The Transition From Rationalism to Sentimentalism in English Poetry

The major aim of this work is reflect the neglected role of the transitional poets in moving poetry and thinking in that time from depending on Reason as the only criterion in all fields of society life to regrading both Reason and emotions in humankind life.Romanticism came across a bridge of transition. That bridge is the essence and core of this study; it is a transition from rationalism to romanticism. The transitional period is neither classical nor romantic; however, it has the characteristics of both. One end of the bridge is on classicism and the other on romanticism. The poetry composed in that era has features of classical in length, and romantic in content and metre. Thomson, Cowper, Gray, and Blake are the poets who exemplify the transitional period . The transitional poets are classical in body but romantic in flesh and bones.