ENGLISH LITERARY CRITICISM



C. E. VAUGHAN

Edited by C H. HERFORD, Litt. D



WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY C. E. VAUGHAN





PREFACE.


In the following pages my aim has been to sketch the development of
criticism, and particularly of critical method, in England; and to
illustrate each phase of its growth by one or two samples taken from
the most typical writers. I have in no way attempted to make a full
collection of what might be thought the most striking pieces of
criticism to be found in our literature.

Owing to the great wealth of such writing produced during the last
sixty years, it is clearly impossible to give so complete a picture
of what has been done in this period as in others. I am obliged to
content myself with one specimen of one writer. But that is the writer