In a history of English literature, therefore, we must fix attention upon the personalities of the men by whom this literature has been made. In a short sketch we cannot, of course, examine in detail their lives, experiences, and characters. This must be left for a more extended study. But we must try nonetheless to understand the distinctive quality in the genius of each man who comes before us. The reason of this is clear. Genius means many things, but at bottom it means strength of personality and as a consequence, what we call originality. Every great writer, it has been well said, brings one absolutely new thing into the world-himself; and it is just because he puts this one new thing into what he writes that his work bears its own special hall-mark, and has something about it which makes it unlike the work done by anyone else. In the detailed study of any great writer this essential element of individuality is the chief feature to be considered, and in an historical survey, no matter how slight, it must be carefully noted too, for otherwise we cannot learn why such a writer counts as he dies in the literature of his nation. A history of English literature, then, is concerned to indicate the nature and value of the particular contribution, which each writer personally has made to that literature.