| | | A book of extracts from the poets fulfils an office, and holds a | place quite independent of the originals themselves, and of which | a selection only is capable. It is not merely a convenient | substitute for the whole works for such as have not, from any | cause, access to these; but there are many moods of mind in | which we prefer the part to the whole. In the first place, the | variety itself is agreeable; we may not feel ourselves equal to | grappling with the whole mind of an individual writer; as there | are times when we are more disposed to promiscuous social | converse than to a téte-à-téte | with one friend, however instructive. And not only this, but the | very passages themselves acquire a new meaning and are seen in | a new light by their new collocation. If the selection be guided, | as it ought, by anything of a principle, we cannot help reading | with this before us, and referring continually our detached | fragments to this as a new whole, by being inserted into which | they have gained a new character. The marble was viewed | before as a portion of its native rock, and the source of our | gratification was its homogeneousness with all the rest; it is here | as the squared specimen inserted in a rich mosaic pattern, and | our pleasure arises from the contrast and comparison. Or, single | thoughts of the poets are like single words, not without | signification as they stand, but capable of the most infinite | permutation as to the sense they shall convey, by their | arrangement in the sentence. Or they are like the separate | sections of the ingenious toy called the 'Myriorama,' each by | itself a complete picture, but transformed in an instant into a | component part of a new landscape, by being placed in a fresh | juxtaposition. | | Substitutes for the originals they can never be. Not even in the | case of diffuse and unequal writers, in whom the pure metal | bears a small proportion to the alloy. Some poets, indeed, admit | of being abridged in this way better than others; and the 'Beauties | of Shelley,' and 'Selections from Wordsworth,' might well | console a future generation, should their works hereafter share | the fate of so many of the Greek classics. But it is those who are | familiar with the whole works of our poets to whom a | well-selected miscellany from them is likely to be most acceptable. | Such scraps could not introduce us to a knowledge | | of the authors, could not give us an acquaintance with them. For | this purpose, for the satisfaction of that desire which a true lover | of poetry feels for a complete and searching insight into the mind | of his poet, nothing will serve but the unlimited range of his | whole productions. To a feeling of this sort may be, in some | degree, ascribed the anxiety usually shown to gather every stray | fragment of a favourite poet which may have before escaped | collection into his works. It is felt that the induction as to what | he was, is not complete, that some little trait may be preserved in | a single line, or a shapeless fragment restore a missing feature to | the portrait. A single line of the Margites suffices to reveal | Homer (were it, as Aristotle thought, genuine) in a wholly new | light as the parent of Comedy. But the process of which we | speak is the reverse; it is not from the extract to the whole work, | but from the whole work to the extract. It is, in short, to those | who are most familiar with the poet before, that the selection is | the most welcome. It is renewing in public an acquaintance | which has been matured in private; we run over quickly, and | compare with their fellows an assemblage of those with whom | our intercourse had been hitherto solitary. We watch, as it were, | their bearing and behaviour to one another, and how of their own | accord they fall into their just order and position in our mind. | And then, from contrasting and discriminating, we pass to the | opposite process of combining, and generalizing; we abstract | from the individual characteristics, or rather the individuals give | and take, supply each other's deficiencies, and absorb each | other's superfluities, and we estimate the 'Corpus poetarum' as | the product of one mind, as the effluence of the poetic spirit of a | nation, as a single contribution to the poetic literature of the | world. | | Thus a selection is far from being that easy task that it is often | considered. It is not a work which has no higher pretensions than | adoption in the boarding-school on repetition-day, but one | interesting to the highest and most formed poetical taste. Instead | of being, as it usually has been in practice, the province of the | mere book-maker, it demands a degree of taste and judgment far | from common, and, what is even still less common, an extensive | and well-grounded knowledge of poetical literature. A selection | such as we are contemplating could not be made by a mere | reading over of the poets for the purpose. It is like the | well-selected library of the scholar, in which the volumes are not | capriciously chosen, because they happened once to please, but | in which the presence of the few favourites informs the surveyor | that others are absent, not because they are unknown, but | because they have been known well enough to be deliberately | rejected. And the number of those who have any tolerable | acquaintance with the literature of English poetry is exceedingly | | small. A knowledge of the Greek dramatists is much more | common than of the English. And so different is early English | literature from later, that it is rare to find one who unites a taste | for both. He whose studies have lain in the Elizabethan writers | will have usually little inclination for Pope or Churchill. | | But assuming an editor competent in point of literature, we have | still made only one step, however important a one. Will he not | be embarrassed by the richness of his lore? And how shall he | satisfy the conflicting claims of a hundred authors, and the still | more irreconcilable predilections of readers? If any commentary | were needed upon the utter impossibility of giving universal | satisfaction by any classification that could be adopted in matters | of this sort, we should be tempted to refer to the warm | discussions so lately waged in the papers on the lists of | illustrious names recommended by the Committee for decorating | the Houses of Parliament. Letters poured in from all sides, | expressing the astonishment and disappointment of the writers at | the Committee's decision. Yet in this decision there had been no | very striking reversal of general opinion, nor would any of the | amended lists, as proposed, have been at all more likely to unite | the suffrages of other objectors. Their cross demurrers were all | equally well and ill-founded. For all parties were appealing to no | determined standard, but to the vague and fluctuating public | sense, which had never originally anything certain to found upon. | | And such dissatisfying confusion is all that can ever be hoped | from these promiscuous attempts to assemble names and | enshrine memories on no more definite ground than popular | acclamation; with no better defined a common term than 'great' | or 'distinguished.' This sort of roving and licentious admiration | is often ascribed to want of principle in taste or judgment of | character. Many are led into it by a servile dependence on | opinion, and a miserable vanity, which cannot be satisfied | without the applause of the many. But more philosophical minds | are tempted to adopt it from the notion, that it is founded on an | enlarged view of human nature; that it argues a narrowness of | mind to be exclusive; and that, on the contrary, it is a proof of | wide sympathies to admire excellence in whatever shape it | appears. They say that a studied diversity, that an almost | fantastic delight in contradictories, is the characteristic of nature; | and that the mind of the wise man is the one convergent point in | which all the radii centre. That the heart which has | been rightly educated will be comprehensive as nature herself; | and that it is impossible to imagine any form of humanity, | provided it have strength, vigour, originality, or novelty enough | to engage the understanding, which shall not at the same time | claim and command our fellow-feeling. , is | | its motto; and this doctrine, or some form of it, seems to be the | prevailing one at this day; and that not in religion, politics, and | morals alone, but in Art also. And it is one of those theories | which has so much truth in it as to make the error it embodies | doubly dangerous. With the forms it assumes on higher subjects | we have nothing to do on the present occasion; we speak only of | its application to objects of Taste; though even this one branch of | the subject is far too extensive for us to think of treating fully. | We will only draw the reader's notice to one or two parts of the | question. | | In the first place, then, though this system is at first sight so free, | unshackled, and impartial, that it is often met by those who | dislike it with the reproach of 'unprincipled,' it is truly founded | upon a principle as any other. It rejoices in the free play of its | critical powers, and in the independence of its action on any law | save the instincts of the sublime and the beautiful. But never was | boast of freedom more fallacious. Its admiration is as little at its | own disposal as it would be in any other system which it despises | for its partiality and one-sidedness. Not all the metamorphoses | of Proteus can elude the binding fetters of a general law, any | more than the comet's most eccentric orbit can escape the force | of that gravitation which pervades all space. It has its idol like | all the other worships, whose superstition it so much derides, and | that idol is talent. It bows down blindly to intellectual energy; it | admires a means, a tool, an instrument, a mere , a thing | whose very essence is, that it is indifferent, that it has no quality | of good or bad within itself, but is denominated from the end to | which it subserves. This theory, as much as any other, is | chargeable with exclusiveness, with confining its view to one | portion of man's nature, and that a subordinate one, which it | arbitrarily exalts to an eminence which it is incapable of filling. | | The theory or canon of poetical taste we have now in view is but | an application to this particular subject (a most uncongenial one | to be sure!) of the ruling doctrine of the day. And yet a fitting | retribution it is, if we consider the channel through which this | doctrine has become the prevailing law of the minds of free | countries. It is by a diffused literature and a degraded press, | which has carried to the utmost possible limits the divorce | between moral worth and intellectual influence, that this | principle of indifference to distinctions has been propagated, and | has established its tyranny over society. Justly then has it reacted | on the parent from which it sprung, and brought the realm of | letters under its dominion. It is the boast of the men of letters | that they have, through the press, made themselves supreme over | public opinion; but that very public opinion now itself, | | in turn, has made itself the standard, by which the merits of even | the first rank in literature, the poetical, are to be tried. | | This popular doctrine is not to be confounded with another of a | subtle and philosophical character, to which it bears a distant | resemblance, and of which it is, perhaps, a coarse, common-place | imitation, and as being such endeavours sometimes to profit by | the authorities and arguments which the latter has to show for | itself. This theory is that which makes the end of poetry to be | singly the expression or exhibition of beauty. Poetry is one of | the Arts; and this is the common end of all the Arts. The | material or vehicle of expression is indifferent; be it marble, | canvass, or words ~~ all besides that a poem contains is only | complement, or accompaniment, more or less necessary, of what | is really poetical. That this latter is all with which we have to do, | and that wherever it is found there admiration is due, and the | need of praise is to be assigned. | | Now, without entering on the question, how far this is true of the | Fine Arts, properly so called, or even whether this element of | Beauty be not one which is indispensable to Poetry, we deny | entirely that this is the essence of the Poetical, or is even the | most important portion of it. Poetry is essentially ethical, an | imitation or expression of moral action. Human life and the | human heart are its one subject; all other topics are ornamental | and accessory, and can never in true poetry bear to the main | action more than the proportion which, in real life, does taste in | furniture or dress to conduct and affairs. This it is, viewed with | reference to its subject. And no less with reference to its author | must it be the expression of the poet's whole mind; the effluence | and copy of his whole being and character; his heart, and not his | head merely. It is spoken from one man to another. If it is to go | home to the heart, it must come from the heart. . This | it has in common with Rhetoric; while it shares with Art, in its | power of addressing the taste, and moving the æsthetic | affections, it shares with Eloquence its property of appealing to | the moral affections. And if it want either of these branches, it is | so far defective and incomplete. It is well said by one worthy to | be heard on such a subject, . ~~ | Preface to Poems by Eliz. Barrett . | | But to proceed to the compilations before us: they are, perhaps, | as near an approach to books of devotional verse as could be | made without becoming simply devotional. The volumes almost | | compose a set of religious meditations in verse; and their | unpretending character is adapted with great propriety to this | object. There are times with all, though more common with | some than with others, when the mind seeks some gentle outlet | for thought and feeling, beneath the devotional, yet untainted by | earth and self. The tone of highly intellectual Poetry is too | exalted, too impassioned, requires too much of the vigour and | gush of natural spirits and physical life, to be listened to at such | times. In short, it is in sickness, in sorrow, at the seasons when | we are most brought to a sense of the emptiness of this world, | that we feel the full force and value of truths which at other times | we have called trite and common-place, and to see their real | worth in comparison with the gaudy theories, and brilliant | systems, which alone have powers to captivate in the full tide of | youth and health. At such times only we become aware how | habitually we misapply the epithet deep, and that it is | upon axioms and maxims , which we are used | to slight as obvious truisms, that the world and the realities of life | turn. Our true concern is indeed with the ~~ God, | above, the Incomprehensible; and our own trivial actions of | every day here below; these are quite enough to occupy all our | thoughts; and all the philosophy and speculations we are | accustomed to value so highly belongs to that middle region | which is only useful or subservient to the other, and is of those | things which are to 'perish with the using.' Then we see the true | importance of little things; a flower, a leaf, a kind word teaches | us more, and contains more for the heart to dwell on, than all the | wars, treaties, battles and sieges, all the great actions and | splendid triumphs with which history regales our hours of pride. | To this temper such volumes as these are addressed, and such, | we think, will feel that the character sketched in the following | simple lines is one far more worth dwelling on than that of hero | or sage, and is at least as rare. | | | | | We shall first give four Sonnets, written . It may be as | well to quote the lines from the Lyra, for the convenience of the | reader. | | | | | | These explanatory sonnets, signed C. M., may bring to our | readers' minds a certain line about ; but our next extract | shall be of a less abstruse character. It is by the same author as | the first piece. | | | | | | We select the following as almost the only approach to the | historical we have been able to find among the original portion of | these volumes. Perhaps the locality 'Egloshayle,' may enable | some of our readers to penetrate the mystery of the initial C. | which is prefixed to it. | | | | | | | 'Wheat' is a new and a somewhat bold subject for a sonnet; its | poetical character is generally so completely superseded by its | utilitarian. The following lines elicit it: ~~ | | | | There is a mysterious shade over the picture of nature we have in | the following: ~~ | | | | | | One feature, and a very pleasing one, of these volumes, consists | in the little poems on particular flowers, in which the moral | physiognomy of the plant is brought out in a way very | congenial to those who love to nurse and watch such favourites. | Is it the of the 'Lyra Apostolica' who thus speaks for | | | | | | Some pieces, from another contributor, show a delicate insight | into a tender moral sympathy with beauty in nature, which we | seldom see. Flowers are the writer's especial department, and | they are personified and receive a soul and character under the | touch. It is not the simply enjoyable, or the simply sentimental, | love of nature, that we see here; but something superior: ~~ | | | | | | The 'Fuchsia' shows the same kind of poetry, but in richer | colours: ~~ | | | | A more elaborate application of the same idea to another class of | natural objects, is put into our hands as we write, in 'The Songs | of the Birds; or, Analogies of Animal and Spiritual Life.' | | The object of the book is to follow out the example set in | Scripture, of drawing lessons from the instincts and habits of | birds. It may be told in the author's own words: ~~ | | | | | | Such is the task he proposes to himself; and to its execution Mr. | Evans brings the eye of a naturalist, and that delicate sensibility | to rural sounds and appearances, which is only attainable by | habitual observation out of doors in the country; and which is | altogether unappreciable by one whose abode is in the city and | the haunts of men, and whose stolen visits to pure air and fresh | green fields are only short and occasional. It is a great deal if | such an one, by aid of a visit to the Museum, or the Zoological | Gardens, can distinguish the more remarkable species, or have of | the more common orders and genera . But the student of | stuffed specimens, or, what is very little better, of the poor | captives of the aviary , has very little idea of the variety | of character exhibited by birds in their natural state, in the | meadows, the hedges, the woods, and streams which are their | several homes. The species differ not more in plumage and song, | than they do in their habits and modes of life, their behaviour to | one another, and their moral character. For animals have a moral | character. Not indeed, as themselves being moral agents, but as | giving a human observer, accustomed to associate certain | physical phenomena in his own species with certain dispositions, | the impression that similar motions and phenomena in the brute | proceed from a similar cause. Indeed, this is universally known | with respect to the larger and the domestic quadrupeds. But it is | equally true in the smaller and less distinguishable species of | birds, as any out-of-door naturalist will testify. Mr. Evans well | says of the owl, and the persecutions to which he is subject from | the smaller birds: ~~ | | | | | But we must have been giving our readers an impression that Mr. | Evans's volume is in plain prose; from having lingered so long, | perhaps with an unconscious preference, in this department of it. | But those descriptions are only introductory to the Songs of the | Birds, which are, as they should be, in verse. We take as a | specimen the | |