important matters in a pleasurable poem than in a treatise on ethics.
Again, there are historians who allege that English literature must include
not simply the works of Britain but everything written in the English
language. There are other objections; but to straighten them all out is to
be long in starting, and there is a pleasant journey ahead of us. Chaucer
had literature in mind when he wrote:

Through me men goon into that blisful place
Of hertes hele and dedly woundes cure;
Through me men goon unto the wells of grace,
Ther grene and lusty May shal ever endure:
This is the wey to al good aventure.




CHAPTER II

BEGINNINGS OF ENGLISH LITERATURE

Then the warrior, battle-tried, touched the sounding glee-wood:
Straight awoke the harp's sweet note; straight a song uprose,
Sooth and sad its music. Then from hero's lips there fell
A wonder-tale, well told.

_Beowulf_, line 2017 (a free rendering)


In its beginnings English literature is like a river, which proceeds not
from a single wellhead but from many springs, each sending forth its