OBSERVATIONS

ON

THE FAIRY QUEEN

OF

SPENSER.

By THOMAS IVARTON, A. M.

FELLOW OF

TRINITY-COLLEGE, AND PROFESSOR OF

POETRY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD.

A NEW EDITION...

VOL.

London:

Printed by C. Stower, Pater-noster Row ;

FOR R. DUTTON, GRACECHURCH-STREET; AND THOMAS OSTELL,

AVE-MARIA LANE.

1807.

Eu.

THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY 160408

ASTOR, LENOX AND TILDEN FOUNDATIONS. 1899.

:..

Of Spenser's stanza, versification, and language...: 157

ON

THE FAIRY QUEEN

OF

SPENSER.

SECT I.

Of the plan and conduct of the Fairy Queen.

WHEN the works of Homer and of Aristotle began to be restored and studied in Italy, when the genuine and uncorrupted sources of ancient poetry and ancient criticism were opened, and every species of literature at last emerged from the depths of Gothic ignorance and barbarity, it might have been expected, that, instead of the romantic manner of poetical composi