Produced by Karina Aleksandrova, Juliet Sutherland and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net HOME UNIVERSITY LIBRARY OF MODERN KNOWLEDGE No. 61 _Editors:_ THE RT. HON. H. A. L. FISHER, M.A., F.B.A. PROF. GILBERT MURRAY, LITT.D., LL.D., F.B.A. PROF. SIR J. ARTHUR THOMSON, M.A. PROF. WILLIAM T. BREWSTER, M.A. _A complete classified list of the volumes of The Home University Library already published to be found at the back of this book._ THE VICTORIAN AGE IN LITERATURE BY G. K. CHESTERTON NEW YORK HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY LONDON THORNTON BUTTERWORTH LTD. COPYRIGHT, 1913, BY HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY CONTENTS CHAP. PAGE INTRODUCTION 7 I THE VICTORIAN COMPROMISE AND ITS ENEMIES 12 II THE GREAT VICTORIAN NOVELISTS 90 III THE GREAT VICTORIAN POETS 156 IV THE BREAK-UP OF THE COMPROMISE 204 BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE 253 INDEX 255 The Editors wish to explain that this book is not put forward as an authoritative history of Victorian literature. It is a free and personal statement of views and impressions about the significance of Victorian literature made by Mr. Chesterton at the Editors' express invitation. THE VICTORIAN AGE IN LITERATURE INTRODUCTION A section of a long and splendid literature can be most conveniently treated in one of two ways. It can be divided as one cuts a currant cake or a Gruyère cheese, taking the currants (or the holes) as they come. Or it can be divided as one cuts wood--along the grain: if one thinks that there is a grain. But the two are never the same: the names never come in the same order in actual time as they come in any serious study of a spirit or a tendency. The critic who wishes to move onward with the life of an epoch, must be always running backwards and forwards among its mere dates; just as a branch bends back and forth continually; yet the grain in the branch runs true like an unbroken river.