Excerpt from A Short History of Modern English Literature The great pressure upon space has been relieved by dividing the history of English literature into two por tions. If this series continues to receive the support of the public, it is hoped that a volume on the archaic section may bring the story down from the earliest times to Robert of Brunne and Laurence Minot. In my first three chapters I have further lightened my labour by leaving out of consideration what was written in this country in Latin or French, for, although this may be material in dealing with thought in England, it can have but a small connection with the history of expression in the English language. I make no apology for the prominence given throughout to the art of poetry, for it is in verse that style can most definitely and to greatest advantage be studied, especially in a literature like ours, where prose has mainly been written without any other aim than the naive transference of ideas or statement of facts, like the prose of M. Jourdain, while our national poetry, which is one of our main national glories, has been a consecutive chain of consciously elaborated masterpieces. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.