Part I.--Age of Milton (_1630-1660_).

Forces at Work.--The national unity of the Elizabethan age changes to one of internal strife and dissension. The struggle between the doctrine of the “divine right of kings” and civil liberty becomes most acute, and after the failure of the Long Parliament the country is involved in civil war. The defeat of the Royalists and the rise of the Puritans changes the conflict to one of civil and religious liberty, in which the latter gains a temporary triumph. The pendulum of feeling sweeps violently back again soon after Cromwell’s death.

Literary Features.--The clash of parties is deeply reflected in the literature of the times. The unsettled state of affairs results in a smaller output of poetry, and prose assumes a fierce and disputatious character. Milton dominates the period, and with this exception, the fashion is towards shorter poems with more fancy and less fervour, as witness the metaphysical lyric and its frequent leaps into remote fancy and absurdity. The Elizabethan adventurous spirit has gone; a pensive and often melancholy attitude takes its place. The religious lyric is the only form showing signs of real exaltation: the love lyric, the ode, the narrative and descriptive poem all tend towards artificiality. The classic emphasis on form steadily develops. The heroic couplet begins its long reign, and except in Milton, blank verse is extremely slipshod. Prose shows a fairly continuous development. The tendency is toward the ornate, but both middle and plain styles are well represented. Narrative prose is small, but the age is famous for its sermons, philosophical, historical, and miscellaneous types. A special development is the journalistic essay. The drama has practically collapsed, the only men of note up to the closing of the theatres in 1642, being Ford, Massinger, Shirley, Suckling, Davenant.

1. POETRY.--(a) The Caroline Lyrists: Decline of the sonnet. The classical lyric. The Caroline lyric. Jonson’s influence. Herrick. Carew. Suckling. Lovelace. Chamberlayne. Kynaston. John Hall. (b) The Metaphysical School: Herbert. Crashaw. Vaughan. Treherne. Quarles. (c) The Couplet: Decline of blank verse. Sir John Beaumont. Sandys. Waller. Denham. Cowley. Davenant. Marvell. (d) Milton and his poetry: The epic. The ode. The pastoral. The sonnet. The masque.

2. THE DRAMA and its decline. The Elizabethan tradition: Massinger. Ford. Shirley. Randolph. Brome. Suckling. The masque: Jonson to Milton. Davenant and the new heroic play.

3. THE NOVEL. Bunyan.

4. ESSAYISTS AND CRITICS.--Milton. Hobbes. Davenant. Cowley. Growth of literary characterisation and appreciation. Beginnings of journalism.

5. THE SATIRE.--Marvell. Denham.

6. STUDY AND RESEARCH.--(a) Theology: Baker. Treherne. Baxter. Fuller. Taylor, (b) Philosophy: Hobbes and his critics. Harington. Glanvill. (c) History and Antiquities: Herbert. Clarendon. Digby. Browne. Fuller. Walton. Urquhart.