Or as the pearls of morning’s dew
Ne’er to be found again.
To Daffodils, Herrick (1591–1674)
2. Write a brief criticism of the following passage of Dryden’s prose. Comment upon (a) the vocabulary, (b) the type of sentence, (c) any colloquialisms or slips of grammar, and (d) its value as literary criticism.
He must have been a man of a most wonderful comprehensive nature, because, as it has been truly observed of him, he has taken into the compass of his Canterbury Tales the various manners and humours (as we now call them) of the whole English nation, in his age. Not a single character has escaped him. All his pilgrims are severally distinguished from each other; and not only in their inclinations, but in their very physiognomies and persons. Baptista Porta could not have described their natures better, than by the marks which the poet gives them. The matter and manner of their tales, and of their telling, are so suited to their different educations, humours, and callings, that each of them would be improper in any other mouth. Even the grave and serious characters are distinguished by their several sorts of gravity: their discourses are such as belong to their age, their calling, and their breeding; such as are becoming of them, and of them only. Some of his persons are vicious, and some virtuous; some are unlearned, or (as Chaucer calls them) lewd, and some are learned. Even the ribaldry of the low characters is different; the Reeve, the Miller, and the Cook, are several men, and distinguished from each other as much as the mincing Lady Prioress, and the broad-speaking, gap-toothed Wife of Bath. But enough of this; there is such a variety of game springing up before me, that I am distracted in my choice, and know not which to follow. ’Tis sufficient to say, according to the proverb, that “Here is God’s plenty.” We have our forefathers and great-granddames all before us, as they were in Chaucer’s days; their general characters are still remaining in mankind, and even in England, though they are called by other names than those of monks and friars, and canons, and lady abbesses, and nuns; for mankind is ever the same, and nothing lost out of Nature, though everything is altered.
Preface to the “Fables”
3. The extracts given below illustrate the development of the stopped couplet. Point out briefly the change that comes over the meter, paying attention to (a) the regularity of the accent, (b) the pause, and (c) the cæsura.
(1) The sable mantle of the silent night
Shut from the world the ever-joysome light.
Care fled away, and softest slumbers please