year of his age, universally lamented; especially by queen Elizabeth, who did his memory the honor to remark that 'she would rather have given ten thousand pounds than to have lost him.'

Ascham was the earliest writer on education in the English language, and his writings themselves not only furnish an improved example of style, but abound also in sound sense and excellent instructions. The Schoolmaster, which was published by his widow after his death, contains, besides the correct views of education already alluded to, what Dr. Johnson acknowledged to be 'perhaps the best advice that was ever given for the study of languages.' From this deeply interesting work we extract the two following passages, to which we shall add The Qualifications of a Historian, from the Discourse on the Affairs of Germany.

THE CHOICE OF A TUTOR.

It is pity that commonly more care is had, and that among very wise men, to find out rather a cunning man for their horse, than a cunning man for their children. To the one they will gladly give a stipend of 200 crowns by the year, and loth to offer the other 200 shillings. God, that setteth in heaven, laugheth their choice to scorn, and rewardeth their liberality as it should; for he suffereth them to have tame and well-ordered horse, but wild and unfortunate children.

One example, whether love or fear doth work more in a child for virtue and learning, I will gladly report; which may be heard with some pleasure, and followed with more profit. Before I went into Germany, I came to Broadgate, in Leicestershire, to take my leave of that noble Lady Jane Grey, to whom I was exceedingly much beholden. Her parents, the duke and the duchess, with all the household, gentlemen and gentlewomen, were hunting in the park. I found her in her chamber reading Phoëdon Platonis in Greek, and that with as much delight, as some gentlemen would read a merry tale in Bocace. After salutation and duty done with some other talk, I asked her, why she would lose such pastime in the park? Smiling, she answered me, 'I wiss, all their sport in the park is but a shadow to that pleasure that I find in Plato. Alas! good folk, they never felt what true pleasure meant.' 'And how came you, madam,' quoth I, 'to this deep knowledge of pleasure? And what did chiefly allure you unto it, seeing not many women, but very few men, have attained thereunto?' 'I will tell you,' quoth she, and tell you a truth which, perchance, ye will marvel at. One of the greatest benefits that ever God gave me, is that he sent me so sharp and severe parents, and so gentle a schoolmaster. For when I am in presence either of father or mother, whether I speak, keep silence, sit, stand, or go, eat, drink, be merry or sad, be sewing, playing, dancing, or doing any thing else, I must do it, as it were, in such weight, measure, and number, even so perfectly as God made the world, or else I am so sharply taunted, so cruelly threatened, yea, presently, sometimes with pinches, nips, and bobs, and other ways, which I will not name for the honour I bear them, so without measure misordered, that I think myself in hell, till time come that I must go to Mr. Elmer; who teacheth me so gently, so pleasantly, with such fair allurements to learning, that I think all the time nothing, while I am with him. And when I am called from him, I fall on weeping, because, whatever I do else, but learning, is full of grief, trouble, fear, and whole misliking unto me. And thus my book has been so much my pleasure, and bringeth daily to me more pleasure and more, that, in respect of it, all other pleasures, in very deed, be but trifles and troubles unto me.'

THE NECESSITY OF LEARNING MORE THAN ONE LANGUAGE.

I have been a looker on in the cockpit of learning these many years; and one cock only have I known, which, with one wing, even at this day, doth pass all other, in mine opinion, that ever I saw in England though they had two wings. Yet nevertheless, to fly well with one wing, to run fast with one leg, are masteries, much to be marvelled at than sure examples, safely to be followed. A bishop that now liveth, a good man, whose judgment in religion I better like, than his opinion in perfectness in other learning, said once unto me; 'We have no need now of the Greek tongue, when all things be translated into Latin.' But the good man understood not, that even the best translation, is for mere necessity but an evil imped wing to fly withal, or a heavy stump leg of wood to go withal. Such, the higher they fly, the sooner they falter and fail: the faster they run the ofter they stumble and sorer the fall. Such as will needs so fly, may fly at a pye, and catch a daw: and such runners, as commonly they, shove and shoulder, to stand foremost, yet in the end they come behind others, and deserve but the hopshakles, if the masters of the game be right judgers.

QUALIFICATIONS OF A HISTORIAN.

When you and I read Livy together (if you do remember), after some reasoning we concluded both what was in our opinion to be looked for at his hand, that would well and advisedly write an history. First point was, to write nothing false; next, to be bold to say any truth: whereby is avoided two great faults-flattery and hatred. For which two points, Cæsar is read to his great praise; and Jovius the Italian to his just reproach. Then to mark diligently the causes, counsels, acts, and issues, in all great attempts: and in causes, what is just or unjust; in counsels, what is purposed wisely or rashly; in acts, what is done courageously or faintly; and of every issue, to note some general lesson of wisdom and weariness for like matters in time to come, wherein Polybius in Greek, and Philip Comines in French, have done the duties of wise and worthy writers. Diligence also must be used in keeping truly the order of time, and describing lively both the site of places and nature of persons, not only for the outward shape of the body, but also for the inward disposition of the mind, as Thucydides doth in many places very trimly; and Homer everywhere, and that always most excellently; which observation is chiefly to be marked in him. And our Chaucer doth the same, very praiseworthy: mark him well, and confer him with any other that writeth in our time in their proudest tongue, whosoever list. The style must be always plain and open; yet sometime higher and lower, as matters do rise and fall. For if proper and natural words, in well-joined sentences, do lively express the matter, be it troublesome, quiet, angry, or pleasant, a man shall think not to be reading, but present in doing of the same. And herein Livy of all other in any tongue, by mine opinion, carrieth away the praise.

After the publication of Ascham's work, it became more usual for learned men to compose in English, especially when they aimed to influence public. opinion; English literature from that period therefore, assumes a new aspect.

Lecture the Seventh.

THE AGE OF ELIZABETH-JOHN HARRINGTON-THOMAS SACKVILLE-SIR PHILIP SIDNEY SIR WALTER RALEIGH-NICHOLAS BRETON-HENRY CONSTABLE-JOSHUA SYLVESTER-RICHARD BARNFIELD-EDMUND SPENSER.

W

E have thus brought the history of English literature down to the period at which its infancy may be said to cease, and its manhood to commence. In the early part of the sixteenth century, it was sensibly effected by a variety of influences, which, for one or two ages before, had operated powerfully in extending the intellect of all the different nations of Europe. The study of classical literature, the invention of the art of printing, and the freedom of religious discussion, had everywhere given activity and strength to the minds of men. The immediate effect of these circumstances upon English literature, were, the enriching of the language by a great variety of words from the classic tongues, the establishing of better models of thought and style, and the allowing of greater freedom to the fancy and powers of observation in the exercise of literary efforts. Not only the Greek and Roman writers, but those also of modern Italy and France, where letters had experienced an earlier revival, were now freely translated into English, and being, through the press, extensively diffused, served to excite a taste for elegant reading in the lower order of society, where the genial influence of literature had never before been felt. The dissemination of the Scriptures in the vernacular tongue, while it greatly affected the language and ideas of the people, was also of no small advantage in giving a new direction to the thoughts of literary men, to whom these antique Oriental compositions presented numberless incidents, images, and sentiments, unknown before, and of the richest and most interesting kind.

Among other circumstances favorable to the literature of this period, must be named the encouragement given to it by queen Elizabeth, who was, herself, a very accomplished scholar, addicted to poetical composition, and had the art of filling her court with men qualified to shine in almost any department of intellectual exertion. Her successors, James and Charles, resembled her in some of these respects, and during their reigns, the impulse

which she had given to literature was rather increased than retarded. There was, indeed, something in the policy, as well as in the personal character of all these sovereigns, which proved favorable to literature. The study of the Belles Lettres was, in some measure, identified with the courtly and arbitrary principles of the time; not, perhaps, so much from any enlightened spirit in those who supported such principles, as from a desire to oppose the Puritans, and other malcontents, whose religious doctrines taught them to despise some departments of elegant literature, and utterly to condemn others. The drama, for instance, doubtless owed the encouragement which it received under Elizabeth and her successors, chiefly, if not entirely, to a spirit of hostility to the 'Puritans,' who justly repudiated it for its immorality. We must, at the same time, allow much to the influence which such a court as that of England during these three reigns, was calculated to have upon men of literary tendencies. Almost all the poets, and many of the prose writers, were either courtiers themselves, or were under the immediate protection of courtiers, and were constantly experiencing the smiles, and occasionally the solid benefactions of royalty. Whatever was refined, or gay, or sentimental, at that time in England, came with its full influence upon literature.

The works brought forth under such circumstances have been very aptly compared, by a recent writer in the Edinburgh Review, to the productions of a soil for the first time broken up, 'where all indigenous plants spring up at once with a rank and irrepressible fertility, and display whatever is peculiar and excellent in their nature on a scale the most conspicuous and magnificent.' The ability to write having been, as it were, suddenly created, the whole world of character, imagery, and sentiment, as well as of information and philosophy, lay ready for the use of those who possessed the gift, and was appropriated accordingly. As might be expected, where there was less rule of art than opulence of materials, the productions of these writers are often deficient in taste, and contain much that is totally irrelevant to their purpose. To pursue the simile just quoted, the crops are not so clean as if they had been reared under systematic cultivation. On this account, the refined taste of the eighteenth century condemned most of the productions of the sixteenth and seventeenth to oblivion, and it is only lately that they have once more obtained their deserved reputation. After every proper deduction has been made, enough remains to fix the era as 'by far the mightiest in the history of English literature, or indeed of human intellect and capacity." There never was any thing elsewhere like the sixty or seventy years that elapsed from the middle of Elizabeth's reign to the period of the Restoration. In point of real force and originality of genius, neither the age of Pericles, nor that of Augustus, nor the age of Leo the Tenth, nor that of Louis the Fourteenth, can at all compare with it. In that short period, we find the names of most of the great men that England has ever produced--the names of Shakspeare, and Spen1 Henry Neale.

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