But in his teching discrete and benigne, To drawen folk to heven with fairénesse, By good ensample was his besinesse; But it were any persone obstinat, What so he were of high or low estat, Him wolde he snibben [16] sharply for the nones: A better preest I trowe that no wher non is; He waited after no pompe ne reverence, He maked him no spiced conscience, But Cristés love and his apostles' twelve He taught, but first he folwed it himselve. [17] [Footnote 1: Parishioners.] [Footnote 2: Wondrous.] [Footnote 3: Such.] [Footnote 4: Proved.] [Footnote 5: Times.] [Footnote 6: Give or have given.] [Footnote 7: Not.] [Footnote 8: Nor.] [Footnote 9: Farthest.] [Footnote 10: Great and small.] [Footnote 11: Gave.] [Footnote 12: Left.] [Footnote 13: Encumbered.] [Footnote 14: Despiteous.] [Footnote 15: Proud.] [Footnote 16: Reprove.] [Footnote: Prologue to Canterbury Tales.] Such change as really took place in the style of our literature after Chaucer's time is with difficulty perceptible, on account of the dearth of writers, during the civil wars of the 15th century. But the transition was not very great; and accordingly we find in Latimer and our other venerable authors about the time of Edward VI. as in Luther, the general characteristics of the earliest manner;--that is, every part popular, and the discourse addressed to all degrees of intellect;--the sentences short, the tone vehement, and the connexion of the whole produced by honesty and singleness of purpose, intensity of passion, and pervading importance of the subject. Another and a very different species of style is that which was derived from, and founded on, the admiration and cultivation of the classical writers, and which was more exclusively addressed to the learned class in society. I have previously mentioned Boccaccio as the original Italian introducer of this manner, and the great models of it in English are Hooker, Bacon, Milton, and Taylor, although it may be traced in many other authors of that age. In all these the language is dignified but plain, genuine English, although elevated and brightened by superiority of intellect in the writer. Individual words themselves are always used by them in their precise meaning, without either affectation or slipslop. The letters and state papers of Sir Francis Walsingham are remarkable for excellence in style of this description. In Jeremy Taylor the sentences are often extremely long, and yet are generally so perspicuous in consequence of their logical structure, that they require no reperusal to be understood; and it is for the most part the same in Milton and Hooker. Take the following sentence as a specimen of the sort of style to which I have been alluding:--