The splendid
dream is still far from being realized; yet it seems as if any nation could
become Utopia in a single generation, so simple and just are the
requirements.

Greater than either of these books, in its influence upon the common
people, is Tyndale's translation of the New Testament (1525), which fixed a
standard of good English, and at the same time brought that standard not
only to scholars but to the homes of the common people. Tyndale made his
translation from the original Greek, and later translated parts of the Old
Testament from the Hebrew. Much of Tyndale's work was included in Cranmer's
Bible, known also as the Great Bible, in 1539, and was read in every parish
church in England. It was the foundation for the Authorized Version, which
appeared nearly a century later and became the standard for the whole
English-speaking race.

WYATT AND SURREY. In 1557 appeared probably the first printed collection of
miscellaneous English poems, known as _Tottel's Miscellany_. It contained
the work of the so-called courtly makers, or poets, which had hitherto
circulated in manuscript form for the benefit of the court. About half of
these poems were the work of Sir Thomas Wyatt (1503?-1542) and of Henry
Howard, Earl of Surrey (1517?-1547). Both together wrote amorous sonnets
modeled after the Italians, introducing a new verse form which, although
very difficult, has been a favorite ever since with our English poets.[110]
Surrey is noted, not for any especial worth or originality of his own
poems, but rather for his translation of two books of Virgil "in strange
meter." The strange meter was the blank verse, which had never before
appeared in English. The chief literary work of these two men, therefore,
is to introduce the sonnet and the blank verse,--one the most dainty, the
other the most flexible and characteristic form of English poetry,--which
in the hands of Shakespeare and Milton were used to make the world's
masterpieces.

MALORY'S MORTE D'ARTHUR. The greatest English work of this period, measured
by its effect on subsequent literature, is undoubtedly the _Morte
d'Arthur_, a collection of the Arthurian romances told in simple and vivid
prose. Of Sir Thomas Malory, the author, Caxton[111] in his introduction
says that he was a knight, and completed his work in 1470, fifteen years
before Caxton printed it. The record adds that "he was the servant of Jesu
both by day and night." Beyond that we know little[112] ex