SOURCE: Allison, Alexander Ward. “The Refinement of Our Language.” In Toward an Augustan Poetic: Edmund Waller's “Reform” of English Poetry, 24-46. University of Kentucky Press, 1962.

In the following essay, discusses the influences of Waller's poetic diction.

There is general consent, now as in 1700, that the language of English poetry should simultaneously fulfill our expectations of our tongue as it is spoken and be set apart from the most ordinary discourse. But there also existed then a rather general consensus that felicitous combinations of familiar words alone could not sustain the style of serious poetry. Neoclassical poets might rejoice in lines and phrases which were at once natural and noble. Dryden was pleased that for “Open the door,” there existed the alternative “Set wide the palace gates.”¹ But most poets and critics of the period also advocated the avoidance of low words in nobler or politer ventures and the...