IB R ART FOR 
 IVE POUNDS 
 
 r. ROBERTSON NICOLL
 
 A LIBRARY FOR FIVE POUNDS
 
 WORKS BY 
 
 W. ROBERTSON NICOLL, LL.D. 
 
 THE ROUND OF THE CLOCK. With Illustrations by 
 GEORGE MORROW. 
 
 IAN MACLAREN. The Life of the Rev. John Watson, 
 D.D. With Portrait. FIFTH EDITION. 
 
 A BOOKMAN'S LETTERS. FIFTH EDITION. 
 
 MY FATHER. An Aberdeenshire Minister, 1812-1891. 
 With Portraits. SECOND EDITION. 
 
 THE PROBLEM OF EDWIN DROOD. A Study in the 
 Method of Dickens. SECOND EDITION. 
 
 JAMES MACDONELL. SECOND EDITION. 
 LETTERS ON LIFE. EIGHTH EDITION. 
 THE DAY BOOK OF CLAUDIUS CLEAR. THIRD 
 EDITION. 
 
 LONDON: HODDER & STOUGHTON
 
 A LIBRARY FOR 
 FIVE POUNDS 
 
 BY 
 
 CLAUDIUS CLEAR 
 
 HODDER AND STOUGHTON 
 
 LONDON NEW YORK TORONTO 
 
 MCMXVII
 
 Prtnttd in Great Britain fry Haull, Walton & Viney, La., 
 London and Aylettiwy.
 
 PREFACE 
 
 THE following chapters were written as 
 letters in the British Weekly, and in obedi- 
 ence to the wishes of many readers they are 
 now collected. 
 
 As I write, the price of books is being 
 raised, and my figures, though accurate 
 as far as I can make them so, may be 
 wrong in various particulars. I hope to 
 write a companion volume on Recent and 
 Contemporary Authors. Mr. Dobson in 
 his A Bookman's Budget has reprinted 
 Coleridge's wise words on the Influence of 
 Contemporaries : 
 
 " No models of past times, however 
 perfect, can have the same vivid effect on 
 the youthful mind as the production of a 
 contemporary genius. . . . The great works 
 of past ages seem to a young man things of 
 
 7
 
 8 Preface 
 
 another race, in respect to which his 
 faculties must remain passive and submiss, 
 even as the stars and mountains. But the 
 writings of a contemporary, perhaps not 
 many years older than himself, surrounded 
 by the same circumstances, and disciplined 
 by the same manners, possess a reality for 
 him, and inspire an actual friendship as 
 of a man for a man. His very admiration 
 is the wind which fans and feeds his hope. 
 The poems themselves assume the pro- 
 perties of flesh and blood. To recite, to 
 extol, to contend for them is but the pay- 
 ment of a debt due to one who exists to 
 receive it." 
 
 HAMPSTEAD, 
 
 October, 1917.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 I. A LIBRARY FOR FIVE POUNDS : 
 
 INTRODUCTION . . .11 
 
 BOOKS OF REFERENCE . . 18 
 
 ESSAYS AND BELLES LETTRES 19 
 II. MORE ESSAYS AND BELLES 
 
 LETTRES . ... . 26 
 
 FICTION .... 31 
 
 III. MORE FICTION ... 43 
 
 IV. POETRY .... 60 
 V. BIOGRAPHY .... 77 
 
 RELIGIOUS BOOKS . . .85 
 
 MISCELLANEOUS . /. 88 
 
 VI. HISTORY .... 90 
 
 LIST OF BOOKS ... 94 
 
 CONCLUSION 98
 
 A Library for Five Pounds 
 
 A LIBRARY FOR FIVE POUNDS 
 INTRODUCTION 
 
 I PROPOSE to give a list of the best books 
 for reading, which shall include, say, one 
 hundred volumes, to be obtained at the 
 price of five pounds or thereabouts. Under 
 most of the titles I hope to place reasons 
 why the particular book named should stand 
 on the shelves. A few preliminary obser- 
 vations may not be amiss. 
 
 In the first place, I propose to name 
 books which shall be enjoyable, with a 
 certain proportion of reference books. 
 Reading must be made a pleasure if it is to 
 be persevered in. There is no doubt that, 
 comparatively speaking, very few people 
 read books. In fact, many regard books as 
 a hindrance to the enjoyment of life. 
 11
 
 A Library for Five Pounds 
 
 Educated men by the thousand read no- 
 thing but newspapers, with perhaps a little 
 contemporary fiction. They have no desire 
 to read. What they expect from the author 
 is that he shall amuse and entertain them 
 for the moment. But, as Ruskin says, 
 " There is a society continually open to us, 
 of people who will talk to us as long as we 
 like, whatever our rank or occupation ; 
 talk to us in the best words they can choose, 
 and with thanks if we listen to them. 
 And this society, because it is so numerous 
 and so gentle, and can be kept waiting round 
 us all day long, not to grant audience, but 
 to gain it kings and statesmen lingering 
 patiently in those plainly furnished and 
 narrow ante-rooms, our bookcase shelves 
 we make no account of that company 
 perhaps never listen to a word they would 
 say all day long." 
 
 Richard of Bury, at a time when printed 
 
 books did not exist, spoke in the same spirit. 
 
 " There are masters," he wrote in his 
 
 Philobiblion (A.D. 1340), " who instruct us 
 
 13
 
 A Library for Five Pounds 
 
 without chastisement, without anger, with- 
 out fear ; if you repair to them they are not 
 sleepy ; if you ask them anything they do 
 not hide themselves ; if you blunder they 
 complain not ; if you betray ignorance they 
 laugh not." 
 
 It is true that readers will profit most by 
 what they enjoy most. Said Dr. Johnson : 
 " A man ought to read just as inclination 
 leads him, for what he reads as a task will do 
 him little good. ' ' Johnson himself, from his 
 early days in Lichfield onwards, read just as 
 he pleased. But it would be too much to say 
 that inclination is a safe guide. Inclination 
 has to be educated, and this cannot be done 
 unless the pupil is prepared to take trouble 
 and make a little sacrifice. That is, we must 
 take the best books on trust and set our?/ 
 selves diligently to find out what made them 
 great. If we do so, and if we find ourselves 
 in sympathy, we have won a great victory. 
 Matthew Arnold defined culture as " ac- 
 quaintance with the best that has been 
 thought and written." To this it has been 
 13
 
 A Library for Five Pounds 
 
 added that we should know " the best that 
 has been composed, painted and built." 
 The thing, however, is to make a beginning. 
 Once make a beginning and read a good 
 book with delight and you have taken a 
 step which will not be retraced, which 
 will, if followed up, call you higher and 
 higher. 
 
 So then in making this list I have re- 
 frained from giving the names of difficult 
 books, even if they are of the first rank. 
 This, be it noted, is a preliminary list. 
 As it stands it will supply a library very 
 much larger and very much better selected 
 than the average library in a middle- class 
 home. I will go further and say that 
 every one who faithfully goes through these 
 hundred books or so will be much more 
 cultured, much better educated, than the 
 vast majority of men and women. 
 
 I am almost ashamed to point out that 
 
 it is worth while for a man to buy these 
 
 books even if he has no intention of reading 
 
 them. The presence of good books in a 
 
 14
 
 A Library for Five Pounds 
 
 house sweetens and freshens the air. Almost 
 always there will be some one in the house 
 a son or a daughter perhaps who will take 
 up the books and grow wise even though the 
 parents confine themselves to the news- 
 papers. Good books never stand up in their 
 mute appeal to readers without being 
 answered at one time or another. So if any 
 reader says to himself that he is too old to 
 begin studying, let him remember the case 
 of others and give them a chance. How 
 terrible is the spectacle of a bookless house, 
 and I am afraid it is too common. A friend 
 of mine stayed for a week-end at a rather 
 luxurious home and found three books in the 
 place, of which one was a Bradshaw and 
 another a prayer-book. I forget what the 
 third was, but it was some odd volume. 
 Other houses again have a good many books 
 which have come down from posterity, 
 mostly incomplete. Nobody has read 
 them, but they have been allowed to stay. 
 Sometimes it comes into the mind of the 
 unhappy owners that they may be very 
 15
 
 A Library for Five Pounds 
 
 valuable in the pecuniary sense. They 
 never are. 
 
 I do not forget that there are great 
 exceptions and that libraries may be found 
 in unexpected places. 1 have the pleasure 
 of numbering among my readers not a few 
 miners who are very intelligent, One of 
 these writes me and sends a copy of his 
 book catalogue. He says : "I have always 
 made it my endeavour to buy my books, 
 as I dislike borrowing even more than the 
 lending of such, and I could not brook the 
 idea of carrying a book that I loved of 
 course, I don't condemn others back to a 
 lending library. I would rather make the 
 sacrifice and I have made many of 
 buying it. Reading, taking it at its lowest 
 value, is a recreation, is one of the best, as it 
 suits all weathers." My friend goes on to 
 complain that he is now close on fifty and 
 that he is not able to read so much as he did : 
 " 1 find if one is to become a reader in any 
 measure he or she must start young, because 
 as they become older they may not have the 
 16
 
 A Library for Five Pounds 
 
 strength left after their day's work to sus- 
 tain serious reading. They may delight in 
 reading even more than ever, but they 
 weary quicker not through lack of interest, 
 but want of strength. Of course I am talking 
 as a miner, where one has to give all his 
 strength and more than his strength to 
 each day's work. But with reading, as 
 with other things, it is, Learn young, learn 
 fair." I have examined his catalogue and 
 find many capital books like volumes by 
 Locke, Bacon, Berkeley, Hume, Adam 
 Smith, Gibbon, Marcus Aurelius, Mon- 
 taigne, Emerson, Homer, Johnson, Boswell, . 
 and many others. It is cheering to think 
 there are so many men busily occupied in 
 the labour of the hands who maintain 
 their intellectual interests so remarkably 
 and give a fair proportion of their means to 
 the purchase of books. 
 
 And now to my list. The books 
 
 named are nearly all included in Mr. 
 
 Dent's wonderful enterprise, "Everyman's 
 
 Library," and in the no less admirable 
 
 B 17
 
 Books of Reference 
 
 "World's Classics." These are among the 
 greatest, most spirited and most useful 
 enterprises of modern publishing. But the 
 inquiring reader is respectfully requested 
 to apply to a bookseller in case of any 
 difficulty. Booksellers are fully alive to 
 the value of cheap editions and to their 
 increasing vogue, and may be trusted to give 
 information accurately and pleasantly. 
 Some books have gone out of print in the 
 meantime, but, generally speaking, they can 
 be procured without difficulty. I do not bind 
 myself to make up the exact sum of 5, but 
 hope to get sufficiently near it. 
 
 BOOKS OF REFERENCE 
 
 It is necessary to have some books of 
 reference. I assume that each reader has 
 a Bible. The best one-volume edition of 
 Shakespeare is the Globe edition of Messrs. 
 Macrnillan (3s. Qd.). The best English Dic- 
 tionary at the price is that of Chambers 
 18
 
 Essays and Belles Lettres 
 
 (3s. Qd.). To this should be added Cham- 
 bers's Gazetteer, which costs 75. Qd. All 
 Chambers 's reference books are of the 
 highest order. And I most strongly re- 
 commend the Everyman Encyclopaedia, in 
 twelve volumes. It is priceless to the 
 ordinary reader. 
 
 ESSAYS AND BELLES LETTRES 
 
 Essays are amongst the most attractive 
 and valuable forms of literature. There are 
 comparatively very few first-rate essays in 
 English. A good essayist is less common 
 than a good novelist. 
 
 Bacon's Essays (Dent) are in the van of 
 our prose literature. Bacon's Essays, says 
 John Morley, " are the unique masterpiece 
 in our literature of this oracular wisdom of 
 life, applied to the scattered occasions of 
 men's existence." Dean Church said : 
 " These short papers say what they have 
 19
 
 Essays and Belles Lettres 
 
 to say without preface and in literary un- 
 dress, without a superfluous word, without 
 the joints and bands of structure ; they say 
 it in brief, rapid sentences, which come 
 down sentence after sentence like the strokes 
 of a great hammer." The late Principal 
 Caird, of Glasgow, who was highly competent 
 to speak, declared that Bacon's greatest 
 and most characteristic work was his 
 Essays. 
 
 The hostile critics are represented by 
 Emerson, who says : "Bacon's Essays are 
 the portrait of an ambitious and profound 
 calculator a great man of the vulgar sort. 
 Of the upper world of man's being they 
 speak few and faint words." 
 
 Nevertheless, it remains true that, though 
 the book can be read from beginning to end 
 in a few hours, " after the twentieth perusal 
 one seldom fails to remark in it something 
 overlooked before." As Johnson said, 
 " their excellence and value consist in their 
 being the observations of a strong mind 
 operating upon life, and, in consequence, 
 20
 
 Essays and Belles Lettres 
 
 you will find there what you seldom find 
 in other books." 
 
 The Essays of Elia, by Charles Lamb, are 
 perhaps the most delightful and alluring of 
 all essays in English. The Americans have 
 taken a particular delight in these, and R. H. 
 Hutton admits that in some respects, 
 though in some only, Charles Lamb's humour 
 anticipates the type of humour which we 
 now call, in the main, American. An 
 American critic says : " We never rise from 
 one of his essays without a feeling of con- 
 tentment. He leads our thoughts to the 
 actual available springs of enjoyment. 
 He reconciles us to ourselves, causing home 
 pleasures and the charms of the wayside and 
 the mere comforts of existence to emerge 
 from the shadow into which our indifference 
 has cast them into the light of fond recogni- 
 tion. In truth, there are few better teachers 
 of gratitude than Lamb." Another genial 
 American, Edward Eggleston, tells how 
 Lamb found him. " What I felt most keenly 
 was the intellectual starvation I suffered 
 21
 
 Essays and Belles Lettres 
 
 in the strenuous pioneer life of Minnesota in 
 1856. About this time there came along a 
 man who conducted a book business on a 
 plan I have never heard of since. He 
 carried the priced catalogue of Derby and 
 Jackson, and took orders for any book on 
 the list. I bought in this way a copy of 
 Charles Lamb's works. It was my only 
 book in a land where books were not, and 
 it was no end of advantage to me. His 
 delicious and whimsical humour is a great 
 prophylactic against priggery. I cleave still 
 to my stout one -volume copy of Lamb. 
 There are many better editions, but none 
 so good for me as this, with its margins 
 covered by pencil notes, humiliating enough 
 now, for they reveal the crudities, preju- 
 dices, immaturities of the young man who 
 wrote them." 
 
 To Emerson's Essays I look back with the 
 warmest appreciation. They were among 
 the first essays I ever read. They remain 
 among the best and the most suggestive. If 
 one's mind comes to a standstill, it is set 
 22
 
 Essays and Belles Lettres 
 
 moving more surely by Emerson than by any 
 other. It will be sufficient to procure the two 
 series of Essays, leaving others to the future. 
 John Morley wrote : " Though it is only 
 the other day that Emerson walked the 
 earth and was alive among us, he is already 
 one of the privileged few whom the reader 
 approaches in the mood of settled respect 
 and whose names have surrounded them- 
 selves with an atmosphere of religion." 
 Professor Tyndall said amusingly and half 
 to himself: " The first time I ever knew 
 Waldo Emerson was when, years ago, a 
 young man, I picked up on a stall a copy of 
 his Nature. I read it with much delight, and 
 I have never ceased to read it ; and if any 
 one can be said to have given the impulse to 
 my mind it is Emerson. Whatever I have 
 done the world owes to him." And Lowell 
 says in his fine panegyric : " We look upon 
 him as one of the few men of genius whom 
 our age has produced, and there needs no 
 better proof of it than his masculine faculty 
 of fecundating other minds. Search for his 
 23
 
 Essays and Belles Lettres 
 
 eloquence in his books and you will perchance 
 miss it, but meanwhile you will find that 
 it has kindled all your thoughts. ... A 
 diction at once so rich and so homely as his 
 I know not where to match in these days of 
 writing by the page ; it is like homespun 
 cloth-of-gold." 
 
 Another shrewd testimony I will add 
 from the columns of The British Weekly, 
 written by P. G. Hamerton : " Emerson 
 had at one time a great influence on me that 
 was good in some ways, but not in all. His 
 philosophy is stimulating and encouraging, 
 but not quite true, because it is too optimis- 
 tic for real truth. He encourages young 
 readers in the desire to be themselves and 
 develop their own faculties, which is very 
 good, but at the same time he encourages 
 a degree of self-confidence which is not 
 always good either for young people or old 
 ones." 
 
 The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table, by 
 Oliver Wendell Holmes, is one of the most 
 delightful books ever written. The author 
 24
 
 Essays and Belles Lettres 
 
 may be said to have invented a peculiar 
 species of dramatic essay. The late W. J. 
 Stillman, a journalist who knew everybody, 
 said : "Of the three men whom I have 
 personally known in the world who seemed 
 most satisfied with what fate and fortune 
 had made them viz., Gladstone, Professor 
 Freeman, and Holmes I think Holmes 
 enjoyed himself the most." 
 
 25
 
 More Essays and Belles Lettres 
 
 II 
 
 MORE ESSAYS AND BELLES 
 LETTRES 
 
 CARLYLE 
 
 EVERY library should contain at least 
 one volume of Carlyle. " Everyman's 
 Library " contains Sartor Resartus and 
 Heroes and Hero Worship. It includes also 
 Past and Present. These are excellent books, 
 but on the whole I advise the reader to begin 
 with Carlyle's Essays. They appear in 
 two volumes, with a note by J. Russell 
 Lowell. Most of them were written in the 
 days when Carlyle was much repressed by 
 editors and before the more startling pecu- 
 liarities of his style were developed. Carlyle 
 complained angrily that Lord Jeffrey mutil- 
 ated his Essays. It is a curious fact that 
 26
 
 More Essays and Belles Lettres 
 
 when Carlyle came to reprint in volume 
 form the essays published originally by 
 Jeffrey, he allowed Jeffrey's emendations to 
 stand. At least, this is true of several which 
 I have carefully compared. There can be 
 little doubt that the best of the essays, and 
 one of the best critical essays ever written, 
 was Carlyle on Burns the first sympathetic 
 interpretation which the illustrious poet 
 ever received. Dr. Garnett, who was not 
 rhetorical, says : " The Essay on Burns 
 is the very voice of Scotland, expressive 
 of all her passionate love and tragic sorrow 
 for her darling son. It has paragraphs of 
 massy gold, capable of being beaten out 
 into volumes, as indeed they have been. 
 Unlike some of Carlyle' s essays, it is by no 
 means open to the charge of mysticism, 
 but is distinguished by the soundest good 
 sense." 
 
 MACAULAY 
 
 It will be necessary to add the two 
 volumes of Macaulay's Miscellaneous Essays. 
 27
 
 More Essays and Belles Lettres 
 
 This is the time when all critical estimates 
 are being revised and men are disputing 
 boldly the accepted doctrines. So I venture 
 to say that Macaulay occupies a unique 
 position among essayists and biographers. 
 Perhaps I might also say that the best of 
 his writings are his first and his last. I refer 
 to the Essay on Milton and the Life of Pitt 
 in the Encyclopedia Britannica. Macaulay 
 came to think that his Essay on Milton 
 was loaded with gaudy and ungraceful orna- 
 ments. This may be, but it is an astonishing 
 production, and the young heart that does 
 not kindle to it is cold indeed. The short 
 Life of Pitt is a masterpiece of consummate 
 skill. The music and melody of it, the 
 exquisite art with which the paragraphs are 
 fitted to each other, the satisfying impression 
 of the whole, are simply beyond praise. 
 Perhaps no one has written better about 
 Macaulay than John Morley. He says : 
 " His Essays are as good as a library : 
 they make an incomparable manual and 
 vade mecum for a busy, uneducated man 
 28
 
 More Essays and Belles Lettres 
 
 who has curiosity and enlightenment enough 
 to wish to know a little about the great lives 
 and great thoughts, the shining words and 
 many-coloured complexities of action that 
 have marked the journey of man through 
 the ages. Macaulay has an intimate ac- 
 quaintance both with the imaginative litera- 
 ture and the history of Greece and Rome, 
 with the literature and the history of modern 
 Italy, of France, and of England. What- 
 ever his special subject, he contrives to 
 pour into it with singular dexterity a stream 
 of rich, graphic, and telling illustrations 
 from all these widely diversified sources." 
 All this is well said, but Morley leaves out 
 what is the chief attraction of Macaulay 
 the glowing fire of his heart. 
 
 There is no doubt another side to this. 
 It is pleasant to find Matthew Arnold 
 doing justice to the Essay on Milton. He 
 says : " With the Essay on Milton began 
 Macaulay 's career, and, brilliant as the 
 career was, it had few points more brilliant 
 than this beginning." Arnold states as well 
 29
 
 More Essays and Belles Lettres 
 
 as any one the objections and deductions to 
 be made in criticising Macaulay : "A style 
 to dazzle, to gain admirers everywhere, to 
 attract imitators in multitude ! A style 
 brilliant, metallic, exterior ; making strong 
 points, alternating invective with eulogy, 
 wrapping in a robe of rhetoric the thing it 
 represents ; not, with the soft play of life, 
 following and rendering the thing's very form 
 and pressure. For, indeed, in rendering things 
 in this fashion, Macaulay 's gift did not lie." 
 This is well enough. But Macaulay is 
 safe, and it is true of him that he created the 
 historical essay. Through the door he has 
 opened we can, any one of us, pass into the 
 great world of politics, history and litera- 
 ture. No one has influenced English style as 
 Macaulay has done, and, on the whole, the 
 influence has made for clarity and for vigour. 
 I may add, for those who can afford expen- 
 sive editions, that Macaulay 's Essays have 
 been published in three volumes, I think, by 
 Messrs. Methuen, with introductions by 
 Professor Montague. I have no hesitation 
 30
 
 Fiction 
 
 in saying that this is the best edited English 
 classic I know not a word too much, not a 
 word too little. 
 
 FICTION 
 
 I now come to the great and not alto- 
 gether easy subject of fiction. We have 
 in English a huge library, but only a certain 
 number are elevated above the mass. I pro- 
 pose to give only books from the greatest 
 writers, and in choosing them I have to think 
 of the qualities which attract new readers. 
 If one book fascinates, the other books will 
 be read in due time. Thus, I do not recom- 
 mend Romola or even Middlemarch for 
 George Eliot because, whatever difference 
 of opinion there may be as to their merits, 
 it will be allowed that they are not easy 
 reading for the beginner. 
 
 SCOTT 
 
 The master novelist is Sir Walter Scott, 
 31
 
 Fiction 
 
 and four at least of his books should find a 
 place. But what four ? Lowell once said 
 that the Bride of Lammermoor was to him 
 the most beautiful story in the language. 
 Andrew Lang on one occasion put Old 
 Mortality and Quentin Durward at the top 
 of the list, but I rather think that he slightly 
 changed this opinion. Excellent judges like 
 George Gilfillan have chosen Guy Manner- 
 ing for the premier position. For my own 
 part I prefer Rob Roy to the rest. The Anti- 
 quary was Scott's own favourite. The one 
 novel to which I have never been quite 
 reconciled is St. Ronan's Well, and yet 
 we all remember how it was admired by 
 Ruskin. On the whole I advise beginning 
 with Ivanhoe, The Heart of Midlothian, The 
 Antiquary, and Rob Roy. I do not forget 
 that Lord Tennyson put Old Mortality 
 before The Heart of Midlothian, and I know 
 there are some curious lapses in The Heart 
 of Midlothian, and the last third is unsatis- 
 factory. But I agree with Fitzgerald : 
 " Oh, how refreshing is the leisurely, easy 
 32
 
 Fiction 
 
 movement of the story, with its true and 
 well- harmonised variety of scene and 
 character ! " As for Ivanhoe, they say there 
 are many historical inaccuracies and errors 
 in its pages. But what does it matter ? 
 Andrew Lang says : " Ivanhoe is such 
 a very dear and old friend that no one who 
 has ever been a boy can pretend to apply 
 to it any stern critical tests." Leslie Stephen, 
 who was not an undiscriminating admirer of 
 Scott, speaks of its splendid audacity, its 
 vivid presentation of mediaeval life, and the 
 dramatic vigour of the narrative. 
 
 JANE AUSTEN 
 
 Jane Austen comes next, and her vitality 
 is supreme. What may be said against her 
 has been said by Charlotte Bronte, writing 
 about Pride and Prejudice : What did I 
 find ? An accurate daguerreotyped portrait 
 of a commonplace face ; a carefully fenced, 
 high- cultivated garden, with neat borders 
 and delicate flowers ; but no glance of a 
 bright, vivid physiognomy, no open country, 
 c 33
 
 Fiction 
 
 no fresh air, no blue hill, no bonny beck. I 
 should hardly like to live with her ladies 
 and gentlemen, in their elegant but con- 
 fined houses." On the other hand, Scott 
 said in his diary : " Read again, and for the 
 third time at least, Miss Austen's very 
 finely written novel of Pride and Prejudice. 
 That young lady had a talent for describing 
 the involvements and feelings and characters 
 of ordinary life, which is to me the most 
 wonderful I ever met with. The big Bow- 
 wow strain I can do myself like any now 
 going ; but the exhaustive touch, which 
 renders ordinary commonplace things and 
 characters interesting, from the truth of the 
 description and the sentiment, is denied to 
 me. What a pity such a gifted creature 
 died so early ! " Macaulay writes : " Read 
 Northanger Abbey ; worth all Dickens and 
 Plato together. Yet it was the work of a 
 girl. She was certainly not more than 
 twenty-six. Wonderful creature ! " 
 
 I put Emma first. Mrs. Oliphant, in her 
 very acute criticism, says that Jane Austen 
 84
 
 Fiction 
 
 was only about twenty in her sheltered and 
 happy life at home in the end of the old 
 century, when she wrote what might have 
 been the outcome of the profoundest pro- 
 longed observation and study of mankind 
 what is, we think, the most perfect of all her 
 works Pride and Prejudice. But Mrs. 
 Oliphant admits that Emma, perhaps, is the 
 work upon which most suffrages would meet 
 as the most perfect of all her performances. 
 I think we may safely put down Emma and 
 Pride and Prejudice to begin with. The others 
 must be read in turn, but we are at the com- 
 mencement of our work. By the way, Lord 
 Iddesleigh, the famous politician, made 
 the proposal that a magazine should be 
 started which should be devoted entirely 
 to Miss Austen, and to which only her sincere 
 admirers should be allowed to contribute. 
 
 DICKENS 
 
 I now pass on to the great novelist who 
 has been honoured in this manner. That 
 excellent periodical, the Dickensian, of 
 35
 
 Fiction 
 
 which I religiously read every word, is 
 wholly devoted to Charles Dickens, who 
 takes his place as one of the very few 
 masters of English fiction, and to him we 
 must devote a certain space. 
 
 In his masterly criticism of Dickens 
 Mr. G. K. Chesterton distinguishes well 
 between the two periods of Dickens. The 
 first period included Pickwick, which 
 Frederic Harrison describes as " his first, 
 his best, his inimitable triumph." Then 
 comes Nicolas Nickleby, which conquered 
 Sydney Smith : " ' Nickleby is very good. 
 I stood out against Mr. Dickens as long as 
 I could, but he has conquered me." I 
 pass over Barndby Rudge, and, with more 
 hesitation, The Old Curiosity Shop, and come 
 to Martin Chuzzlewit, one of the first of his 
 compositions. Then I proceed to David 
 Copper field, which Dickens himself put above 
 the rest. " What a pleasure," says Matthew 
 Arnold, " to have the opportunity of prais- 
 ing a work so sound, a work so rich in 
 merits, as David Copperfield ! . . . What
 
 Fiction 
 
 treasures of gaiety, invention, life, are in 
 that book ! what alertness and resource ! 
 what a soul of good nature and kindness 
 governing the whole ! " Andrew Lang says 
 that "David Copperfieldno doubtis Dickens's 
 masterpiece as a novel, Pickwick, as has 
 been said, being no novel, but merely an 
 isolated phenomenon. . . The entire 
 charm of ' Copperfield ' was never recaptured 
 by Dickens." Swinburne said in his last 
 essay on Dickens in the Quarterly, " In that 
 unequal and irregular masterpiece his 
 comic and his tragic genius rose now and 
 then to the very highest pitch of all." 
 
 We need not deal with the novels of the 
 second period and their great and varied 
 excellence. They want something, but they 
 contain much. The reader is advised to 
 include in his library Pickwick, Nicholas 
 Nickleby, Martin Chuzzlewit and David 
 Copperfield. These contain much of the best 
 work of Dickens, but there is not one book 
 of Dickens that can be safely neglected. I 
 should personally give a very high place to 
 87
 
 Fiction 
 
 A Tale of Two Cities and Great Expectations. 
 But, strange to say, there is a difference of 
 opinion among good judges, especially about 
 the former. Of all the brutal reviews that 
 have disgraced English literature, and there 
 are many, the most brutal and stupid by 
 far was the criticism of A Tale of Two Cities 
 published in the Saturday Review and 
 written by Fitzjames Stephen. 
 
 THACKERAY 
 
 I pass on to another writer of the first 
 eminence W. M. Thackeray, Thackeray 
 has had his detractors. One of them 
 was W. E. Henley, who complained that, 
 " Esmond apart, there is scarce a man or 
 a woman in Thackeray whom it is possible 
 to love unreservedly or thoroughly respect. 
 That gives the measure of the man, and 
 determines the quality of his influence." 
 But Henley admitted that Thackeray was a 
 rare artist in words and therefore a great 
 writer. " Setting aside Cardinal Newman's, 
 the style he wrote is certainly less open to 
 38
 
 Fiction 
 
 criticism than that of any other modern 
 Englishman. He was neither super- eloquent 
 like Mr. Ruskin, nor a Germanised Jeremy 
 like Carlyle : he was not marmoreally 
 emphatic as Landor was, nor was he 
 slovenly and inexpressive as was the great 
 Sir Walter ; he neither dallied with anti- 
 thesis like Macaulay nor rioted in verbal 
 vulgarisms with Dickens ; he abstained 
 from technology and what may be called 
 Lord Burleighism as carefully as George 
 Eliot indulged in them, and he avoided con- 
 ceits as sedulously as Mr. George Meredith 
 goes out of his way to hunt for them. He 
 is a better writer than any one of these, in 
 that he is always a master of speech and of 
 himself, and that he is always careful yet 
 natural, and choice yet seemingly spon- 
 taneous.'.' 
 
 Thackeray was all this and a great deal 
 more. He was a novelist of the foremost 
 rank, but readers must be careful in their 
 approach to him. For example, it is prob- 
 ably true that Thackeray never did any-
 
 Fiction 
 
 thing more remarkable than Barry Lyndon, 
 but Barry Lyndon is not a book to begin 
 with. I think we must choose Vanity Fair. 
 " The most brilliant, the most heartless, and 
 the most hateful of modern fictions ! " this 
 is how a leading novelist describes it. But 
 Dr. John Brown was right when he called it 
 Thackeray's greatest work and one of the 
 chief masterpieces of genius in any language. 
 Charlotte Bronte's passionate admiration 
 for the story may be recalled. Speaking of 
 the last number of Vanity Fair, she writes : 
 " Forcible, exciting in its force, still more 
 impressive than exciting, carrying on the 
 interest of the narrative in a flow, deep, full, 
 resistless, it is still quiet as quiet as reflec- 
 tion, as quiet as memory ; and to me there 
 are parts of it that sound as solemn as an 
 oracle." 
 
 By the way, I do not know any reference 
 by Charlotte Bronte to the earlier books of 
 Thackeray, though it is possible she may 
 have read them. Mr. W. D. Howells is 
 almost alone in describing Vanity Fair as 
 40
 
 Fiction 
 
 " the poorest of Thackeray's novels, crude, 
 heavy-handed, caricatured." 
 
 Next to Vanity Fair I should be inclined to 
 name The Newcomes. It is by far the most 
 genial of the author's works, and he wrote 
 it at the height of his great powers. It 
 reveals the very best side of Thackeray. It 
 fills a large canvas with the greatest ease, 
 and is perhaps the best of all the novels of 
 manners. 
 
 There is one other book of Thackeray 
 I must name, and that is Henry Esmond. 
 There are dissentients from this judgment. 
 Gilfillan speaks of " such dull mimicry of 
 the past as is to be found in Esmond. 11 
 And there is a certain truth in this 
 put very neatly by Taine, who says, 
 " Thackeray has not written a less popular 
 nor a more beautiful story." Esmond repro- 
 duced with perfect accuracy the style in 
 which men wrote and talked in the days of 
 Queen Anne. Even though it may be diffi- 
 cult at first, the reader should by all means 
 persevere. I am scarcely bold enough to 
 41
 
 Fiction 
 
 follow an American example and recom- 
 mend that Henry Esmond should be read 
 if possible at a sitting, though I grant that 
 its completeness as a whole will be felt best 
 in that way. But it is not an easy book, 
 though it is a very great book. And so I 
 recommend readers to begin with Vanity 
 Fair or with The Nezvcomes and take Henry 
 Esmond last. Even a five-pound library 
 cannot dispense with Esmond. We have 
 thus three books of Thackeray.
 
 More Fiction 
 
 III 
 MORE FICTION 
 
 CHARLOTTE BRONTE 
 
 IT is now the turn of Charlotte Bronte. 
 Charlotte Bronte published her first novel, 
 Jane Eyre, in 1847. As soon as it appeared 
 judgment was taken out of the hands of the 
 critics. The hold it took and the impulse it 
 gave were almost unparalleled in literature. 
 "It is easy," says Mr. Birrell, " to under- 
 stand the great interest and excitement 
 such a tale at once created. Most books are 
 born dead, and it is always a startling 
 moment when you first discover that you 
 are holding an exception in your hands. 
 Jane Eyre was a live coal dropped by some 
 unknown hand from some unknown quarter 
 amongst the literary coteries and ' log- 
 43
 
 More Fiction 
 
 rollers.' There was no mistake about it, 
 here was a book at first hand." This fever 
 continued to rage for years. Jane Eyre left 
 Vanity Fair far behind in popularity. J. G. 
 Lockhart, then a veteran among critics, 
 said, " I have finished the adventures of Miss 
 Jane Eyre, and think her far the cleverest 
 that has written since Austen and Edgeworth 
 were in their prime. Worth fifty Trollopes 
 and Martineaus rolled into one counterpane, 
 with fifty Dickenses and Bulwers to keep 
 them company but rather a brazen Miss." 
 Strange to say, George Eliot judged un- 
 favourably. She admitted that the book 
 was interesting, but she wished the charac- 
 ters " would talk a little less like the heroes 
 and heroines of police reports." 
 
 It is not worth while to recall the vicious 
 and violent attacks made upon the writer 
 from the standpoint of the Pharisee. There 
 are good critics like Dr. Saintsbury who do 
 not think that the book improves or holds its 
 ground very well. But the truest thing said 
 of the book is perhaps the judgment of 
 44
 
 More Fiction 
 
 Frederic Harrison : "Of Charlotte's work 
 it is Jane Eyre only that can be called a 
 masterpiece. ... With all its fault, its 
 narrowness of range, its occasional extra- 
 vagances, Jane Eyre will long be remembered 
 as one of the most creative influences of the 
 Victorian literature, one of the most poetic 
 pieces of English romance, and among the 
 most vivid masterpieces in the rare order of 
 literary ' Confessions.' " Swinburne, writing 
 in his clumsiest manner, insists that the 
 inevitability of the book is its great quality. 
 He attributes to Charlotte Bronte " the 
 power to make us feel in every nerve, at 
 every step forward which our imagination is 
 compelled to take under the guidance of 
 another's, that thus and not otherwise, but 
 in all things altogether even as we are told 
 and shown, it was and it must have been with 
 the human figures set before us in their 
 action and their suffering ; that thus and 
 not otherwise they absolutely must and 
 would have felt and thought and spoken 
 under the proposed conditions." 
 45
 
 More Fiction 
 
 I pass over Shirley, though it is my 
 favourite among her novels. It is a happy 
 and even a buoyant book. There is an 
 explanation of this which yields itself to a 
 study of Mrs. GaskelPs biography. But I 
 admit that good critics and the public gener- 
 ally put it lower than Jane Eyre and Villette. 
 
 Villette, according to the majority of 
 critics, is the finest, the most delicate, the 
 ripest, and the wisest of all Charlotte Bronte's 
 books. Certainly it describes the very 
 heart- beats of the writer. The autobio- 
 graphical element is stronger in it than in 
 any other of her volumes. 
 
 The Bronte novel I read first was The 
 Professor, which was published after her 
 death. " It was," says Swinburne, a " diffi- 
 dent, uncertain dawn." Mr. Birrell speaks 
 of it contemptuously. I venture to 
 disagree. There is a letter in The Professor 
 which in itself is worth the majority of 
 complete novels. It is with the two or three 
 first-rate letters in fiction. But The Pro- 
 fessor has not yet found its true appreciates 
 46
 
 More Fiction 
 
 Let me be content then with recom- 
 mending to my readers Jane Eyre and 
 Villette. Charlotte Bronte is the chief 
 novelist of love, and she has more glow than 
 any other. "She is intensely true, and 
 draws from actual life cost what it may, 
 and in that little remote village of hers, a 
 village as it seems of a hundred years back, 
 facts came to light of a frightful, unmiti- 
 gated force ; events accompanied them, 
 burning with a lurid glow, and setting their 
 very hearts on fire. She is like her books, 
 and her life explains much in them which 
 needs explanation." I accept Mr. A. C. 
 Benson's judgment, " The first of women 
 writers of every age." 
 
 GEORGE ELIOT 
 
 We come to George Eliot, and it must 
 be admitted at once that her vogue has 
 greatly declined. It is very difficult to 
 discover a eulogy of her in the criticisms 
 of recent years. But she had a great 
 47
 
 More Fiction 
 
 day. Her popularity was immense, and she 
 had the whole-hearted suffrages of critics 
 and experts like R. H. Hutton. Hutton 
 came to write of her with a rapture and a 
 reverence which were very wonderful. 
 
 For my part I choose among her books the 
 first, Scenes of Clerical Life, then Adam 
 Bede, and then Silas Marner. Scenes of 
 Clerical Life appealed to me as wonderfully 
 moving when I first read them. Dickens 
 himself came forward to express his admira- 
 tion of the first two all he had read. He 
 said, " I have been so strongly affected by 
 the two first tales in the book you have had 
 the kindness to send me, through Messrs. 
 Blackwood, that I hope you will excuse my 
 writing to you to express my admiration of 
 their extraordinary merit. The exquisite 
 truth and delicacy both of the humour and 
 the pathos of these stories I have never 
 seen the like of, and they have impressed 
 me in a manner that I should find it very 
 difficult to describe to you, if I had the 
 impertinence to try." Even J. A. Froude 
 48
 
 More Fiction 
 
 was moved by the book, and wrote : " I do 
 not know whether I am addressing a young 
 man or an old, clergyman or a layman. 
 Perhaps if you answer this note you may 
 give us some information about yourself. 
 But at any rate, should business or pleasure 
 bring you into this part of the world, pray 
 believe that you will find a warm welcome 
 if you will accept our hospitality." 
 
 By the way, Mr. Benn in his History of 
 Rationalism mentions Janet's Repentance 
 as one of the greatest of rationalistic books. 
 Dr. Marcus Dods reckoned it as one of the 
 hundred best religious books. Let the reader 
 test the matter by perusing the story. 
 
 Next comes Adam Bede, which had an 
 immense popular success. It is still the book 
 on which her popular reputation mainly 
 rests. That it is a very great book is most 
 certain. " I love it very much," wrote the 
 author, " and am deeply thankful to have 
 written it." A good critic has said, "It is 
 of all her books the heartiest, the wittiest, the 
 most cheerful, or, rather, the least de- 
 D 49
 
 More Fiction 
 
 pressing. It was a typical romance which 
 everything she had thought or known 
 impelled her to write, in which she told the 
 best of what she had seen, and the most 
 important of what she had to say. Had she 
 never written anything but Adam Bede 
 she would have had a special place of her 
 own in English romance and I am not sure 
 that anything else which she produced very 
 materially raised, enlarged, or qualified that 
 place." This I take to be a true charac- 
 terisation. 
 
 I pass over The Mill on the Floss, excellent 
 as it is, and come to Silas Marner. It has the 
 great merit of brevity. As Henry James 
 wrote in his youth, " It holds a higher place 
 than any of the author's works. It is more 
 nearly a masterpiece ; it has more of that 
 simple, rounded, consummate aspect, that 
 absence of loose ends and gaping issues which 
 marks a classical work." It is indeed a 
 perfect gem. There is nothing to which we 
 can take exception and much that is almost 
 Shakespearean in quality. Adam Bede is 
 50
 
 More Fiction 
 
 spoilt to some extent by the story of Hetty's 
 respite, which is thoroughly untrue to facts. 
 But everything in Silas Marner is as it 
 should be. Above all, it lacks the heaviness 
 which, as her essays show, was in George 
 Eliot a heaviness which almost extin- 
 guished her genius ere the end came. 
 
 So, then, I recommend from George 
 Eliot Scenes of Clerical Life, Adam Bede, 
 and Silas Marner. The appreciative reader 
 may go on to Romola, which is a great 
 achievement, but not alive. It is learned, it 
 is powerful, it is ambitious in the highest 
 degree. It is often admirable. And yet it 
 does not move. We may also pass over 
 Felix Holt, though Mr. Lyon does a great 
 deal to redeem it. Middlemarch is an 
 encyclopaedia rather than a novel. It came 
 out in parts, and I remember reviewing 
 each part as it appeared, but I should not 
 willingly go through it again, excellent 
 as many parts undoubtedly are. 
 
 Of Daniel Deronda there is little to say. 
 A few good judges have praised it, but it is 
 51
 
 More Fiction 
 
 laborious. In order to write it' George 
 Eliot read through two hundred books. It 
 may be that George Eliot made a fine 
 defence of the Jews in the volume, but this 
 is not satisfying. Still, let it be said that 
 the aged and famous American novelist, 
 Harriet Beecher Stowe, took pleasure in it. 
 She said it had succeded in " awakening in 
 my somewhat worn-out mind an interest." 
 And, if I mistake not, Mr. Oscar Browning 
 places the book at the head of her works. 
 Neither her essays nor her verses count for 
 anything. 
 
 NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE 
 
 Among the many admirable novelists of 
 America the acknowledged supremacy 
 belongs to Nathaniel Hawthorne. He died 
 at sixty and did not write very much. But 
 The Scarlet Letter at least and The Blithedale 
 Romance must be read for ever. Exquisite 
 and ethereal are adjectives which fit him. 
 But there was another side of his genius. 
 52
 
 More Fiction 
 
 That acute French critic, Emile Montegut, 
 shows real insight when he says : " This 
 marked love of cases of conscience, this 
 tactiturn, scornful cast of mind ; this habit 
 of seeing sin everywhere, and hell always 
 gaping open ; this dusky gaze bent always 
 upon a damned world, and a nature draped 
 in mourning ; these lonely conversations 
 of the imagination with the conscience ; 
 this pitiless analysis resulting from a per- 
 petual examination of one's self, and from 
 the tortures of a heart closed before men and 
 open to God all these elements of the 
 Puritan character have passed into Mr. 
 Hawthorne, or, to speak more justly, have 
 filtered into him, through a long succession 
 of generations." 
 
 This applies particularly to The Scarlet 
 Letter. It is little to say that the style is 
 perfect. It does not perhaps captivate, but 
 it takes one captive. Henry James was right 
 when he said that it is " densely dark, with 
 a single spot of vivid colour in it ; and it will 
 probably long remain the most consistently 
 53
 
 More Fiction 
 
 gloomy of English novels of the first order. 
 But I just now called it the author's master- 
 piece, and I imagine it will continue to be, 
 for other generations than ours, his most 
 substantial title to fame. It expresses the 
 power, the mystery, and the deathless 
 judicial zeal which are inseparable elements 
 of the human conscience." 
 
 The House of the Seven Gables is a very 
 fine piece of powerful and imaginative prose. 
 But I prefer The Blithedale Romance, and 
 am sometimes inclined to agree with Mr. 
 Howells that it stands first. It is, to my 
 thinking, the most beautifully written story 
 in the English language. Longfellow said : 
 " Another characteristic of this writer is the 
 exceeding beauty of his style. It is as clear 
 as running waters are. Indeed, he uses words 
 merely as stepping-stones upon which, with 
 a free and youthful bound, he crosses and 
 recrosses the bright and rushing stream 
 of thought." No wonder that Dora Green- 
 well said, " I am altogether entranced with 
 Hawthorne." George Eliot said, " Haw- 
 54
 
 More Fiction 
 
 thorne is a grand favourite of mine, and I 
 shall be sorry if he do not go on surpassing 
 himself." " The greatest writer in prose 
 fiction whom America has produced " is 
 the verdict of Andrew Lang, and it still 
 holds. 
 
 The Scarlet Letter and The Blithedale 
 Romance are the choicest products of Haw- 
 thorne's great, lonely, and touching genius. 
 
 ANTHONY TROLLOPS 
 
 I suppose it must be allowed that Anthony 
 Trollope, great as he is, belongs to the second 
 rank, though I know very good judges have 
 placed him in the first. Perhaps he lacked 
 that imagination and poetry which lift a 
 book above the fluctuations of taste. In 
 his own way, however, there was no one to 
 surpass him. Personally he was boisterous, 
 combative and ebullient. But there was 
 deep kindness in him and a habit of search- 
 ing observation, the results of which are 
 almost startling. 
 
 Unquestionably his Barchester series is 
 55
 
 More Fiction 
 
 by far the best of his many books. He could 
 not write anything but fiction. His criti- 
 cisms are pedestrian in the extreme, and 
 he had none of the biographer's gift. But 
 as a realist in the best sense, as a matchless 
 painter of nineteenth- century Englishmen, 
 he is hardly rivalled. He kept on writing to 
 the end, and his later books are sadly in- 
 ferior to their predecessors. It is difficult 
 to make a choice. But I think I am safe in 
 recomending Barchester Towers, Doctor 
 Thome, Framley Parsonage, and The Last 
 Chronicle of Barset as the choicest of his 
 books. If one is compelled to a narrow 
 choice, then I name Barchester Towers and 
 The Last Chronicle of Barset. After The Last 
 Chronicle he wrote nothing that will live, 
 though he remained readable perhaps even 
 to the last. 
 
 R. D. BLACKMORE 
 
 R. D. Blackmore was a man of one book, 
 Lorna Doone. He was an accomplished 
 scholar, and not a mean poet, and almost 
 56
 
 More Fiction 
 
 everything he wrote had a certain quality. 
 Even his first novel, Clara Vaughan, which 
 was very lightly esteemed, contained some 
 excellent dramatic and sensational passages. 
 But Lorna Doone is a book by itself. It is 
 full of romance, and it has an atmosphere 
 in a high degree. It may be true that it is a 
 lovable story rather than a great story, but 
 lovable books are few. Dr. Saintsbury's 
 summary is good : "A style racy and 
 quaint, without excessive affectation ; a 
 good old-fashioned scholarship ; a perpetual 
 fund of humour ; a store of English patriot- 
 ism, sense, and sanity these are some of 
 the good things which Mr. Blackmore 
 always gives us." 
 
 DEFOE 
 
 As I am choosing only about a hundred 
 books from the vast multitude, I do not 
 attempt to select from the older novelists, 
 who were perhaps the greatest masters of 
 all. But I must put in my list Daniel 
 Defoe's Robinson Crusoe. Rousseau says 
 57
 
 More Fiction 
 
 of it in his Emile : " My Emile shall read 
 this book before any other ; it shall for a 
 long time be his entire library, and shall 
 always hold an honourable place. It shall 
 be the text on which all our discussions of 
 natural science shall be only commentaries. 
 It shall be a test for all we meet during our 
 progress toward a ripened judgment, and so 
 long as our taste is unspoiled we shall enjoy 
 reading it." Dr. Johnson put it among the 
 three books that its readers wish to be 
 longer. They are Don Quixote, Robinson 
 Crusoe, and The Pilgrim's Progress. The 
 critics of our own day are much of the same 
 mind. In his book on the English novel Sir 
 Walter Raleigh says that " the main piece 
 of original narrative is a masterpiece, and 
 marks a new era in the writing of prose 
 fiction." 
 
 SWIFT 
 
 Robinson Crusoe did not reach its position 
 for some years, but when Dean Swift pub- 
 lished his Gulliver's Travels people of taste 
 58
 
 More Fiction 
 
 ran mad about it. So Lady Mary Wortley 
 Montagu tells us in one of her letters. We 
 learn from John Gay that the first impres- 
 sion sold in a week, and I suppose there is 
 no appeal from the judgment of Coleridge : 
 " I think Gulliver's Travels the great work 
 of Swift." The object of the author, as set 
 out by himself, was to vex the world, and 
 readers may satisfy themselves with the 
 first two voyages. There is a ghastly signi- 
 ficance about much of it, but so long as the 
 satire does not predominate the book may 
 be read for the story, and found to be what 
 it is a consummate masterpiece of narra- 
 tive. 
 
 59
 
 Poetry 
 
 IV 
 POETRY 
 
 POETRY is most accessible to the ordi- 
 nary reader in the form of lyrics. I take 
 leave, therefore, to recommend anthologies 
 as an essential part of such a library as 
 I am contemplating. One anthology bids 
 fair to hold its ground. I mean Palgrave's 
 Golden Treasury of the best songs and lyrical 
 poems in the English language. It was 
 originally published in 1861, and its merits 
 obtained universal recognition. Tennyson, 
 whose critical taste was excellent, gave 
 Palgrave help in its preparation. Much has 
 been written since 1861, and the Oxford 
 University Press issue, in their cheap and 
 excellent series, the " World's Classics," an 
 edition of the Golden Treasury which con- 
 tains 160 pages of additional poems by
 
 Poetry 
 
 Fitzgerald, Tennyson, the Brownings, 
 Arnold, and other modern poets. This is a 
 golden volume, and I do not wonder that a 
 new edition is printed every year, even in 
 war time. I should also strongly recom- 
 mend the Oxford Book of English Verse, 
 edited by Sir Arthur Quiller- Couch. But the 
 price runs away with a good deal of our 
 allotted sum. It is, however, among the 
 best anthologies in print, and readers who 
 have any taste for poetry will find their 
 account in possessing it. 
 
 I have already recommended the Globe 
 edition of Shakespeare, published by Mac- 
 millan. Some readers, however, may prefer 
 the " World's Classics " publication, in nine 
 volumes. This contains the Oxford text 
 edited by that very careful student, the late 
 Mr. W. J. Craig, and there are introductory 
 studies of the various plays by Edward 
 Dowden, who is always clear, scholarly and 
 informed. The general introduction by 
 Algernon Charles Swinburne is compara- 
 tively slight, and so is a note by Theodore 
 61
 
 Poetry 
 
 Watts-Dunton on the typographical and 
 other features of this edition. Anyhow, it is 
 an excellent edition, and will satisfy the 
 need of ordinary students. 
 
 Of Milton's Poems, which are indispens- 
 able, the best available edition at a low 
 price is that in the " World's Classics." It 
 is a reprint of the English poems from the 
 Oxford edition of H. C. Beeching, with 
 modernised spelling. Dean Beeching is an 
 accomplished master of English literature, 
 and all his work is highly wrought. I will 
 add only one thing. Judge Oliver Wendell 
 Holmes, of the Supreme Court of the United 
 States, told me that one winter in Boston, 
 when he and his wife were obliged to keep 
 to the house through ill-health, they read 
 together aloud some of the English poets. 
 Of these Milton stood the test of reading 
 much better than the others. I therefore 
 venture to suggest that to appreciate Milton 
 it may be wise to call in a friend, so that his 
 harmonies may be duly appreciated. Read- 
 ing a poet aloud is a severe test of his 
 62
 
 Poetry 
 
 merits, but Milton will bear that test and 
 any other. 
 
 ROBERT BURNS 
 
 True to our principle that lyrical poetry 
 is the most easily appreciated, I come to 
 the illustrious name of Robert Burns. 
 " Destiny for so in our ignorance we 
 must speak his faults, the faults of others, 
 proved too hard for him ; and that spirit, 
 which might have soared could it but have 
 walked, soon sank to the dust, its glorious 
 faculties trodden under foot in the blossom, 
 and died, we might almost say, without ever 
 having lived. And so kind and warm a soul, 
 so full of inborn riches, of love of all living 
 and lifeless things ! " So speaks Carlyle. 
 
 Burns is the favourite of the whole world. 
 No poet has been so minutely and lovingly 
 studied. I think it is true that he is the only 
 poet of the first rank who has ever been 
 really popular in modern times. All praise 
 of him seems inadequate, even the most 
 eloquent. Let me quote from Emerson : 
 63
 
 Poetry 
 
 " How true a poet is he ! and the poet, 
 too, of poor men, of grey hodden and the 
 guernsey coat and the blouse. He has 
 given voice to all the experiences of com- 
 mon life ; he has endeared the farmhouse 
 and cottage, patches and poverty, beans 
 and barley ; ale, the poor man's wine ; 
 hardship ; the fear of debt ; the dear 
 society of weans and wife, of brothers and 
 sisters, proud of each other, knowing so few, 
 and finding amends for want and obscurity 
 
 in books and thoughts As he was 
 
 thus the poet of the poor, anxious, cheerful, 
 working humanity, so had he the language 
 of low life. He grew up in a rural district, 
 speaking a patois unintelligible to all but 
 natives, and he has made the Lowland 
 Scotch a Doric dialect of fame. It is the 
 only example in history of a language made 
 classic by the genius of a single man." 
 
 It is needless to say more in the case 
 
 of a poet whose reputation grows and 
 
 whose readers increase from year to year. 
 
 An excellent edition is that in the " World's 
 
 64
 
 Poetry 
 
 Classics " the Poetical Works of Burns, 
 complete, with the poet's notes, a glossary, 
 and index of first lines. 
 
 WORDSWORTH 
 
 I now come to poets who must be read 
 at first in selections. First I name William 
 Wordsworth. The complete editions of his 
 poetical works run into several volumes. 
 But there is much in Wordsworth that may 
 be safely omitted at the start. The general 
 view of his character has been altered in some 
 respects by recent discoveries, but there is 
 something magnificent in Wordsworth's 
 erenity and patience. He waited for recog- 
 nition, and recognition came in ample 
 measure. He was inspired no doubt, but 
 partially and unequally inspired. Matthew 
 Arnold says : " Although Jeffrey com- 
 pletely failed to recognise Wordsworth's 
 real greatness, he was yet not wrong in 
 saying of the ' Excursion,' as a work of 
 poetic style, ' This will never do.'" The 
 ** Prelude " is occasionally prosaic, but ha* 
 ic 65
 
 Poetry 
 
 fine passages. As a sonneteer, however, 
 Wordsworth can be praised almost without 
 reserve in his best pieces. It was he who 
 brought the sonnet to its place of honour. 
 Arthur Quiller- Couch says : " On the re- 
 sponse of the common conscience of men 
 Wordsworth's sonnets may rely for their 
 perpetual justification." 
 
 On many readers Wordsworth's poems 
 have had a profound moral influence. John 
 Stuart Mill, in his autobiography, writes : 
 " What made Wordsworth's poems a medi- 
 cine for my state of mind was that they 
 expressed, not mere outward beauty, but 
 states of feeling, under the excitement of 
 beauty. They seemed to be the very culture 
 of the feelings which I was in quest of. In 
 them I seemed to draw from a source of in- 
 ward joy, of sympathetic and imaginative 
 pleasure, which could be shared in all by 
 human beings, which had no connection with 
 struggle or imperfection, but would be made 
 richer by every improvement in the physical 
 or social condition of mankind. From them I 
 66
 
 Poetry 
 
 seemed to learn what would be the perennial 
 sources of happiness, when all the greater 
 evils of life shall have been removed. And 
 I felt myself at once better and happier as 
 I came under their influence." 
 
 And others can speak, though perhaps 
 in different terms, of what Wordsworth 
 did for them in the day of their calamity 
 and perplexity. Perhaps Sir William Watson 
 may speak for all such : 
 
 " From Shelley's dazzling glow or thunderous haze, 
 
 From Byron's tempest-anger, tempest-mirth, 
 Men turned to thee and found not blast and blaze, 
 
 Tumult of tottering heavens, but peace on earth. 
 Nor peace that grows by Lethe, scentless flower, 
 
 There in white languors to decline and cease ; 
 But peace whose names are also rapture, power, 
 
 Clear sight and love : for these are parts of peace." 
 
 In the " World's Classics " will be found 
 an excellent selection from the Poems of 
 Wordsworth, with indexes of titles and 
 first lines. 
 
 SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE 
 " Come back into memory, like as thou 
 wert in the day-spring of thy fancies, with 
 67
 
 Poetry 
 
 hope like a fiery column before thee the 
 dark pillar not yet turned Samuel Taylor 
 Coleridge Logican, Metaphysician, Bard!" 
 So Charles Lamb summons the dearest 
 of his friends. Coleridge wrote perhaps 
 not much that will live, and many of 
 his years were barren, but the judgment 
 of Mr. Swinburne will stand, and it will 
 bear repeated examination : 
 
 "As a poet his place is indisputable. 
 It is high among the highest of all time. 
 An age that should forget or neglect him 
 might neglect or forget any poet that ever 
 liyed. At least, any poet whom it did 
 remember such an age would remember 
 as something other than a poet ; it would 
 prize and praise in him, not the absolute 
 and distinctive quality, but something 
 empirical or accidental. That may be said 
 of this one which can hardly be said of any 
 but the greatest among men ; that come 
 what may to the world in course of time, it 
 will never see his place filled. Other and 
 stronger men, with fuller control and con- 
 68
 
 Poetry 
 
 centration of genius, may do more service, 
 may bear more fruit ; but such as his was 
 they will not have in them to give. The 
 highest lyric work is either passionate or 
 imaginative ; of passion Coleridge's has 
 nothing ; but for height and perfection of 
 imaginative quality he is the greatest of 
 lyric poets. This was his special power, 
 and this is his special praise." 
 
 I mention Mr. Swinburne's essay in the 
 third volume of Chambers's Cyclopaedia of 
 English Literature as his final verdict on 
 Coleridge. Practically all of Coleridge's 
 poetry that will live may be found in the 
 volume of selections in the " World's 
 Classics " the Poems of Coleridge, with an 
 introduction by Sir Arthur Quiller- Couch. 
 
 BYRON 
 
 " We talked of Byron and Wordsworth," 
 says Tennyson's son in his biography of 
 the Laureate. " Of course," said Tennyson, 
 " Byron's merits are on the surface. This is 
 not the case with Wordsworth. You must
 
 Poetry 
 
 love Wordsworth ere he will seem worthy 
 of your love. As a boy I was an enormous 
 admirer of Byron, so much so that I got a 
 surfeit of him, and now I cannot read him 
 as I should like to do. I was fourteen when 
 I heard of his death. It seemed an awful 
 calamity ; I remember I rushed out of 
 doors, sat down by myself, shouted aloud, 
 and wrote on the sandstone : ' Byron is 
 dead ! ' ' ' Even surly young Carlyle was 
 moved at this passing : " Poor Byron ! 
 alas, poor Byron ! the news of his death 
 came upon my heart like a man of lead ; 
 and yet, the thought of it sends a painful 
 twinge through all my being, as if I had lost 
 a brother. O God ! that so many souls of 
 mud and clay should fill up their base 
 existence to its utmost bound ; and this 
 the noblest spirit in Europe should sink 
 before half his course was run." 
 
 The impression made by Byron's life 
 
 and death is almost unparalleled, but he 
 
 does not now hold his ground. His star is 
 
 fast waning, and it is not likely that a 
 
 70
 
 Poetry 
 
 change will come. But Byron must be read, 
 in part at least, by all students of literature. 
 Tennyson, in later life, could read the 
 " Vision of Judgment " and parts of " Childe 
 Harold," but though he thought Byron 
 endlessly clever and unduly appreciated, he 
 refused to style him an artist or a thinker 
 or a creator. Again I recommend the selec- 
 tion in the " World's Classics " series the 
 Poems of Byron, a selection, with indexes of 
 titles and first lines. 
 
 KEATS 
 
 John Keats was born on October 81, 
 1795, and he died in Rome on February 23, 
 1821. If these dates are duly considered, 
 the achievement of Keats will be seen to be 
 a miracle. When he died his lungs were 
 gone, and all through his short life he was 
 oppressed by illness. I never go through 
 Well Walk at Hampstead without remem- 
 bering how Keats was once sitting on a 
 bench there when Leigh Hunt came up to 
 him. He told Hunt, with tears in his eyes, 
 71
 
 Poetry 
 
 that his heart was breaking. Not that he 
 was a coward. He was, on the contrary, a 
 very brave man, and fought an unflinching 
 fight against his enemies. " He would 
 have been among the very greatest of us if 
 he had lived," said Tennyson. " There is 
 something of the innermost soul of poetry 
 in almost everything he ever wrote." It 
 has been well said that he was the most 
 Shakespearean spirit that has lived since 
 Shakespeare. But whatever he might have 
 been, we know what he was. What he has 
 left us puts him irrevocably in the first 
 rank of the poets of all time. The " World's 
 Claassics " include the Poetical Works of 
 Keats complete. 
 
 SHELLEY 
 
 The same may be said of Percy Bysshe 
 Shelley, who is even more studied in these 
 days than Keats. This may be because the 
 circumstances of his life were more com- 
 plicated and present various problems to 
 those who think that they are entitled to 
 72
 
 Poetry 
 
 judge moral character. The fact is there 
 was a great contradiction in Shelley. On 
 one side of him he was a frail, ethereal, 
 dreamy spirit. On the other side he was 
 strong, practical, and sometimes harsh. I 
 again invoke the aid of Sir William Watson : 
 
 "A creature of impetuous breath, 
 Our torpor deadlier than death 
 He knew not; whatso'er he saith 
 
 Flashes with life : 
 He spurreth man, he quickeneth 
 
 To splendid strife. 
 And in his gusts of song he brings 
 Wild odours shaken from strange wings, 
 And unfamiliar whisperings 
 
 From far lips blown, 
 While all the rapturous heart of things 
 
 Throbs through his own." 
 
 Again, selections of the Poems of Shelley 
 will be found in the " World's Classics." 
 
 LONGFELLOW 
 
 I decided to say a word about the 
 
 American poet, Longfellow, who, as it 
 
 seems to me, is very much underrated by 
 
 certain critics. He is one of the most 
 
 78
 
 Poetry 
 
 popular of all poets, one of the most easily 
 read and understood. There is a tendency 
 to sneer at such poets, and it must of course 
 be admitted that some of Longfellow's 
 weakest verses were the most popular. In 
 1889 Andrew Lang wrote : "I have not 
 read much in him for twenty years. I 
 take him up to-day, and what a flood of 
 memory his music brings with it 1 To me it 
 is like a sad autumn wind blowing over the 
 woods, blowing over the empty fields, bring- 
 ing the scents of October, the song of a 
 belated bird, and here and there a red leaf 
 from the tree. There is that autumnal sense 
 of things fair and far behind in his poetry, 
 or, if it is not there, his poetry stirs it in our 
 forsaken lodges of the past. Yes, it comes 
 to one out of one's boyhood ; it breathes of 
 a world very vaguely realised a world of 
 imitative sentiments and forebodings of 
 hours to come. Perhaps Longfellow first 
 woke me to that later sense of what poetry 
 means, which comes with early manhood." 
 It should be remembered also that Henley, 
 74
 
 Poetry 
 
 heterodox in so many things, was a warm 
 admirer of Longfellow. 
 
 Longfellow's Poetical Works are published 
 in the " World's Classics " in two volumes. 
 
 TENNYSON AND BROWNING 
 I do not need to say anything of the 
 poets who are well known and so nearly 
 contemporary as Tennyson. Nor is it neces- 
 sary to write about Browning. Some know- 
 ledge of both is essential to a student of 
 poetry. It will be sufficient to mention the 
 selection Poems of Tennyson, 1830-1865, 
 which is published in the " World's Classics " 
 and runs to 600 pages. The same series con- 
 tains the Poems of Robert Browning, 1833 
 1864, in two volumes. Much copyright 
 matter of both poets still belongs to the 
 publishers. Mr. Murray has the Browning 
 books and Messrs. Macmillan have the 
 Tennyson books. They are issued in very 
 convenient forms, but a little beyond the 
 cheap price which we prefer. 
 
 I would also recommend in the " World's 
 75
 
 Poetry 
 
 Classics " the Poems of Matthew Arnold, 
 1849-1867, with an introduction by Sir 
 Arthur Quiller- Couch. Also the Poems 
 of Christina Rossetti, and the Poems of 
 William Morris, in the same series. 
 
 76
 
 Biography 
 
 BIOGRAPHY 
 
 To many of us biographies are the 
 most attractive of books, and there are 
 many sound and excellent specimens of 
 this kind in English literature, but by uni- 
 versal consent two stand out as pre-eminent. 
 I mean, of course, Boswell's Life of Johnson 
 and Lockhart's Life of Scott. 
 
 BOSWELL'S " LIFE OF JOHNSON " 
 
 Bos well remains, and will remain, the 
 prince of biographers. Many have spoken 
 contemptuously of his quality and char- 
 acter. They have dwelt on Boswell's want 
 of tact, on his amazing folly and egotism, 
 on his want of self-respect, on his vanity, 
 pomposity, and general looseness. All these 
 77
 
 Biography 
 
 may be allowed, but there is much more to 
 say on the other side. Bos well was a man 
 of genius and of good heart. He was a writer 
 of original merit. As William Black says : 
 " Johnson, Goldsmith, and all the rest of 
 them are only ghosts until the pertinacious 
 young laird of Auchinleck comes on the scene 
 to give them colour, and life, and form." 
 Leslie Stephen, who was a studious and 
 successful practitioner of the biographical 
 art, points out that Boswell has a little of 
 the true Shakespearean secret. He never 
 misses the point of a story. He gives just 
 what is wanted to indicate character or to 
 explain the full meaning of a repartee. He 
 has an amazing skill in extracting the 
 essence of a conversation and in indicating 
 the whole scheme by a few telling touches. 
 " We are tempted to fancy that we have 
 heard the very thing, and rashly infer that 
 Boswell was simply the mechanical trans- 
 mitter of the good things uttered. Any one 
 who will try to put down the pith of a 
 brilliant conversation within the same space 
 78
 
 Biography 
 
 may soon satisfy himself of the absurdity of 
 such a hypothesis, and will learn to appreci- 
 ate Boswell's powers not only of memory 
 but artistic representation. Such a feat 
 implies not only admirable quickness of 
 appreciation but a rare literary faculty. 
 Boswell's accuracy is remarkable ; but it is 
 the least part of his merit." 
 
 To this it may be added that Boswell's 
 own personality emerges from his book 
 almost as clearly as the personality of his 
 illustrious subject. It has been calculated 
 that Boswell and Johnson were acquainted 
 for about twenty years. During that time 
 they met together for about three hundred 
 days. But a great deal can be done in three 
 hundred days if it be the object of the 
 biographer to turn the conversation into 
 rewarding channels. This is what Boswell 
 did. He kept his end in view and hardly 
 ever missed recording the experience of each 
 day. He had long, solitary interviews with 
 Dr. Johnson, and he met him in the society 
 where his powers were most taxed, most 
 79
 
 Biography 
 
 responsive, and most brilliant. It hardly 
 ever happened that silence fell between the 
 two. Thousands of biographies have been 
 written and attempts have been made here 
 and there to give pages of conversation. 
 This has been done, for example, by John 
 Morley in his excellent Life of Gladstone, 
 but the inferiority of Gladstone's talk to 
 Johnson's talk is only too apparent. The 
 day will come, I believe, when every bio- 
 graphy will as a matter of course contain 
 letters and conversations. The predestined 
 biographer will give heed and take care that 
 from every interview he bears something 
 away. The reader who comes under the spell 
 of Boswell will remain enthralled. Perhaps 
 for those who find difficulty in getting into a 
 book it will be best to begin with the record 
 of BoswelPs acquaintance with Johnson 
 that acquaintance which so speedily ripened 
 into true and confidential friendship. 
 
 The most available edition of BoswelPs 
 Life of Johnson is the two-volume edition 
 in " Everyman's Library." 
 80
 
 Biography 
 
 LOCKHART'S " LIFE OF SCOTT " 
 
 There comes next Lockhart's Life of 
 Scott, and it is not easy to say which is 
 the more delightful and satisfying of the 
 two. I have no quarrel with any one who 
 prefers Lockhart. Every fresh perusal in- 
 creases one's sense of Lockhart's most 
 skilful, entertaining and fascinating book. 
 It is possible to contend with some plausi- 
 bility that Lockhart gives too much space to 
 discussing the connection between Scott and 
 the Ballantynes. The truth is the connec- 
 tion was not creditable either to Scott or to 
 his printers. Lockhart had a quarrel with the 
 world and wrote much that was inexcusably 
 bitter. In the Life of Scott, however, he rose 
 into a high region, and I think that the care- 
 ful reader will perceive that Lockhart re- 
 strained himself as far as he could. He 
 was not completely successful, however, 
 in his efforts, and this may be acknowledged 
 without abating at all Lockhart's claim to 
 rank with Boswell. Both were happy in 
 F 81
 
 Biography 
 
 having truly noble subjects, but it must be 
 admitted that Johnson had the grander 
 nature of the two, with idealisms and 
 faiths to which Scott was not indeed a 
 stranger, though far less at home than 
 the beloved Doctor. No one who really 
 understands Scott would wish to have 
 Lockhart's biography diminished by one 
 page. It must, however, be conceded 
 sorrowfully that it is too long for modern 
 tastes, and so I reluctantly recommend the 
 judiciously abbreviated edition of Mr. 
 Dent which appears in " Everyman's 
 Library " in two volumes. 
 
 CARLYLE'S " LIFE OF STERLING " 
 
 Carlyle's Life of Sterling can hardly be 
 called a great biography. A great biography 
 must deal with a great personality, and it 
 cannot be said that Sterling's amiable and 
 ineffectual character had any touch of 
 grandeur. But it is agreed that, when 
 allowance is made for this, Carlyle's bio- 
 82
 
 Biography 
 
 graphy is the most pleasant of all his books. 
 Emerson said : " With all its blemish of 
 pity and Philistinism and pessimism, it 
 stands remarkable, a monument built by 
 such hands I will not say planned by such 
 a mind, for the mind protested ; but never- 
 theless the hands, obedient to the spirit, 
 built it with the best they could bring in 
 gratitude to helpful love whose sunlight had 
 reached an imprisoned soul." Mrs. Oliphant 
 was one of the staunchest of all Carlyle's 
 friends and defenders, but she admits the 
 real weakness of the book. She says : "I 
 have always felt, notwithstanding a strong 
 affection and admiration for Carlyle, that 
 his Life of Sterling has in it a breath of 
 Mephistopheles, something of the mocking, 
 scornful spirit, satirically superior to all 
 a young man's hereditary beliefs and with a 
 careless pleasure in pursuing and stripping 
 him of these but weakly founded non- 
 individual religious views which had built 
 up the outer fabric of his life, such as hurts 
 the moral sense, wonderful as is the almost 
 88
 
 Biography 
 
 lyrical strain of its lament and praise. " When 
 all is said and done, there is more mildness 
 and tenderness in the book than in any other 
 written by its author. 
 
 Carlyle's Life of Sterling is included in 
 the " World's Classics," with an introduction 
 by Mark Rutherford. 
 
 MRS. GASKELL'S " LIFE OF CHARLOTTE 
 BRONTE " 
 
 A remarkably skilful and effective bio- 
 graphy is Mrs. GaskelPs Life of Charlotte 
 Bronte. It is the work of a novelist, and the 
 novelist's gifts never had a rarer oppor- 
 tunity than in the strange life of the great 
 Yorkshire sisters. I can understand that 
 objection may be taken to the book, and 
 certainly its candour is remarkable. But 
 though we have now more materials than 
 Mrs. Gaskell could use in writing her work, 
 her substantial soundness of judgment has 
 on the whole been confirmed. The extreme 
 care and artistry with which the book is 
 84
 
 Religious Books 
 
 compiled are really very wonderful. Char- 
 lotte Bronte was a woman of genius, and 
 she was also a woman who took a high 
 and lonely way. Through almost every 
 step of the pilgrimage Mrs. Gaskell walked 
 with intimacy and understanding. She did 
 not indeed treat the great inward incident 
 of Charlotte Bronte's life her relations 
 with M. Heger and it is not quite certain 
 how far she was qualified to do so. What 
 she said, however, is generally beyond chal- 
 lenge. The best edition of Mrs. Gaskell' s 
 Life of Charlotte Bronte is that edited by 
 Mr. Clement Shorter and published now by 
 John Murray. But this runs away with 
 some money, and so I advise the edition 
 published in " Everyman's Library " and 
 introduced by May Sinclair. 
 
 RELIGIOUS BOOKS 
 
 I come to religious books, of which I shall 
 name very few. The Bible is, of course, 
 85
 
 Religious Books 
 
 taken for granted, and I also take for 
 granted the Imitation of Christ, by Thomas 
 a Kempis. 
 
 BUNYAN'S " PILGRIM'S PROGRESS " 
 
 A word upon Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress 
 also included in " Everyman's Library." 
 Dr. Arnold of Rugby wrote : " Pilgrim's 
 Progress seems to be a complete reflection 
 of Scripture, with none of the rubbish of the 
 theologians mixed up with it." Froude says : 
 " His experience is so truly a human experi- 
 ence that Christians of every persuasion can 
 identify themselves with him, and even those 
 who regard Christianity itself as the natural 
 outgrowth of the conscience and intellect, 
 and yet desire to live nobly and make the 
 best of themselves, can recognise familiar 
 footprints in every step of Christian's 
 journey." The purity, the plainness, and 
 the soundness of Bunyan's prose have been 
 abundantly recognised by those who under- 
 stand. I do not know any more felicit- 
 86
 
 Religious Books 
 
 cms characterisation than that of John 
 Richard Green. He writes : " It is in this 
 amazing reality of impersonation that 
 Bunyan's imaginative genius specially dis- 
 plays itself. But this is far from being his 
 only excellence. In its range, in its direct- 
 ness, in its simple grace, in the ease with 
 which it changes from living dialogue to 
 dramatic action, from simple pathos to 
 passionate earnestness, in the subtle and 
 delicate fancy which often suffuses its 
 childlike words, in its playful humour, its 
 bold character-painting, in the even and 
 balanced power which passes without an 
 effort from the Valley of the Shadow of 
 Death to the land ' where the Shining 
 Ones commonly walk because it is on the 
 borders of Heaven,' in its sunny kindliness 
 unbroken by one bitter word, the Pilgrim's 
 Progress is among the noblest of English 
 poems." 
 
 It will generally be admitted that the 
 Pilgrim's Progress is the greatest of English 
 prose books, written with a mastery to 
 87
 
 Miscellaneous 
 
 which no other has attained. For myself 
 I confess that even above the Pilgrim's 
 Progress I prefer as a masterpiece of style 
 Grace Abounding. But Grace Abounding 
 may be thought to have in it a certain mor- 
 bid element not to be discovered in Pilgrim's 
 Progress. "It is," said Coleridge, " a 
 study for a philosopher, and it is the best 
 study for the origin and essence of Puri- 
 tanism." 
 
 MISCELLANEOUS 
 
 I add a few books which may be read with 
 the greatest advantage. Montaigne's Essays, 
 in three volumes, are included in the 
 "World's Classics," and better reading is 
 hardly to be found. Cervantes' Don Quixote 
 is one of the immortal books. It is printed 
 in two volumes in the " World's Classics." 
 Pope's translation of Homer's Odyssey is in 
 the same series. It is also included in 
 "Everyman's Library" in the translation 
 of William Cowper. Also, there is one 
 88
 
 Miscellaneous 
 
 scientific book which is almost essential 
 The Origin of Species, by Charles Darwin 
 to be found in the "World's Classics." I 
 would fain have named a hundred more but 
 the foundation is laid.
 
 History 
 
 VI 
 
 HISTORY 
 
 THERE need be no hesitation in naming 
 Macaulay's History of England, published 
 in " Everyman's Library " in three volumes. 
 The merits of Macaulay are transcendent 
 and far outweigh his faults. " No one," 
 says the great French critic, Taine, " has 
 so well taught or known history. He is not 
 a poet like Michelet ; he is not a philo- 
 sopher like Guizot ; but he possesses so 
 well all the oratorical powers, he accumu- 
 lates and arranges so many facts, he holds 
 them so closely in his hand, he manages them 
 with so much ease and vigour, that he suc- 
 ceeds in recomposing the whole and har- 
 monious woof of history, not losing or 
 separating one thread. The poet reanimates 
 the dead, the philosopher formulates crea- 
 tive laws, the orator knows, expounds, and 
 90
 
 History 
 
 pleads causes. The poet resuscitates souls, 
 the philosopher composes a system, the 
 orator redisposes chains of arguments ; 
 but all three march towards the same end 
 by different routes, and the orator, like his 
 rivals, and by other means than his rivals, 
 reproduces in his work the unity and com- 
 plexity of life." If it were only for his style 
 Macaulay should be studied day and night, 
 by all who wish to write clearly, vigorously 
 and with current. The apes of Macaulay, as 
 Freeman called them, are much mistaken, 
 but every writer of English will do well to 
 study his writings even though he may not 
 quite call himself a disciple. 
 
 I will also mention that excellent book, 
 Green's Short History of the English People. 
 It is published in two volumes in " Every- 
 man's Library," with useful revisions ap- 
 pendices, and maps. Green's book is full of 
 colour and incident, and though in its earlier 
 editions there were many inaccuracies these 
 have been largely corrected. He had a 
 strong sense of literary form, and was more 
 91
 
 History 
 
 successful perhaps than any other man in 
 bringing out the unity and continuity of 
 great movements and of economic changes. 
 
 I should also have liked to name Justin 
 McCarthy's smooth and wonderfully ac- 
 curate History of Our Own Times, but it is 
 still in copyright. The chief historical work 
 among English books is Gibbon's Decline 
 and Fall of the Roman Empire, published in 
 six volumes in " Everyman's Library," but 
 hardly to be tackled by beginners. Many 
 years ago Professor Wellhausen, as we were 
 walking in the neighbourhood of Greifswald, 
 said to me " Gibbon is the great historian. 
 He knows the watersheds." 
 
 I also find that I have omitted Ruskin 
 an indispensable writer. Sesame and Lilies 
 is a good book to begin with. It appears 
 in the " Everyman's Library " along with 
 The Two Paths and The King of the Golden 
 River, with an introduction by Sir Oliver 
 Lodge. 
 
 Before proceeding with my complete list, 
 I wish to name some other editions of the 
 92
 
 Preliminary Essays 
 
 works recommended. As things stand, I 
 have naturally referred almost exclusively to 
 "Everyman's Library" and the "World's 
 Classics," but it would be unpardonable not 
 to mention the beautiful editions of Messrs. 
 Nelson. Messrs. Nelson publish at ninepence 
 the chief works of Scott, Jane Austen, 
 Dickens, George Eliot, Anthony Trollope, 
 and others, and more seemly and tasteful 
 little volumes there could not be. Also 
 Messrs. Cassell have a good many of the 
 books named, generally priced at eightpence. 
 Messrs. Routledge also publish not a few 
 standard works, generally at the price of a 
 shilling. 
 
 I very strongly recommend purchasers 
 to choose reprints with preliminary essays. 
 These essays furnish most important help to 
 the reader if they are decently done, as they 
 usually are. They give the circumstances 
 under which each book was published, 
 details of its reception, and indications of its 
 strong and weak points, which are most 
 useful to the beginner, and indeed to all 
 93
 
 List of Books 
 
 readers. The very able gentlemen who 
 preside over the libraries which I have men- 
 tioned will act wisely if they see that in 
 future a competent introduction is prefixed 
 to every book they publish 
 
 LIST OF BOOKS 
 
 The list which follows is accurate at the 
 time that I compile it, but the prices of 
 books are continually being raised.* 
 
 BOOKS OF KEFERENCE : 
 
 8. d. 
 
 English Dictionary. Chambers's . .36 
 
 Gazetteer. Chambers's . . . .76 
 Encyclopaedia. Everyman (Dent) (12 vols.) . 15 
 
 ESSAYS AND BELLES LETTRES : 
 
 Emerson's Essays. Everyman . . .13 
 Bacon's Essays. Everyman . . .13 
 Lamb's " Essays of Elia." Everyman. . 1 3 
 Oliver Wendell Holmes' " Autocrat of the 
 
 Breakfast Tale." Everyman . .13 
 Carlyle' s Essays. Everyman (2 vols.) . . 2 6 
 Macaulay's Essays. Everyman (2 vols.) . 2 6 
 Ruskin' s " Sesame and Lili es." Everyman. 1 3 
 
 * Since publication of- my list the "Everyman 
 Library" and the "World's Classics" have been 
 raised respectively to Is. 4d. and 10. 3d. 
 
 94
 
 List of Books 
 
 FICTION : 
 
 Sir Walter Scott : . d. 
 
 " Ivanhoe." Everyman . . . .13 
 
 " The Heart of Midlothian." Everyman . 1 3 
 
 " The Antiquary." Everyman . . .13 
 
 " Rob Roy." Everyman . . . .13 
 
 Jane Austen : 
 
 " Emma." Everyman . . . .13 
 
 " Pride and Prejudice." Everyman . .13 
 
 Dickens : 
 
 " Pickwick Papers." Everyman . .13 
 
 " Nicholas Nickleby." Everyman . .13 
 
 " Martin Chuzzlewit." Everyman . .13 
 
 " David Copperfield." Everyman . .13 
 
 Thackeray : 
 
 " Vanity Fair." Everyman . . .13 
 
 " The Newcomes." Everyman (2 vols.) . 2 6 
 
 " Esmond." Everyman . . . .13 
 
 Charlotte Bronte : 
 
 " Jane Eyre." Everyman . . .13 
 
 " Villette." Everyman . . . .13 
 
 George Eliot : 
 
 " Scenes of Clerical Life." Everyman . .13 
 
 " Adam Bede." Everyman . . .13 
 
 " Silas Marner." Everyman . . .13 
 
 Nathaniel Hawthorne : 
 
 " Scarlet Letter." Everyman . . .13 
 
 " Blithedale Romance." Everyman . .13 
 
 95
 
 List of Books 
 
 FICTION (continued) : 
 
 Anthony Trollope : 8. d. 
 
 " Barchester Towers." Everyman . .13 
 
 " Doctor Thome." Everyman . . .13 
 
 " Framley Parsonage." Everyman . .13 
 " Last Chronicle of Barset." Everyman 
 
 (2 vols.) . . . ' . . .26 
 
 R. D. Blackmore's " Lorna Doone." Every- 
 man 13 
 
 Daniel Defoe's " Robinson Crusoe." Every- 
 man 13 
 
 Jonathan Swift's " Gulliver's Travels." 
 
 Everyman . . . . . .13 
 
 POETRY : 
 
 Shakespeare's Works. Macmillan . .36 
 Palgrave's Golden Treasury. World's 
 
 Classics. Oxford University Press . 1 
 Milton's Poems. World's Classics. Oxford 
 
 University Press . . . .10 
 
 Poetical Works of Burns. World's Classics. 
 
 Oxford University Press . . .10 
 
 Poems of Wordsworth. World's Classics. 
 
 Oxford University Press . . .10 
 Poems of Coleridge. World's Classics. Oxford 
 
 University Press . . . . .10 
 Poems of Byron. World's Classics. Oxford 
 
 University Press . . t . .10 
 Poetical Works of Keats. World's Classics. 
 
 Oxford University Press . . .10 
 Poems of Shelley. World's Classics. Oxford 
 
 University Press 10 
 
 Longfellow' sPoetical Works. World' s Classics. 
 
 Oxford University Press . . .10 
 
 96
 
 List of Books 
 
 POETRY (continued) : s. d. 
 
 Poems of Tennyson. World's Classics. Oxford 
 
 University Press . . . . .10 
 Poems of Robert Browning. World' s Classics. 
 
 Oxford University Press . . .10 
 Poems of Matthew Arnold. World's Classics. 
 
 Oxford University Press . . .10 
 Poems of Christina Rossetti. World's Classics. 
 
 Oxford University Press . . .10 
 Poems of William Morris. World's Classics. 
 
 Oxford University Press . . .10 
 
 BIOGRAPHY : 
 Boswell's "Life of Johnson." Everyman 
 
 (2 vols.) 26 
 
 Lockhart's "Life of Scott." Everyman . 1 3 
 Carlyle's "Life of Sterling." World's Classics 1 
 Mrs. Gaskell's "Life of Charlotte Bronte." 
 
 Everyman . . . . . .13 
 
 RELIGIOUS : 
 
 Thomas a Kempis' " Imitation of Christ." 
 
 Everyman 13 
 
 Bunyan's " Pilgrim's Progress." Everyman 1 3 
 
 MISCELLANEOUS : 
 
 Montaigne' s Essays. World's Classics (3 vols.) 3 
 Cervantes' " Don Quixote." World's Classics 
 
 (2 vols.) 20 
 
 Homer's " Odyssey " (Pope'sTranslation). 
 
 World's Classics 10 
 
 (Also included in" Everyman" William 
 
 Cowper's Translation.) 
 Darwin's "Origin of Species." World's Classics 1 
 
 G 97
 
 Conclusion 
 
 HISTOEY : a. d. 
 
 Macaulay's "History of England." Everyman 
 
 (3 vols.) 39 
 
 Green' a " Short History of the English People." 
 
 Everyman (2 vols.) . . . .26 
 
 5 12 9 
 
 CONCLUSION 
 
 AND now I bring to an end a very pleasant 
 task, which has turned out not so easy as I 
 expected it to be. I have had much en- 
 couragement and many letters of appreci- 
 tion from readers of every class. I know of a 
 good many who are purchasing books for 
 themselves, and some are purchasing them 
 to give away. A library of this kind given 
 to young people may be of the greatest 
 possible service in their intellectual and 
 moral development. 
 
 One of the most brilliant of our critics has 
 sent me a charming letter, which I venture 
 to publish. One of the greatest pleasures 
 of reading is to discuss the qualities of 
 favourite books with sympathetic friends. 
 I make an extract from his kind letter : 
 98
 
 Conclusion 
 
 " ' Claudius Clear ' has been specially 
 interesting in his 5 Library, and most 
 of all when the number of an author's 
 works compels him to make a selection 
 among them. I looked at once to his 
 favourite among the Waverleys. If I 
 had been with him I should have pleaded 
 for Quentin Durward. It is the best of all 
 as a story of adventure, and Quentin himself 
 is the best of Scott's young heroes. He is not 
 the prig that some of them tend to be. Then 
 Louis XI. shows Scott at his best as a char- 
 acter painter, and the scenes between him 
 and Charles the Bold are wonderful. I should 
 have put 4 Q. D.' in the place of The Anti- 
 quary. The Heart of Midlothian is wonder- 
 ful down to the tune when Jeanie Deans 
 starts for London, but less so afterwards, 
 except her interview with the Queen. I 
 agree that Rob Roy is the finest of all. It 
 has the finest love scenes, and Baillie Nicol 
 Jarvie makes even the rise of Scottish com- 
 merce attractive. I should put Redgauntlet 
 very high, both for the opening letters, and 
 99
 
 Conclusion 
 
 the picture of Charles Edward in his decline. 
 But the Quaker scenes are rather spun out, 
 though they are a striking instance of Scott's 
 power of doing justice to creeds and man- 
 ners with which he has no natural sym- 
 pathy. No one can question the choice of 
 Emma and Pride and Prejudice as Jane 
 Austen's finest, though there are touches 
 equally fine in Persuasion, but I admit they 
 are only touches. In Dickens I should put 
 Dombey and Son in place of Nicholas 
 Nickleby. Captain Cuttle and Bunsby are, 
 to my mind, his greatest achievements, the 
 one as the most lovable of his eccentrics, the 
 other as the most amusing for his cranks. I 
 have no doubt that you are right about 
 Thackeray, but personally I have never 
 cared for Esmond. It is a triumph of 
 literary art, but the hero's end is too much 
 like marrying your mother-in-law. If it 
 were not for the contemptible Stephen in 
 the last part of The Mill on the Floss, I 
 should put it above Adam Bede. 
 
 " J have given you enough disjointed com- 
 100
 
 Conclusion 
 
 ments on your selections, but I am sure that 
 a vast number of the readers of the B. W. 
 will be profoundly grateful to ' C. C.' for 
 giving them just what they most need a 
 signpost to tell them that neither all novel- 
 ists nor all novels are equally good." 
 
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