[10] The old translation, "by Raphe Robinson, 1551," has been republished by Dr. Dibdin, accompanied by copious annotations. Almost everything relating to the family, the life, and the works of the author may be found in "the biographical and literary introduction." It is the first specimen of an edition where the diligence of the editor has not been wasted on trivial researches or nugatory commentaries. [11] "Sir Thomas More's Workes," 348. THE EARL OF SURREY AND SIR THOMAS WYATT. Not many years intervened between the uncouth gorgeousness of HAWES, the homely sense of BARCLAY, the anomalous genius of SKELTON, and the pure poetry of Henry Howard the EARL of SURREY. In the poems of SURREY, and his friend, Sir Thomas Wyatt,[1] the elder, the age of taste, if not of genius, opens on us. Dryden and Pope sometimes seem to appear two centuries before their date. There is no chronology in the productions of real genius; for, whenever a great master appears, he advances his art to a period which labour, without creation, toils for centuries to reach. The great reformer of our poetry, he who first from his own mind, without a model, displayed its permanent principles, was the poetic Earl of Surrey. There was inspiration in his system, and he freed his genius from the barbaric taste or the undisturbed dulness which had prevailed since the days of Chaucer. His ear was musical, and he formed a metrical structure with the melodies of our varied versification, rejecting the rude rhythmical rhyme which had hitherto prevailed in our poetry. He created a poetic diction, and graceful involutions; a finer selection of words, and a delicacy of expression, were now substituted for vague diffusion, and homeliness of phrases and feeble rhymes, or, on the other hand, for that vitiated style of crude pedantic Latinisms, such as "purpúre, aureáte, pulchritúde, celatúre, facúnde," and so many others, laborious nothings! filling the verse with noise. The contemplative and tender SURREY charms by opening some picturesque scene or dwelling on some impressive incident. He had discerned the error of those inartificial writers, whose minute puerility, in their sterile abundance, detailed till nothing was remembered, and described, till nothing was perceptible. Hitherto, our poets had narrowed their powers by moulding their conceptions by temporary tastes, the manners and modes of thinking of their day; but their remoteness, which may delight the antiquary, diminishes their interest with the poetical reader. SURREY struck into that secret path which leads to general nature, guided by his art: his tenderness and his thoughtful musings find an echo in our bosoms, and are as fresh with us as they were in the court of Windsor three centuries past.