In the history of English literature, Sir Philip Sidney’s romance will always have a prominent place as the first specimen of a fine prose style.  The affectations and mannerisms which are its chief defect were due to the unsettled condition of the language, and to the influence of foreign works, which the general love of learning had made familiar to cultivated Englishmen.  The position of the “Arcadia” in fiction is established by the exquisite descriptions of nature and the life-like sketches of character which will often reward the patient reader.  That prolixity, which more than any other cause has made the work obsolete, and, as a whole, unreadable, was a recommendation rather than an objection at the time of publication.  The “Arcadia,” standing almost alone in the department of fiction, and far superior to its few competitors, took the place of a small circulating library.  A spirit of lofty ideality pervades the work of Sir Philip Sidney, which is expressive of the aspirations of his time.  In the fictions of that age is to be seen a constant attempt, not always successful, to dignify life, to exalt the beautiful, and to conceal or condemn the base.  Everyday life was not tempting to the writer, because it contained too much that was repulsive.  The story teller and the poet painted amid unreal scenes that happiness and virtue which they thought more easily to be conceived in an ideal land of knights and shepherds, than amidst the cares and dangers of their own existence.[81]

[Footnote 57:  Paine’s “History of English Literature,” book iii, ch. 1.]

[Footnote 58:  Nichol’s “Progresses,” vol.  I, p. 3.]

[Footnote 59:  The Italian tales were issued in various collections, such as Painter’s “Palace of Pleasure,” Whetstone’s “Heptameron,” the “Histories” of Goulard and Grimstone.  One of the best of these collections is “Westward for Smelts,” by Kinde Kit of Kingstone, circa 1603, reprinted by the Percy Society.  It is on the same plan as Boccaccio’s “Decamerone,” except that the story-tellers are fish-wives going up the Thames in a boat.  Imitations of the Italian tales may be found in Hazlitt’s “Shakespeare’s Library,” notably “Romeo and Julietta.”  Most of these are modernized versions of old tales.  I may here add, as undeserving further mention, such stories as “Jacke of Dover’s Quest of Inquirie,” 1601, Percy Soc.; “A Search for Money,” by William Rowley, dramatist, 1609, Percy Soc.; and “The Man in the Moone, or the English Fortune-Teller,” 1609, Percy Soc.]

[Footnote 60:  The most comprehensive remarks on Lyly and “Euphues” are to be found in the London Quarterly Review for April, 1801, and are due to Mr. Henry Morley.]

[Footnote 61:  Henry Peacham, “Compleat Gentleman.”  See Drake’s “Shakespeare and his Times.”]