Arthur, Merlin, Sir Launcelot du Lake, Sir Percivale, Sir Gawaine, Sir Tristram, and the peerless and perfect Galahad. Here figure the beautiful Queen Guenever, Isoud the fair and Isoud the white-handed, Elaine the mother of Galahad, and Elaine the lily maid of Astolat; and many other knights and ladies who form part of this fascinating

romance.

This Morte d'Arthur, a collection of the same stories, added to and enlarged, that had been made by Walter Map and his contemporaries, is the old book from which the modern poet Tennyson has drawn some of the beautiful stories which he tells in his Idyls of the King. The whole of Malory's book is a prose poem, so beautiful that I am going to quote for you one chapter,- that which tells of the beautiful Elaine as she floats down to Camelot in her funeral barge.

"So by fortune King Arthur and the Queen Guenever were speaking together at a window, and so as they looked into Thames they espied this black barget, and had marvel what it meant. Then the King called Sir Kay, and showed it him. 'Sir,' said Sir Kay, 'wit you well, there is some new tidings.' 'Go thither,' said the King to Sir Kay, and take with you Sir Brandiles and Agravaine, and bring me ready word what is there.' Then these three knights departed, and came to the barget, and went in; and there they found the fairest corpse lying in a rich bed, and a poor man sitting in the barget's end, and no word would he speak. So these three knights returned unto the King again, and told him what they found.

"That fair corpse will I see,' said the King. And so then the King took the Queen by the hand and went thither. Then he made the barget to be holden fast, and the King and the Queen entered, with certain knights with them. And there he saw the fairest woman lie in a rich bed, covered unto her middle with many rich clothes, and all was of cloth of gold, and she lay as though she had smiled. Then the Queen espied a letter in her right hand, and told it to the King. Then the King took it, and said: 'Now I am sure this letter will tell what she was and why she is come hither.' ... And so when the King was come within his chamber he called many knights about him, and said he would wit openly what was written within that

letter. Then the King brake it, and made a clerk to read it, and this was the intent of the letter:

"Most Noble Knight, Sir Launcelot: Now hath death made us two at debate for your love; I was your lover, that men called the fair Maiden of Astolat; therefore, unto all ladies I make my moan; yet pray for my soul, and bury me at the least, and offer ye my mass-penny. This is my last request. Pray for my soul, Sir Launcelot, as thou art peerless.

And when it was

"This was all the substance of the letter. read, the King, the Queen, and all the knights wept for pity of the doleful complaints. Then was Sir Launcelot sent for. And when he was come, King Arthur made the letter to be read to him; when Sir Launcelot heard it, word by word, he said, 'My Lord Arthur, wit ye well, I am right heavy of the death of this fair damsel. God knoweth, I was never causer of her death by my willing, and that will I report me to her own brother. . . I will not say nay, but she was both fair and good, and much was I beholden to her; but she loved me out of measure.' 'Ye might have showed her,' said the Queen, 'some bounty and gentleness that might have preserved her life.' 'Madam,' answered Launcelot, 'she would none other way be answered but that she would be my wife, or else my love; and of these two I would not grant her. For, madam, I love not to be constrained to love, for love must arise out of the heart, and not by no constraint.' 'That is true,' said the King and many knights; 'Love is free in himself, and never will be bounden, for where he is bounden he loseth himself.' 'Then,' said the King to Sir Launcelot, it will be your worship that ye oversee that she be interred worshipfully.' 'Sir,' said Launcelot, 'that And so upon the

shall be done as I can best devise.' morn she was interred richly, and Sir Launcelot offered her mass-penny, and all at that time the knights of the Table Round that were there with Sir Launcelot offered.1

Malory's Morte a'Arthur was the last great book, and the most famous, that the fifteenth century produced. But although this century had given to the world so little literature, it had seen two great events which influenced the whole future of literature. Of one of these, the invention of printing, I have already spoken. The second was the discovery 1 Morte d'Arthur, chap. xx., book xviii.

of the New World by Columbus, an event so strange and full of mystery that it must have stimulated the imagination of the dullest and most commonplace man, and made for the time a place for poetry in the most matter-of-fact brain. Early in the sixteenth century, books of voyages to the New World began to appear in Italy and Germany, and the stories of men who had sailed in unknown seas, under skies glittering with new stars, excited the wonder of all who read them. English sailors who had voyaged with Sebastian Cabot to these new lands, brought back to home-ports tales rich in wonders. Thus the discovery of America was sure to work upon literature, although, in an age without telegraphs or steam-engines or newspapers, the strongest forces must work more slowly than in our time, and the immediate results of such discoveries as those of printing and the New World were not seen in a day.

XV.

ON LITERATURE IN THE REIGN OF HENRY VIII.; MORE'S UTOPIA; TYNDALE'S BIBLE; SKELTON, THE COURT POET; THE SONNETS OF SURREY AND WYATT.

TH

HE reign of Henry VIII. covers nearly the first half of the sixteenth century; yet although the last half of this century is perhaps the most glorious of any period in our literature, its first years do not shine with the promise of that after-glory. There are a few great names, but not that crowd of rare spirits that make the age of Queen Elizabeth so resplendent. The great event of Henry's reign, however, the separation of the Church of England from that of Rome, - did much to inspire the thought of the age which followed. Although Henry did not greatly care for the freedom of any man except himself, and meant to hold a tight rein over other men's actions and consciences, still he took a great stride towards freedom when

he made the Church of England independent of that of Rome; and all advances towards freedom are sure to quicken the spirit of fine literature, which is the free expression of the highest thought of the best men of the age. Let me tell you briefly of the greatest men and the best work done in literature from the opening of the century to the time when the great Queen Elizabeth took her father's seat as an English sovereign.

The noblest and most memorable work of the age was done by WILLIAM TYNDALE, who undertook the translation of the Bible. His name deserves to be set high in the annals of English literature and language. Tyndale was only a poor tutor in the house of a nobleman in Gloucestershire, when one day as they sat at table, a religious discussion arose, in which a bigoted priest who was present said dogmatically, "Better be without God's laws than the Pope's." Tyndale took fire at this, and rising, grandly said: "In the name of God I defy the Pope and his laws; and if God spares my life, I will cause the boy who drives the plough to know more of God's laws than either you or the Pope."

A few years later, in spite of persecution, he published his translation of the New Testament into English.

1525

I think that we may decide that this was the greatest literary work between the time of Chaucer and Spenser. The Bible, made accessible to the common people, was not only a religious book, but a fountain-head of literature. The daily speech of men and women was made rich by the introduction into it of the phraseology of the Scriptures rendered into the homely and eloquent English which Tyndale used; and from that day to this, apt and fitting quotations from the Bible have been so imbedded in common speech that we use them often without being aware of their source. Tyndale died in Holland at the stake, a martyr for the work he did, and the opinions he held.

1536

Another noble gentleman, who also died for loyalty to his opinions, very near the time of Tyndale's martyrdom,

1480-1535

was Sir THOMAS MORE, one of the saintliest and most lovable characters in all this time. He did not follow the king in his separation from the Church of Rome, but remained a stanch Catholic, and avowed his religious scruples against the divorce of the king from Queen Katharine, and the marriage with Anne Boleyn. He was executed on Tower Hill, dying with the serenity which became such a noble and true man. As he laid his head upon the block, he carefully put away his long full beard from under the axe, saying simply, "This should not be cut; it has never committed treason.”

His great book, Utopia, was written in Latin, a language which was still, and for a long time after, used by scholars in prose writings. Utopia was an imaginary land, a wonderful country whose society and laws were ideally perfect. A sailor, sunbrowned and strange as Coleridge's Ancient Mariner, who says he has been on voyages to the New World with the great discoverer Amerigo Vespucci, gives the account of this wonderful country and its romantic discovery. In this fabled Utopia, More could embody all his ideas of a perfect commonwealth, and so show by contrast the defects in laws and social conditions in England. And his ideas of religious charity and social reform are so generous and grand that this nineteenth century has not yet excelled them. But when he pictures an ideal city, and his highest conception of the material comforts of life, we shall find that we have to-day outstripped his best imaginings. For instance, he thus describes Amaurote, the chief city of the Utopians:

"The city is compassed about with a high and thick stone wall full of turrets and bulwarks. A dry ditch, but deep and broad and overgrown with bushes, briers, and thorns, goeth about three sides or quarters of the city. To the fourth side the river itself serveth for a ditch. The streets be twenty feet broad. On the back side of the houses, through the whole length of the street, lie large gardens. . . . The houses be curiously builded after a gorgeous and gallant sort, with three stories, one over another. The outsides of the walls be made of hard plaster, or else of brick, and the inner sides well