I. THESE Volumes are intended to accompany Mr. Ellis's well known Specimens of the Early English Poets. That series concludes with the reign of Charles II, this begins with that of James his successor : the two together will exhibit the rise, progress, decline and revival of our Poetry, and the fluctuations of our poetical taste, from the first growth of the English language to the present times. A slight difference has been made in arrangement; instead of sorting the Poets, according to the reigns in which they flourished, I have noticed each under the year of his death, where that could be ascertained, otherwise according to the date of his chief publication. It was desirable that the series should be brought down to the end of the last century, and this order deter |