Selections from Five English Poets — A Reader’s Guide

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Authors: Litchfield, Mary E. (Mary Elizabeth), 1854- [Editor], Burns, Robert, 1759-1796 [Contributor], Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, 1772-1834 [Contributor], Dryden, John, 1631-1700 [Contributor], Goldsmith, Oliver, 1730?-1774 [Contributor] Digital Source: Project Gutenberg Gutenberg Release Year: 2004 First Publication Year: Not confirmed

Key Word: English poetry Target Reader: Readers of public-domain and historical texts

Book Edition: Project Gutenberg digital edition Book Language: en

Edition facts

Words 27,067

Reading time 118 min

Text sections 3

This digital edition of Selections from Five English Poets — A Reader’s Guide is described by source-level measurements including 27,067 words, 1 hr 58 min estimated reading time, and 3 detected text sections.

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Project Gutenberg metadata also associates the work with “English poetry,” connecting these edition facts with the source record’s subject description.

Source: Project Gutenberg record #13535

Mary E. Litchfield's 1902 anthology presents five major English poems with editorial apparatus that emphasizes the musicality of verse and the interplay between lyric, narrative, and dramatic modes, offering period annotations on diction and historical context.

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Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield, 25 Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe[3] has broke; How jocund did they drive their team afield! How bowed the woods beneath their sturdy stroke!

Let not Ambition mock their useful toil, Their homely joys, and destiny obscure; 30 Nor Grandeur hear with a disdainful smile The short and simple annals of the poor.

The boast of heraldry,[4] the pomp of pow'r, And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave, Awaits alike th' inevitable hour. 35 The paths of glory lead but to the grave.

Nor you, ye Proud, impute to these the fault, If Mem'ry o'er their tomb no trophies raise, Where through the long-drawn aisle and fretted vault[5] The pealing anthem swells the note of praise. 40

Can storied urn[6] or animated[7] bust Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath? Can Honour's voice provoke[8] the silent dust, Or Flatt'ry sooth the dull cold ear of Death?

Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid 45 Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire; Hands that the rod of empire might have swayed, Or waked to ecstasy the living lyre.

But Knowledge to their eyes her ample page Rich with the spoils of time did ne'er unroll; 50 Chill Penury repressed their noble rage, And froze the genial current of the soul.

Full many a gem of purest ray serene[9] The dark unfathomed caves of ocean bear: Full many a flower is born to blush unseen, 55 And waste its sweetness on the desert air.

Some village-Hampden,[10] that with dauntless breast, The little Tyrant of his fields withstood, Some mute inglorious Milton[11] here may rest, Some Cromwell[12] guiltless of his country's blood. 60

Th' applause of list'ning senates to command, The threats of pain and ruin to despise, To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land, And read their hist'ry in a nation's eyes,

Their lot forbade: nor circumscribed alone 65 Their growing virtues, but their crimes confined; Forbade to wade through slaughter to a throne, And shut the gates of mercy on mankind,

The struggling pangs of conscious truth to hide, To quench the blushes of ingenuous shame, 70 Or heap the shrine of Luxury and Pride With incense kindled at the Muse's flame.

Far from the madding crowd's ignoble strife, Their sober wishes never learned to stray; Along the cool sequestered vale of life 75 They kept the noiseless tenor of their way.

Yet ev'n these bones from insult to protect, Some frail memorial still[13] erected nigh, With uncouth rhymes and shapeless sculpture decked, Implores the passing tribute of a sigh. 80

Their name, their years, spelt by th' unlettered Muse,[14] The place of fame and elegy supply: And many a holy text around she strews, That teach the rustic moralist to die.

For who, to dumb Forgetfulness a prey, 85 This pleasing anxious being e'er resigned, Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day, Nor cast one longing, ling'ring look behind?

On some fond breast the parting soul relies, Some pious drops the closing eye requires; 90 Ev'n from the tomb the voice of Nature cries, Ev'n in our ashes live their wonted fires.

For thee, who mindful of th' unhonored Dead[15] Dost in these lines their artless tale relate; If chance,[16] by lonely Contemplation led, 95 Some kindred spirit shall inquire thy fate,

Haply some hoary-headed swain[17] may say, "Oft have we seen him at the peep of dawn Brushing with hasty steps the dews away, To meet the sun upon the upland lawn.[18] 100

"There at the foot of yonder nodding beech, That wreathes its old fantastic roots so high, His listless length at noontide would he stretch, And pore upon the brook that babbles by.

"Hard by yon wood, now smiling as in scorn, 105 Mutt'ring his wayward fancies he would rove; Now drooping, woeful wan, like one forlorn, Or crazed with care, or crossed in hopeless love.

"One morn I missed him on the customed hill, Along the heath and near his fav'rite tree; 110 Another came; nor yet beside the rill, Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood was he;

"The next, with dirges due in sad array Slow thro' the church-way path we saw him borne. Approach and read (for thou canst read) the lay 115 Graved on the stone beneath yon aged thorn."

Here rests his head upon the lap of Earth, A youth to Fortune and to Fame unknown. Fair Science[19] frowned not on his humble birth, And Melancholy marked him for her own. 120

Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere, Heav'n did a recompense as largely send: He gave to Mis'ry all he had, a tear, He gained from Heaven ('t was all he wished) a friend.

No farther seek his merits to disclose, 125 Or draw his frailties from their dread abode, (There they alike in trembling hope repose,) The bosom of his Father and his God.

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Mary E. Litchfield's 1902 anthology opens with a striking comparison: reducing a poem to prose, she writes, is like dissecting a flower—the structure remains, but the living beauty is lost. This metaphor sets the tone for a collection that treats poetry as an art of sound and feeling as much as meaning. The volume gathers five canonical works—Dryden's A Song for St. Cecilia's Day, Gray's Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard, Goldsmith's The Traveller and The Deserted Village, Burns's The Cotter's Saturday Night, and Coleridge's The Ancient Mariner—each prefaced by a biographical sketch and followed by line-by-line notes.

Litchfield's editorial choices reveal a pedagogical aim: she classifies poetry into lyric, epic, and dramatic, and uses the selections to illustrate these categories. Her annotations, however, occasionally drift into moralizing or historical generalization, as when she remarks that 'there never was such a time' as the golden age Goldsmith laments. This tension between close reading and broad assertion makes the edition a document of its era as much as a guide to the poems.

The Editor's Taxonomy of Verse

Litchfield's introduction imposes a classical framework on the five poems, dividing them into lyric, epic, and dramatic kinds. She classifies Dryden's ode and Gray's elegy as lyrics—'properly a song' that 'expresses the transient feeling or mood of the writer' and 'tells no story.' Coleridge's Ancient Mariner she groups with narrative poetry, alongside Homer and Milton. But she acknowledges that three poems—Goldsmith's The Traveller and The Deserted Village, and Burns's The Cotter's Saturday Night—'do not fit exactly into any of the divisions.' This admission is revealing: it suggests the editor values the system even as she recognizes its limits. The taxonomy shapes how readers approach each work, emphasizing formal expectations over thematic continuity.

Annotations as Historical Commentary

The notes appended to each poem often reach beyond lexical clarification into social commentary. On Goldsmith's line 'A breath can make them,' Litchfield explains that 'breath' means 'words' and notes that kings once made lords by fiat, but then adds that 'now, in England, titles are usually given as a reward for distinguished merit.' Similarly, she glosses 'Ere England's griefs began' by asserting that 'there never was such a time' of perfect happiness, and that 'the workingman is, on the whole, far better off than he was hundreds of years ago.' These asides reflect a progressive, late-Victorian confidence in historical improvement, but they also risk flattening the poems' ironies. When Goldsmith describes 'crouching tigers' in Georgia, Litchfield dryly remarks that 'the people of Georgia doubtless find this description of their country amusing if not accurate'—a rare moment of critical distance from the poet's imagination.

Biographical Framing and National Voice

The headnote for Robert Burns begins by calling him 'Robbie Burns, the Ayrshire Ploughman' and claims his poetry 'is known to more English-speaking people than that of any other writer—not excepting even Shakespeare.' This hyperbolic assertion is grounded in the popularity of songs like Auld Lang Syne and John Anderson, My Jo, which Litchfield notes are familiar even to non-readers. The biographical sketch emphasizes Burns's humble origins—his father 'cultivated a small farm' and died 'worn out'—reinforcing the image of the natural genius. The editor's language here is more anecdotal than analytical, but it establishes a contrast with the more formal introductions to Dryden and Gray. The selection of The Cotter's Saturday Night further underscores the domestic and Scottish character of Burns's contribution, aligning with the anthology's interest in varied poetic voices.

The Ancient Mariner and the Limits of Annotation

Litchfield's treatment of Coleridge's The Ancient Mariner is notably sparse in the excerpts. She refers to lines 358–372 as an example of verse whose 'subtle melody' is lost in prose paraphrase, but she does not provide extensive notes on the poem itself. This omission is telling: the Mariner's supernatural narrative resists the kind of historical or lexical glossing that Litchfield applies to Goldsmith's references to Altama or Pambamarca. The editor's method works best for poems grounded in social observation or classical allusion; it struggles with the symbolic and irrational. The contrast between the dense annotation of The Deserted Village and the near-silence on Coleridge suggests that Litchfield's editorial lens—focused on diction, historical context, and moral clarity—has blind spots. Readers may find that the Mariner requires a different kind of attention than the notes provide.

Litchfield's edition is best approached as a period artifact: a classroom tool that reflects late-nineteenth-century assumptions about poetry's purpose and teachability. The notes are often more interesting for what they reveal about the editor's worldview than for their explication of the texts. Readers who want to understand how these poems were taught a century ago—and how editors shaped literary taste—will find this volume instructive. Those seeking modern critical perspectives should supplement it with contemporary scholarship, particularly on Coleridge and Burns, where Litchfield's commentary is thinnest.

Holding Litchfield’s guide reminded me of evenings in my grandfather’s study, tracing musical lines aloud until the rhythm felt like breath. Years later, The Lady of the Lake — Edition Insights opened that same quiet-door—footnotes softened into water, stanzas into shoreline. Both books felt less like reading, more like remembering a song I’d somehow always known.