Frontmatter -- Preface -- Contents -- Chaucer and his Contemporaries -- The 15 th Century and the First Half of the 16 th Century -- The Elizabethan Period (including the reign of James I. and that of Charles I. to the outbreak of the Civil War). 1558-1642 -- The Period of the Civil War and the Commonwealth 1642-1660 -- The Period of the Restoration and the Revolution 1660-1702 -- First Half of the 18 th Century -- Second Half of the 18 th Century -- The 19 th Century -- Index