not previously known, the immediate result was a long line of dramas by Shakespeare and others, a national epic like Spenser's Faerie Queene, and a host of romances, lyrics, and novels such as appealed to the cultivated society of that time.

Near the end of the eighteenth century a new force appeared. Poets began to see in the lives of common people romance and mystery. Gray, in his "Elegy," wrote of "the short and simple annals of the poor." He saw, too, that many a man who might have gained fame was prevented from realizing his ability solely because of lack of opportunity. Another poet, George Crabbe, complained about the false way in which poets who lived near the court had described country life, with a patronizing praise of simplicity and rustic health and the advantages of the simple life that was not borne out by the facts. He set himself, he says, "to paint the cot (rustic home) as truth would have it and as bards will not." And greater than these in his representation of the tragedy or the simple dignity or the comedy of the peasant's life was Robert Burns, a Scottish plowboy, who wrote of the Cotter and his family and proclaimed that "the rank is but the guinea's stamp," that the honest man, no matter how poor, is king of men.

What Gray dimly felt, what Crabbe longed to see, what Burns poured forth with fiery eloquence, was in process of becoming reality. At last the great masses of the people were becoming awake to their rights and their possibilities. From this awakening America achieved independence, France cast off her outworn system, and England began the process of extending the right of participation in government to every man. And from this awakening a whole new literature was born.

III

Lowell's poem, The Vision of Sir Launfal, is an excellent example of the change in ideals. Its theme is the search for the Grail, a favorite theme in Arthurian romance since the twelfth century. Sir Launfal starts out, like the knights in the old romances, to win glory. But he learns

that the Grail is not to be found through the performance of the deed which dazzles the world, but through sharing his scanty food with a beggar. He found himself when he forgot himself. Hawthorne, in "The Ambitious Guest," handles the theme in a different way. He writes of a man who sought fame, one who could not bear to be forgotten in the grave. But the avalanche overwhelmed him, and his ambition was never realized.

In the poetry of Burns you approach the theme from still another angle. In the old days lords and ladies were the subjects of poetry; here, a simple Scottish peasant, his family, and his home life form the theme. There is poetry in the homecoming of the children on Saturday night. There is a healthfulness about them and the lives they lead that the courtier may lack. Again, in the old days Nature was ignored altogether, or was merely the background of the story, or was described daintily and in ornamental aspects. But Robert Burns writes a poem about a mouse, and does it so well that his poem will never be forgotten. You have also read some of the poems he wrote about the equality of men. "Liberty, equality, fraternity," the watchwords of the French Revolution, and the "rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" of our own Declaration of Independence these are the themes of the poems by the Scottish peasant. Poetry was reflecting the awakening that was bringing democracy to men.

Now the significance of this group of stories and poems, which are representative of dozens of others that might be included, is that they show how certain democratic ideals came to play a part in literature and that they define these ideals. They show that the happiness and prosperity of nations depend not upon a few chosen individuals, but upon all men, even the humblest. They show that every man ought to be given the opportunity to make the most of himself. They show that besides the service rendered by the individual hero, there is the service in which all men coöperate for the good of all.

In order to give even more concrete reality to these ideals, you will read, in the last half of Part IV, something more

about the meaning of democracy. The point of approach here is not the political. Universal suffrage, laws made by representatives of all the people, government officials elected by the people and responsible only to them, the whole political machinery of democracy-these are only means to an end. You will get a new and interesting idea of the meaning of America if you look at it through the immigrant's eyes. You will find two or three little pictures from the past history of America that will reinforce this conception. You will also get a little deeper knowledge of some of the men who have been knights and epic heroes of our nation, men such as Washington, Lincoln, Roosevelt.

Thus the selections that have been chosen to illustrate this great theme of Man and His Fellows are intimately related to each other. Through poem and story and speech, you see how this theme is at the basis of our democracy. It all means that a man may attain the fullest development of all his powers, through sympathy, service, coöperation with his fellows. It is not that the old knightly ideal was a wrong one. To seek personal distinction is no unworthy aim. But it is incomplete. America means opportunity for the ambitious man to develop to the fullest extent his powers. America also means that this self-development involves coöperation with others.

And what is so rare as a day in June? Then, if ever, come perfect days; Then Heaven tries earth if it be in tune,

And over it softly her warm ear lays; Whether we look, or whether we listen, We hear life murmur, or see it glisten; Every clod feels a stir of might,

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An instinct within it that reaches and towers, And, groping blindly above it for light, Climbs to a soul in grass and flowers. The flush of life may well be seen

Thrilling back over hills and valleys; The cowslip startles in meadows green, 45 The buttercup catches the sun in its chalice,

And there's never a leaf or a blade too mean To be some happy creature's palace; The little bird sits at his door in the sun, Atilt like a blossom among the leaves, And lets his illumined being o'errun

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With the deluge of summer it receives; His mate feels the eggs beneath her wings, And the heart in her dumb breast flutters