Some poems are for holidays only. They are polished and sweet,
but it is the sweetness of sugar, and not such as toil gives to
sour bread. The breath with which the poet utters his verse must
be that by which he lives.
Great prose, of equal elevation, commands our respect more than
great verse, since it implies a more permanent and level height,
a life more pervaded with the grandeur of the thought. The poet
often only makes an irruption, like a Parthian, and is off again,
shooting while he retreats; but the prose writer has conquered
like a Roman, and settled colonies.
The true poem is not that which the public read. There is always
a poem not printed on paper, coincident with the production of
this, stereotyped in the poet's life. It is _what he has become
through his work_. Not how is the idea expressed in stone, or on
canvas or paper, is the question, but how far it has obtained
form and expression in the life of the artist. His true work
will not stand in any prince's gallery.
My life has been the poem I would have writ,
But I could not both live and utter it.
THE POET'S DELAY.
In vain I see the morning rise,
In vain observe the western blaze,
Who idly look to other skies,
Expecting life by other ways.
Amidst such boundless wealth without,
I only still am poor within,
The birds have sung their summer out,
But still my spring does not begin.
Shall I then wait the autumn wind,
Compelled to seek a milder day,
And leave no curious nest behind,
No woods still echoing to my lay?
This raw and gusty day, and the creaking of the oaks and pines on
shore, reminded us of more northern climes than Greece, and more
wintry seas than the Aegean.
The genuine remains of Ossian, or those ancient poems which bear
his name, though of less fame and extent, are, in many respects,
of the same stamp with the Iliad itself. He asserts the dignity
of the bard no less than Homer, and in his era we hear of no
other priest than he. It will not avail to call him a heathen,
because he personifies the sun and addresses it; and what if his
heroes did "worship the ghosts of their fathers," their thin,
airy, and unsubstantial forms? we worship but the ghosts of our
fathers in more substantial forms. We cannot but respect the
vigorous faith of those heathen, who sternly believed somewhat,
and are inclined to say to the critics, who are offended by their
superstitious rites, - Don't interrupt these men's prayers. As if
we knew more about human life and a God, than the heathen and
ancients.
