The Dawn of the Augustan Age: John Dryden

Abstract

Marvell’s poem shows a concern for the orderly presentation of an argument, albeit a falsely-reasoned one. This concern for order and ratiocination was, perhaps, symptomatic of a yearning for the restoration of peace and health to the body politic of Britain, which had been stretched and exhausted by the outbreaks and internal conflicts of the Civil War period. With the restoration of the monarchy in 1660 the nation hoped that the era of self-destructive squabbling was at an end. A desire for stability had been generated by the upheavals of almost twenty years of republican government.