This great estimation of the Faerie Queene was due not only to the intrinsic charms of the poem—to its exquisitely sweet melody, its intense pervading sense of beauty, its abundant fancifulness, its subtle spirituality—but also to the time of its appearance. For then nearly two centuries no great poem had been written in the English tongue. Chaucer had died heirless. Occleve's lament over that great spirit's decease had not been made without occasion:—
Alas my worthie maister honorable
This londis verray tresour and richesse
Deth by thy dethe hathe harm irreperable
Unto us done; hir vengeable duresse
Dispoiled hathe this londe of swetnesse
Of Rethoryk fro us; to Tullius
Was never man so like amonges us.{2}
And the doleful confession this orphaned rhymer makes for himself, might have been well made by all the men of his age in England:—
My dere mayster, God his soule quite,
And fader Chaucer fayne would have me taught,
But I was dull, and learned lyte or naught.
No worthy scholar had succeeded the great master. The fifteenth century in England had abounded in movements of profound social and political interest—in movements which eventually fertilised and enriched and ripened the mind of the nation; but, not unnaturally, the immediate literary results had been of no great value. In the reign of Henry VIII, the condition of literature, for various reasons, had greatly improved. Surrey and Wyatt had heralded the advent of a brighter era. From their time the poetical succession had never failed altogether. The most memorable name in our literature between their time and the Faerie Queene is that of Sackville, Lord Buckhurst—a name of note in the history of both our dramatic and non-dramatic poetry. Sackville was capable of something more than lyrical essays. He it was who designed the Mirror for Magistrates. To that poem, important as compared with the poetry of its day, for its more pretentious conception, he himself contributed the two best pieces that form part of it—the Induction and the Complaint of Buckingham. These pieces are marked by some beauties of the same sort as those which especially characterise Spenser; but they are but fragments; and in spirit they belong to an age which happily passed away shortly after the accession of Queen Elizabeth—they are penetrated by that despondent tone which is so strikingly audible in our literature in the middle years of the sixteeth century, not surprisingly, if the general history of the time be considered. Meanwhile, our language had changed much, and Chaucer had grown almost unintelligible to the ordinary reader. Therefore, about the year 1590, the nation was practically without a great poem. At the same time, it then, if ever, truly needed one. Its power of appreciation had been quickened and refined by the study of the poetries of other countries; it had translated and perused the classical writers with enthusiasm; it had ardently pored over the poetical literature of Italy. Then its life had lately been ennobled by deeds of splendid courage crowned with as splendid success. In the year 1590, if ever, this country, in respect of its literary condition and in respect of its general high and noble excitement, was ready for the reception of a great poem.
Such a poem undoubtedly was the Faerie Queene, although it may perhaps be admitted that it was a work likely to win favour with the refined and cultured sections of the community rather than with the community at large. Strongly impressed on it as were the instant influences of the day, yet in many ways it was marked by a certain archaic character. It depicted a world—the world of chivalry and romance—which was departed; it drew its images, its forms of life, its scenery, its very language, from the past. Then the genius of our literature in the latter part of Queen Elizabeth's reign was emphatically dramatic; in the intense life of these years men longed for reality. Now the Faerie Queene is one long idealizing. These circumstances are to accounted for partly by the character of Spenser's genius, partly by the fact already stated that chronologically Spenser is the earliest of the great spirits of his day. In truth he stands between two worlds: he belongs partly to the new time, partly to the old; he is the last of one age, he is the first of another; he stretches out one hand into the past to Chaucer, the other rests upon the shoulder of Milton.
Footnotes
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{1} Nash's Supplication of Pierce Pennilesse, 1592. {2} Skeat's Specimens of English Literature, p. 14.
CHAPTER IV.
1591-1599.