Part 1 (2/2)

A work such as Professor Skeat's Chaucer puts the critic into a frame of mind that lies about ht have I, who have given but a very few hours ofof Chaucer; who have never collated his MSS; who have taken the events of his life on trust fro, his rhyth, rhythe; who have read hireat poets, for the pleasure of reading--what right have I to express any opinion on a work of this character, with its i commentary, its patient research, its enormous accumulation of special information?”

Nevertheless, this diffidence, I am sure, may be carried too far

After all is said and done, ith our average life of three-score years and ten, are the heirs of all the poetry of all the ages We must do our best in our allotted time, and Chaucer is but one of the poets He did not write for specialists in his own age, and his es resides, not in his vocabulary, nor in his inflections, nor in his indebtedness to foreign originals, nor in the metrical uniformities or anomalies that may be discovered in his poes are accidental; his poetry is essential Other interests--historical, philological, antiquarian--nized; but the poetical, or (let us say) the spiritual, interest stands first and far ahead of all others By virtue of it Chaucer, now as always,appeal to that which is spiritual in men He appeals by the poetical quality of such lines as these, from Emilia's prayer to Diana:

”Chaste Goddesse,that I Desire to been a mayden al my lyf, Ne never wol I be no love ne wyf

I a and venerye, And for to walken in the wodes wilde, And noght to been a wyf, and be with childe”

Or of these two froue:

”O moder e in Moyses sighte”

Or of these froh the quality differs:

”Ther was also a Nonne, a Prioresse, That of hir sretteste ooth was but by seynt Loy; And she was clepedthe service divyne, Entuned in hir nose ful semely; And Frensh she spak ful faire and fetisly, After the scole of Stratford atte Bowe, For Frensh of Paris was to hir unknowe”

Now the essential quality of this and of all very great poetry is also e may call a _universal_ quality; it appeals to those sympathies which, unequally distributed and often distorted or suppressed, are yet the common possessions of our species This quality is the real antiseptic of poetry: this it is that keeps a line of Homer perennially fresh and in bloom:--

+”Hos phato tous d' ede katechen physizoos aia en Lakedaiaie”+

These lines live because they contain so which is also permanent in man: they depend confidently on us, and will as confidently depend on our great-grandchildren I was glad to see this point very courageously put the other day by Professor Hiram Corson, of Cornell University, in an address on ”The Aims of Literary Study”--an address which Messrs Macmillan have printed and published here and in Aenius,” says Mr Corson, ”render the best service, in literary education, when they are first assimilated in their absolute character It is, of course, important to know their relations to the several tie is not for the tyro in literary study He must first know literature, if he is constituted so to know it, in its absolute character He can go into the philosophy of its relationshi+ps later, if he like, when he has a true literary education, and when the 'years that bring the philosophic enius is, in fact, in its essential character, no e than to another It is only in its phenomenal character (its outward manifestations) that it has a _special_ relationshi+p” And Mr Corson very appositely quotes Mr Ruskin on Shakespeare's historical plays--

”If it be said that Shakespeare wrote perfect historical plays on subjects belonging to the preceding centuries, I answer that they _are_ perfect plays just because there is no care about centuries in thenize for the human life of all tiive universal truth, but because, painting honestly and completely from the men about him, he painted that huue in the fifteenth century being _at heart_ what a rogue is in the nineteenth century and was in the twelfth; and an honest or knightly , in like manner, very sireat idealists is, therefore, always universal: not because it is _not portrait_, but because it is _complete_ portrait down to the heart, which is the saes; and the work of the mean idealists is _not_ universal, not because it is portrait, but because it is _half_ portrait--of the outside, the manners and the dress, not of the heart Thus Tintoret and Shakespeare paint, both of thelish nature as they saw it in their time, down to the root; and it does for _all_ time; but as for any care to cast theht, or custom, of past time in their historical work, you will find it in neither of thereat man that I know of”--_Modern Painters_

It will be observed that Mr Corson, whose address deals pri, speaks of these absolute qualities of the great masterpieces as the _first_ object of study But his words, and Ruskin's words, fairly support my further contention that they remain the _most important_ object of study, nomay have proceeded To the most erudite student of Chaucer in the orld Chaucer's poetry should be the dominant object of interest in connection with Chaucer

But when the elaborate specialist confronts us, we are apt to forget that poetry is meant for mankind, and that its appeal is, or should be, universal We pay tribute to the unusual: and so far as this iable learning, we do right But in so far as it implies even a momentary confusion of the essentials with the accidentals of poetry, we do wrong And the specialist hi as he keeps them distinct

I hasten to add that Professor Skeat _does_ keep thele sentence of admirable brevity he tells us that of Chaucer's poetical excellence ”it is superfluous to speak; Lowell's essay on Chaucer in 'My Study Windows' gives a just esti the poetical excellence for granted, he proceeds upon his really invaluable work of preparing a standard text of Chaucer and illustrating it out of the stores of his apparently inexhaustible learning The result is a monulish poet Douglas Jerrold assured Mrs Cowden Clarke that, when her tireet her with the first kiss of welcome, ”_even_ should her husband happen to be present” One can hardly with decoru kissed; but Chaucer assuredly will greet hienuine admiration, however, for the poetical excellence of his poet needs to be insisted upon, not only because the nature of his task keeps hi seems now and then to stand between hie It was not quite at haphazard that I chose just now the famous description of the Prioresse as an illustration of Chaucer's poetical quality The Professor has a long note upon the French of Stratford atte Bowe Most of us have hitherto believed the passage to be an example, and a very pretty one, of Chaucer's playfulness The Professor almost loses his temper over this: he speaks of it as a view ”commonly adopted by newspaper-writers who know only this one line of Chaucer, and cannot forbear to use it in jest”

”Even Tyrwhitt and Wright,” he adds iven currency to this idea” ”Chaucer,” the Professor explains, ”merely states a _fact_” (the italics are his own), ”viz, that the Prioress spoke the usual Anglo-French of the English Court, of the English law-courts, and of the English ecclesiastics of higher ranks The poet, however, had been himself in France, and knew precisely the difference between the two dialects; but he had no special reason for thinking _ain) ”of the Parisian than of the Anglo-French Warton's note on the line is quite sane He shows that Queen Philippa wrote business letters in French (doubtless Anglo-French) with 'great propriety'”and so on You see, there was a Benedictine nunnery at Stratford-le-Bow; and as ”Mr Cutts says, very justly, 'She spoke French correctly, though with an accent which savored of the Benedictine Convent at Stratford-le-Bohere she had been educated, rather than of Paris'” So there you have a fact

And, now you have it, doesn't it look rather like Bitzer's horse?

”Bitzer,” said Thorind ”Your definition of a horse?”

”Quadruped Grarinders, four eye-teeth, and twelve incisive Sheds coat in the spring; into be shod with iron Age known by marks in mouth”

Thus (and much more) Bitzer

March 30, 1895 The Texts of the ”Canterbury Tales”