The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland | Page 6

could find no poet honoured with that title in England before the reign of Edward IV, to whom one John Kaye dedicated the Siege of Rhodes in prose by the title of his Humble Poet Laureat.
I cannot better display the character of this great man than in the following words of Urry. "As to his temper, says he, he had a mixture of the gay, the modest and the grave. His reading was deep and extensive, his judgment sound and discerning; he was communicative of his knowledge, and ready to correct or pass over the faults of his cotemporary writers. He knew how to judge of and excuse the slips of weaker capacities, and pitied rather than exposed the ignorance of that age. In one word, he was a great scholar, a pleasant wit, a candid critic, a sociable companion, a stedfast friend, a great philosopher, a temperate oeconomist, and a pious christian." As to his genius as a poet, Dryden (than whom a higher authority cannot be produced) speaking of Homer and Virgil, positively asserts, that our author exceeded the latter, and stands in competition with the former.
His language, how unintelligible soever it may seem, is almost as modern as any of his cotemporaries, or of those who followed him at the distance of 50 or 60 years, as Harding, Skelton and others, and in some places it is so smooth and beautiful, that Dryden would not attempt to alter it; I shall now give some account of his works in the order in which they were written, so far as can be collected from them, and subjoin a specimen of his poetry, of which profession as he may justly be called the Morning Star, so as we descend into later times; we may see the progress of poetry in England from its great original, Chaucer, to its full blaze, and perfect consummation in Dryden.
Mr. Philips supposes a greater part of his works to be lost, than what we have extant of him; of that number may be many a song, and many a lecherous lay, which perhaps might have been written by him while he was a student at Cambridge.
The Court of Love, as has been before observed, was written while he resided at Cambridge in the 18th year of his age.
The Craft Lovers was written in the year of our Lord, 1348, and probably the Remedy of Love was written about that time, or not long after.
The Lamentation of Mary Magdalen taken from Origen, was written by him in his early years, and perhaps Boethius de Consolatione Philosophi? was translated by him about the same time.
The Romaunt of the Rose, is a translation from the French: this poem was begun by William de Lerris, and continued by John de Meun, both famous French poets; it seems to have been translated about the time of the rise of Wickliffe's Opinions, it consisting of violent invectives against religious orders.
The Complaint of the Black Knight, during John of Gaunt's courtship with Blanch is supposed to be written on account of the duke of Lancaster's marriage.
The poem of Troilus and Creseide was written in the early part of his life, translated (as he says) from Lollius an historiographer in Urbane in Italy; he has added several things of his own, and borrowed from others what he thought proper for the embellishment of this work, and in this respect was much indebted to his friend Petrarch the Italian poet.
The House of Fame; from this poem Mr. Pope acknowledges he took the hint of his Temple of Fame.
The book of Blaunch the Duchess, commonly called the Dreme of Chaucer, was written upon the death of that lady.
The Assembly of Fowls (or Parlement of Briddis, as he calls it in his Retraction) was written before the death of queen Philippa.
The Life of St. Cecilia seems to have been first a single poem, afterwards made one of his Canterbury Tales which is told by the second Nonne: and so perhaps was that of the Wife of Bath, which he advises John of Gaunt to read, and was afterwards inserted in his Canterbury Tales.
The Canterbury Tales were written about the year 1383. It is certain the Tale of the Nonnes Priest was written after the Insurrection of Jack Straw and Wat Tyler.
The Flower and the Leaf was written by him in the Prologue to the Legend of Gode Women.
Chaucer's ABC, called la Priere de nostre Dam��, was written for the use of the duchess Blaunch.
The book of the Lion is mentioned in his Retraction, and by Lidgate in the prologue to the Fall of Princes, but is now lost, as is that.
De Vulcani vene, i. e. of the Brocke of Vulcan, which is likewise mentioned by Lidgate.
La belle Dame sans Mercy, was translated from the French