bitterness of the long war with France almost extinguished the literary influence of the French language, which, as was indicated in the last chapter, had been affecting English literature deeply. In the place of French, the study of German literature and learning came rapidly into favor. The first poetical work of Scott is based on the German, and the effects of the new influence can be further observed in the works of Coleridge, Shelley, Byron, and many more. In the course of time German increased its hold upon English, until by the middle of the nineteenth century it was perhaps the dominating foreign tongue.