and particularly in
restoring to English verse a stanza form, which became so noble an
instrument in the hands of later poets, who used it with as much freedom
and vigor as if they had never seen the "Faerie Queene." One is seldom
reminded of Spenser while reading "Childe Harold"[36] or "Adonais" or
"The Eve of Saint Agnes"; but in reading West or Cambridge, or even in
reading Shenstone and Thomson, one is reminded of him at every turn. Yet
if it was necessary to imitate anyone, it might be answered to Dr.
Johnson that it was better to imitate Spenser than Pope. In the
imitation of Spenser lay, at least, a future, a development; while the
imitation of Pope was conducting steadily toward Darwin's "Botanic
Garden."

It remains to notice one more document in the history of this Spenserian
revival, Thomas Warton's "Observations on the Faerie Queen," 1754.
Warton wrote with a genuine delight in his subject. His tastes were
frankly romantic. But the apologetic air which antiquarian scholars
assumed, when venturing to recommend their favorite studies to the
attention of a classically minded public, is not absent from Warton's
commentary. He writes as if he felt the pressure of an unsympathetic
atmosphere all about him. "We who live in the days of writing by rule
are apt to try every composition by those laws which we have been taught
to think the sole criterion of excellence. Critical taste is universally
diffused, and we require the same order and design which every modern
performance is expected to have, in poems where they never were regarded
or intended. . . If there be any poem whose graces please because they
are situated beyond the reach of art[37] . . . it is this. In reading
Spenser, if the critic is not satisfied, yet the reader is transported."
"In analyzing the plan and conduct of this poem, I have so far tried it
by epic rules, as to demonstrate the inconveniences and incongruities
which the poet might have avoided, had he been more studious of design
and uniformity. It is true that his romantic materials claim great
liberties; but no materials exclude order and perspicacity." Warton
assures the reader that Spenser's language is not "so difficult and
obsolete as it is generally supposed to be;" and defends him against
Hume's censure,[38] that "Homer copied true natural manners . . . but the
pencil of the English poet was employed in drawing the affectations and
conceits and fopperies of chivalry."