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diff --git a/42773-0.txt b/42773-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f0eb997 --- /dev/null +++ b/42773-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7109 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 42773 *** + + TALKS + ON + THE STUDY OF LITERATURE + + BY + + ARLO BATES + + [Illustration] + + BOSTON AND NEW YORK + HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY + The Riverside Press Cambridge + + + + + COPYRIGHT, 1897 + BY ARLO BATES + ALL RIGHTS RESERVED + + + + +This volume is made up from a course of lectures delivered under the +auspices of the Lowell Institute in the autumn of 1895. These have been +revised and to some extent rewritten, and the division into chapters +made; but there has been no essential change. + + + + +CONTENTS + + + PAGE + + I. What Literature Is 1 + + II. Literary Expression 23 + + III. The Study of Literature 33 + + IV. Why we Study Literature 45 + + V. False Methods 60 + + VI. Methods of Study 69 + + VII. The Language of Literature 88 + + VIII. The Intangible Language 111 + + IX. The Classics 123 + + X. The Value of the Classics 135 + + XI. The Greater Classics 142 + + XII. Contemporary Literature 154 + + XIII. New Books and Old 167 + + XIV. Fiction 184 + + XV. Fiction and Life 199 + + XVI. Poetry 219 + + XVII. The Texture of Poetry 227 + + XVIII. Poetry and Life 241 + + + + +TALKS ON THE STUDY OF LITERATURE + + + + +I + +WHAT LITERATURE IS + + +As all life proceeds from the egg, so all discussion must proceed from a +definition. Indeed, it is generally necessary to follow definition by +definition, fixing the meaning of the terms used in the original +explanation, and again explaining the words employed in this exposition. + +I once heard a learned but somewhat pedantic man begin to answer the +question of a child by saying that a lynx is a wild quadruped. He was +allowed to get no further, but was at once asked what a quadruped is. He +responded that it is a mammal with four feet. This of course provoked +the inquiry what a mammal is; and so on from one question to another, +until the original subject was entirely lost sight of, and the lynx +disappeared in a maze of verbal distinctions as completely as it might +have vanished in the tangles of the forest primeval. I feel that I am +not wholly safe from danger of repeating the experience of this +well-meaning pedant if I attempt to give a definition of literature. +The temptation is strong to content myself with saying: "Of course we +all know what literature is." The difficulty which I have had in the +endeavor to frame a satisfactory explanation of the term has convinced +me, however, that it is necessary to assume that few of us do know, and +has impressed upon me the need of trying to make clear what the word +means to me. If my statement seem insufficient for general application, +it will at least show the sense which I shall give to "literature" in +these talks. + +In its most extended signification literature of course might be taken +to include whatever is written or printed; but our concern is with that +portion only which is indicated by the name "polite literature," or by +the imported term "belles-lettres,"--both antiquated though respectable +phrases. In other words, I wish to confine my examination to those +written works which can properly be brought within the scope of +literature as one of the fine arts. + +Undoubtedly we all have a general idea of the limitations which are +implied by these various terms, and we are not without a more or less +vague notion of what is indicated by the word literature in its most +restricted and highest sense. The important point is whether our idea is +clear and well realized. We have no difficulty in saying that one book +belongs to art and that another does not; but we often find ourselves +perplexed when it comes to telling why. We should all agree that "The +Scarlet Letter" is literature and that the latest sensational novel is +not,--but are we sure what makes the difference? We know that +Shakespeare wrote poetry and Tupper doggerel, but it by no means follows +that we can always distinguish doggerel from poetry; and while it is not +perhaps of consequence whether we are able to inform others why we +respect the work of one or another, it is of much importance that we be +in a position to justify our tastes to ourselves. It is not hard to +discover whether we enjoy a book, and it is generally possible to tell +why we like it; but this is not the whole of the matter. It is necessary +that we be able to estimate the justice of our preferences. We must +remember that our liking or disliking is not only a test of the +book,--but is a test of us as well. There is no more accurate gauge of +the moral character of a man than the nature of the books which he +really cares for. He who would progress by the aid of literature must +have reliable standards by which to judge his literary feelings and +opinions; he must be able to say: "My antipathy to such a work is +justified by this or by that principle; my pleasure in that other is +fine because for these reasons the book itself is noble." + +It is hardly possible to arrive at any clear understanding of what is +meant by literature as an art, without some conception of what +constitutes art in general. Broadly speaking, art exists in consequence +of the universal human desire for sympathy. Man is forever endeavoring +to break down the wall which separates him from his fellows. Whether we +call it egotism or simply humanity, we all know the wish to make others +appreciate our feelings; to show them how we suffer, how we enjoy. We +batter our fellow-men with our opinions sufficiently often, but this is +as nothing to the insistence with which we pour out to them our +feelings. A friend is the most valued of earthly possessions largely +because he is willing to receive without appearance of impatience the +unending story of our mental sensations. We are all of us more or less +conscious of the constant impulse which urges us on to expression; of +the inner necessity which moves us to continual endeavors to make others +share our thoughts, our experiences, but most of all our emotions. It +seems to me that if we trace this instinctive desire back far enough, we +reach the beginnings of art. + +It may seem that the splendidly immeasurable achievements of poetry and +painting, of architecture, of music and sculpture, are far enough from +this primal impulse; but I believe that in it is to be found their germ. +Art began with the first embodiment of human feelings by permanent +means. Let us suppose, by way of illustration, some prehistoric man, +thrilled with awe and terror at sight of a mastodon, and scratching upon +a bone rude lines in the shape of the animal,--not only to give +information, not only to show what the beast was like, but also to +convey to his fellows his feelings when confronted with the monster. It +is as if he said: "See! I cannot put into words what I felt; but look! +the creature was like this. Think how you would feel if you came face to +face with it. Then you will know how I felt." Something of this sort may +the beginnings of art be conceived to have been. + +I do not mean, of course, that the prehistoric man who made such a +picture--and such a picture exists--analyzed his motives. He felt a +thing which he could not say in words; he instinctively turned to +pictorial representation,--and graphic art was born. + +The birth of poetry was probably not entirely dissimilar. Barbaric men, +exulting in the wild delight of victory, may seem unlikely sponsors for +the infant muse, and yet it is with them that song began. The savage joy +of the conquerors, too great for word, found vent at first in excited, +bounding leaps and uncouthly ferocious gestures, by repetition growing +into rhythm; then broke into inarticulate sounds which timed the +movements, until these in turn gave place to words, gradually moulded +into rude verse by the measures of the dance. The need of expressing the +feelings which swell inwardly, the desire of sharing with others, of +putting into tangible form, the emotions that thrill the soul is common +to all human beings; and it is from this that arises the thing which we +call art. + +The essence of art, then, is the expression of emotion; and it follows +that any book to be a work of art must embody sincere emotion. Not all +works which spring from genuine feeling succeed in embodying or +conveying it. The writer must be sufficiently master of technique to be +able to make words impart what he would express. The emotion phrased +must moreover be general and in some degree typical. Man is interested +and concerned in the emotions of men only in so far as these throw light +on the nature and possibilities of life. Art must therefore deal with +what is typical in the sense that it touches the possibilities of all +human nature. If it concerns itself with much that only the few can or +may experience objectively, it has to do with that only which all human +beings may be conceived of as sharing subjectively. Literature may be +broadly defined as the adequate expression of genuine and typical +emotion. The definition may seem clumsy, and hardly exact enough to be +allowed in theoretical æsthetics; but it seems to me sufficiently +accurate to serve our present purpose. Certainly the essentials of +literature are the adequate embodiment of sincere and general feeling. + +By sincerity here we mean that which is not conventional, which is not +theoretical, not artificial; that which springs from a desire honestly +to impart to others exactly the emotion that has been actually felt. By +the term "emotion" or "feeling" we mean those inner sensations of +pleasure, excitement, pain, or passion, which are distinguished from the +merely intellectual processes of the mind,--from thought, perception, +and reason. It is not necessary to trespass just now on the domain of +the psychologist by an endeavor to establish scientific distinctions. +We are all able to appreciate the difference between what we think and +what we feel, between those things which touch the intellect and those +which affect the emotional nature. We see a sentence written on paper, +and are intellectually aware of it; but unless it has for us some +especial message, unless it concerns us personally, we are not moved by +it. Most impressions which we receive touch our understanding without +arousing our feelings. This is all so evident that there is not likely +to arise in your minds any confusion in regard to the meaning of the +phrase "genuine emotion." + +Whatever be the origin of this emotion it must be essentially +impersonal, and it is generally so in form. There are comparatively few +works of art which are confessedly the record of simple, direct, +personal experience; and perhaps none of these stand in the front rank +of literature. Of course I am not speaking of literature which takes a +personal form, like any book written in the first person; but of those +that are avowedly a record of actual life. We must certainly include in +literature works like the "Reflections" of Marcus Aurelius, the +"Confessions" of Augustine, and--though the cry is far--Rousseau, and +the "Journal Intime" of Amiel, but there is no one of these which is to +be ranked high in the scale of the world's greatest books. Even in +poetry the same thing is true. However we may admire "In Memoriam" and +that much greater poem, Mrs. Browning's "Sonnets from the Portuguese," +we are little likely to regard them as standing supremely high among +the masterpieces. The "Sonnets" of Shakespeare which we suppose to be +personal are yet with supreme art made so impersonal that as far as the +reader is concerned the experiences which they record might be entirely +imaginary. It is in proportion as a poet is able to give this quality +which might be called generalization to his work that it becomes art. + +The reason of this is not far to seek. If the emotion is professedly +personal it appeals less strongly to mankind, and it is moreover likely +to interfere with its own effective embodiment. All emotion in +literature must be purely imaginative as far as its expression in words +is concerned. Of course poetical form may be so thoroughly mastered as +to become almost instinctive, but nevertheless acute personal feeling +must trammel utterance. It is not that the author does not live through +what he sets forth. It is that the artistic moment is not the moment of +experience, but that of imaginative remembrance. The "Sonnets from the +Portuguese" afford admirable examples of what I mean. It is well known +that these relate a most completely personal and individual story. Not +only the sentiments but the circumstances set forth were those of the +poet's intimate actual life. It was the passion of love and of +self-renunciation in her own heart which broke forth in the fine +sonnet:-- + + Go from me, yet I feel that I shall stand + Henceforward in thy shadow. Nevermore + Alone upon the threshold of the door + Of individual life shall I command + The uses of my soul; or lift my hand + Serenely in the sunshine as before + Without the sense of that which I forebore,-- + Thy touch upon the palm. The widest land + Doom takes to part us, leaves thy heart in mine + With pulses that beat double. What I do + And what I dream include thee, as the wine + Must taste of its own grapes: and when I sue + God for myself, He hears that name of thine, + And sees within my eyes the tears of two. + +There came to Mrs. Browning a poignant moment when she realized with a +thrill of anguish what it would mean to her to live out her life alone, +separated forever from the lover who had won her back from the very +grasp of death. It was not in the pang of that throe that she made of it +a sonnet; but afterward, while it was still felt, it is true, but felt +rather as a memory vividly reproduced by the imagination. In so far both +he who writes impersonally and he who writes personally are dealing with +that which at the instant exists in the imagination. In the latter, +however, there is still the remembrance of the actuality, the vibration +of the joy or sorrow of which that imagining is born. Human +self-consciousness intrudes itself whenever one is avowedly writing of +self; sometimes even vanity plays an important part. From these and +other causes it results that, whatever may be the exceptions, the +highest work is that which phrases the general and the impersonal with +no direct reference to self. Personal feeling lies behind all art, and +no work can be great which does not rest on a basis of experience, more +or less remotely; yet the greatest artist is he who embodies emotion, +not in terms of his own life, but in those which make it equally the +property of all mankind. It is feeling no longer egotistic, but broadly +human. If the simile do not seem too homely, we might say that the +difference is that between arithmetic and algebra. In the one case it is +the working out of a particular problem; in the other of an equation +which is universal. + +Mankind tests art by universal experience. If an author has really felt +what he has written, if what he sets down has been actual to him in +imagination, whether actual in experience or not, readers recognize +this, and receive his work, so that it lives. If he has affected a +feeling, if he has shammed emotion, the whole is sure to ring false, and +the world soon tires of his writings. Immediate popular judgment of a +book is pretty generally wrong; ultimate general estimate is invariably +correct. Humanity knows the truth of human feeling; and while it may be +fooled for a time, it comes to the truth at last, in act if not in +theory. The general public is guided by the wise few, and it does not +reason out the difference between the genuine and the imitation; but it +will in the end save the real, while the sham is forgotten through utter +neglect. + +Even where an author has seemingly persuaded himself that his pretended +emotions are real, he cannot permanently deceive the world. You may +remember the chapter in Aldrich's delightful "Story of a Bad Boy" which +relates how Tom Bailey, being crossed in love at the mature age of +fourteen, deliberately became a "blighted being;" how he neglected his +hair, avoided his playmates, made a point of having a poor appetite, and +went mooning about forsaken graveyards, endeavoring to fix his thoughts +upon death and self-destruction; how entirely the whole matter was a +humbug, and yet how sincere the boy was in supposing himself to be +unutterably melancholy. "It was a great comfort," he says, "to be so +perfectly miserable and yet not to suffer any. I used to look in the +glass and gloat over the amount and variety of mournful expression I +could throw into my features. If I caught myself smiling at anything, I +cut the smile short with a sigh. The oddest thing about all this is, I +never once suspected that I was not unhappy. No one ... was more +deceived than I." We have all of us had experiences of this kind, and I +fancy that there are few writers who cannot look back to a stage in +their career when they thought that it was a prime essential of +authorship to believe themselves to feel things which they did not feel +in the least. This sort of self-deception is characteristic of a whole +school of writers, of whom Byron was in his day a typical example. There +is no doubt that Byron, greatly gifted as he was, took his mooning +melancholy with monstrous seriousness when he began to write it, and the +public received it with equal gravity. Yet Byron's mysterious misery, +his immeasurable wickedness, his misanthropy too great for words, were +mere affectations,--stage tricks which appealed to the gallery. Nobody +is moved by them now. The fact that the poet himself thought that he +believed in them could not save them. Byron had other and nobler +qualities which make his best work endure, but it is in spite of his +Bad-Boy-ish pose as a "blighted being." The fact is that sooner or later +time tries all art by the tests of truth and common sense, and nothing +which is not genuine is able to endure this proving. + +To be literature a work must express sincere emotion; but how is feeling +which is genuine to be distinguished from that which is affected? All +that has been said must be regarded as simply theoretical and of very +little practical interest unless there be some criterion by which this +question may be settled. Manifestly we cannot so far enter into the +consciousness of the writer as to tell whether he does or does not feel +what he expresses; it can be only from outward signs that we judge +whether his imagination has first made real to him what he undertakes to +make real for others. + +Something may be judged by the amount of seriousness with which a thing +is written. The air of sincerity which is inevitable in the genuine is +most difficult to counterfeit. What a man really feels he writes with a +certain earnestness which may seem indefinite, but which is sufficiently +tangible in its effects upon the reader. More than by any other single +influence mankind has in all its history been more affected by the +contagion of belief; and it is not easy to exaggerate the +susceptibility of humanity to this force. Vague and elusive as this test +of the genuineness of emotion might seem, it is in reality capable of +much practical application. We have no trouble in deciding that the +conventional rhymes which fill the corners of the newspapers are not the +product of genuine inner stress. We are too well acquainted with these +time-draggled rhymes of "love" and "dove," of "darts" and "hearts," of +"woe" and "throe;" we have encountered too often these pretty, petty +fancies, these twilight musings and midnight moans, this mild melancholy +and maudlin sentimentality. We have only to read these trig little +bunches of verse, tied up, as it were, with sad-colored ribbons, to feel +their artificiality. On the other hand, it is impossible to read "Helen +of Kirconnel," or Browning's "Prospice," or Wordsworth's poems to Lucy, +without being sure that the poet meant that which he said in his song +with all the fervor of heart and imagination. A reader need not be very +critical to feel that the novels of the "Duchess" and her tribe are made +by a process as mechanical as that of making paper flowers; he will not +be able to advance far in literary judgment without coming to suspect +that fiction like the pleasant pot-boilers of William Black and W. Clark +Russell, if hand-made, is yet manufactured according to an arbitrary +pattern; but what reader can fail to feel that to Hawthorne "The Scarlet +Letter" was utterly true, that to Thackeray Colonel Newcome was a +creature warm with human blood and alive with a vigorous humanity? +Theoretically we may doubt our power to judge of the sincerity of an +author, but we do not find this so impossible practically. + +Critics sometimes say of a book that it is or is not "convincing." What +they mean is that the author has or has not been able to make what he +has written seem true to the imagination of the reader. The man who in +daily life attempts to act a part is pretty sure sooner or later to +betray himself to the observant eye. His real self will shape the +disguise under which he has hidden it; he may hold out the hands and say +the words of Esau, but the voice with which he speaks will perforce be +the voice of Jacob. It is so in literature, and especially in literature +which arouses the perceptions by an appeal to the imagination. The +writer must be in earnest himself or he cannot convince the reader. To +the man who invents a fiction, for instance, the story which he has +devised must in his imagination be profoundly true or it will not be +true to the audience which he addresses. To the novelist who is +"convincing," his characters are as real as the men he meets in his +walks or sits beside at table. It is for this reason that every novelist +with imagination is likely to find that the fictitious personages of his +story seem to act independently of the will of the author. They are so +real that they must follow out the laws of their character, although +that character exists only in imagination. For the author to feel this +verity in what he writes is of course not all that is needed to enable +him to convince his public; but it is certain that he is helpless +without it, and that he cannot make real to others what is not real to +himself. + +In emotion we express the difference between the genuine and the +counterfeit by the words "sentiment" and "sentimentality." Sentiment is +what a man really feels; sentimentality is what he persuades himself +that he feels. The Bad Boy as a "blighted being" is the type of +sentimentalists for all time. There is about the same relation between +sentimentality and sentiment that there is between a paper doll and the +lovely girl that it represents. There are fashions in emotions as there +are fashions in bonnets; and foolish mortals are as prone to follow one +as another. It is no more difficult for persons of a certain quality of +mind to persuade themselves that they thrill with what they conceive to +be the proper emotion than it is for a woman to convince herself of the +especial fitness to her face of the latest device in utterly unbecoming +headgear. Our grandmothers felt that proper maidenly sensibility +required them to be so deeply moved by tales of broken hearts and +unrequited affection that they must escape from the too poignant anguish +by fainting into the arms of the nearest man. Their grandchildren to-day +are neither more nor less sincere, neither less nor more sensible in +following to extremes other emotional modes which it might be invidious +to specify. Sentimentality will not cease while the power of +self-deception remains to human beings. + +With sentimentality genuine literature has no more to do than it has +with other human weaknesses and vices, which it may picture but must not +share. With sentiment it is concerned in every line. Of sentiment no +composition can have too much; of sentimentality it has more than enough +if there be but the trace shown in a single affectation of phrase, in +one unmeaning syllable or unnecessary accent. + +There are other tests of the genuineness of the emotion expressed in +literature which are more tangible than those just given; and being more +tangible they are more easily applied. I have said that sham sentiment +is sure to ring false. This is largely due to the fact that it is +inevitably inconsistent. Just as a man has no difficulty in acting out +his own character, whereas in any part that is assumed there are sure +sooner or later to be lapses and incongruities, so genuine emotion will +be consistent because it is real, while that which is feigned will +almost surely jar upon itself. The fictitious personage that the +novelist actually shapes in his imagination, that is more real to him +than if it stood by his side in solid flesh, must be consistent with +itself because it is in the mind of its creator a living entity. It may +not to the reader seem winning or even human, but it will be a unit in +its conception and its expression, a complete and consistent whole. The +poem which comes molten from the furnace of the imagination will be a +single thing, not a collection of verses more or less ingeniously +dovetailed together. The work which has been felt as a whole, which has +been grasped as a whole, which has as a whole been lived by that inner +self which is the only true producer of art, will be so consistent, so +unified, so closely knit, that the reader cannot conceive of it as being +built up of fortuitous parts, or as existing at all except in the +beautiful completeness which genius has given it. + +What I mean may perhaps be more clear to you if you take any of the +little tinkling rhymes which abound, and examine them critically. Even +some of more merit easily afford example. Take that pleasant rhyme so +popular in the youth of our fathers, "The Old Oaken Bucket," and see how +one stanza or another might be lost without being missed, how one +thought or another has obviously been put in for the rhyme or to fill +out the verse, and how the author seems throughout always to have been +obliged to consider what he might say next, putting his work together as +a joiner matches boards for a table-top. Contrast this with the absolute +unity of Wordsworth's "Daffodils," Keats' "Ode on a Grecian Urn," +Shelley's "Stanzas Written in Dejection," or any really great lyric. You +will perceive the difference better than any one can say it. It is true +that the quality of which we are speaking is sufficiently subtile to +make examples unsatisfactory and perhaps even dangerous; but it seems to +me that it is not too much to say that any careful and intelligent +reader will find little difficulty in feeling the unity of the +masterpieces of literature. + +This lack of consistency is most easily appreciated, perhaps, in the +drawing of character. Those modern writers who look upon literature as +having two functions, first, to advance extravagant theories, and +second,--and more important,--to advertise the author, are constantly +putting forward personages that are so inconsistent that it is +impossible not to see that they are mere embodied arguments or +sensationalism incarnate, and not in the least creatures of a strong and +wholesome imagination. When in "The Doll's House" Ibsen makes Nora Helma +an inconsequent, frivolous, childish puppet, destitute alike of moral +and of common sense, and then in the twinkling of an eye transforms her +into an indignant woman, full of moral purpose, furnished not only with +a complete set of advanced views but with an entire battery of modern +arguments with which to support them,--when, in a word, the author, for +the sake of his theory, works a visible miracle, we cease to believe in +his imaginative sincerity. We know that he is dogmatizing, not creating; +that this is artifice, not art. + +Another test of the genuineness of what is expressed in literature is +its truth to life. Here again we tread upon ground somewhat uncertain, +since truth is as elusive as a sunbeam, and to no two human beings the +same. Yet while the meaning of life is not the same to any two who walk +under the heavens, there are certain broad principles which all men +recognize. The eternal facts of life and of death, of love and of hate, +the instinct of self-preservation, the fear of pain, the respect for +courage, and the enthrallment of passion,--these are laws of humanity +so universal that we assume them to be known to all mankind. We cannot +believe that any mortal can find that true to his imagination which +ignores these unvarying conditions of human existence. He who writes +what is untrue to humanity cannot persuade us that he writes what is +true to himself. We are sure that those impossible heroes of Ouida, with +their superhuman accomplishments, those heroines of beauty +transcendently incompatible with their corrupt hearts, base lives, and +entire defiance of all sanitary laws, were no more real to their author +than they are to us. Conviction springs from the imagination, and +imagination is above all else the realizing faculty. It is idle to say +that a writer imagines every extravagant and impossible whimsy which +comes into his head. He imagines those things, and those things only, +which are real to his inner being; so that in judging literature the +question to be settled is: Does this thing which the author tells, this +emotion which he expresses, impress us as having been to him when he +wrote actual, true, and absolutely real? To unimaginative persons it +might seem that I am uttering nonsense. It is not possible for a man +without imagination to see how things which are invented by the mind +should by that same mind, in all sanity, be received as real. Yet that +is precisely what happens. No one, I believe, produces real or permanent +literature who is not capable of performing this miracle; who does not +feel to be true that which has no other being, no other place, no other +significance save that which it derives from the creative power of his +own inner sense, working upon the material furnished by his perception +of the world around him. This is the daily miracle of genius; but it is +a miracle shared to some extent by every mortal who has the faintest +glimmer of genuine imagination. + +To be convincing literature must express emotion which is genuine; to +commend itself to the best sense of mankind, and thus to take its place +in the front rank, it must deal with emotion which is wholesome and +normal. A work phrasing morbid emotion may be art, and it may be +lasting; but it is not the highest art, and it does not approve itself +to the best and sanest taste. Mankind looks to literature for the +expression of genuine, strong, healthy human emotion; emotion +passionate, tragic, painful, the exhilaration of joy or the frenzy of +grief, as it may be; but always the emotion which under the given +conditions would be felt by the healthy heart and soul, by the virile +man and the womanly woman. No amount of insane power flashing here and +there amid the foulness of Tolstoi's "Kreutzer Sonata," can reconcile +the world to the fact that the book embodies the broodings of a mind +morbid and diseased. Even to concede that the author of such a work had +genius could not avail to conceal the fact that his muse was smitten +from head to feet with the unspeakable corruption of leprosy. Morbid +literature may produce a profound sensation, but it is incapable of +creating a permanent impression. + +The principles of which we are speaking are strikingly illustrated in +the tales of Edgar Allan Poe. He was possessed of an imagination narrow, +but keen; uncertain and wayward, but alert and swift; individual and +original, though unhappily lacking any ethical stability. In his best +work he is sincere and convincing, so that stories like "The Cask of +Amontillado," "The Gold Bug," or "The Purloined Letter," are permanently +effective, each in its way and degree. Poe's masterpiece, "The Fall of +the House of Usher," is a study of morbid character, but it is saved by +the fact that this is viewed in its effect upon a healthy nature. The +reader looks at everything through the mind of the imaginary narrator, +so that the ultimate effect is that of an exhibition of the feelings of +a wholesome nature brought into contact with madness; although even so +the ordinary reader is still repelled by the abnormal elements of the +theme. There is in all the work of Poe a good deal that is fantastic and +not a little that is affected. He is rarely entirely sincere and sane. +He shared with Byron an instinctive fondness for the rôle of a "blighted +being," and a halo of inebriety too often encircles his head; yet at his +best he moves us by the mysterious and incommunicable power of genius. +Many of his tales, on the other hand, are mere mechanical tasks, and as +such neither convincing nor permanent. There is a great deal of Poe +which is not worth anybody's reading because he did not believe it, did +not imagine it as real, when he wrote it. Other stories of his +illustrate the futility of self-deception on the part of the author. +"Lygeia" Poe always announced as his masterpiece. He apparently +persuaded himself that he felt its turgid sentimentality, that he +thrilled at its elaborately theatrical setting, and he flattered himself +that he could cheat the world as he had cheated himself. Yet the reader +is not fooled. Every man of judgment realizes that, however the author +was able to deceive himself, "Lygeia" is rubbish, and sophomoric rubbish +at that. + +There has probably never before been a time which afforded so abundant +illustrations of morbid work as to-day. We shall have occasion later to +speak of Verlaine, Zola, Ibsen, and the rest, with their prurient prose +and putrescent poetry; and here it is enough to note that the diseased +and the morbid are by definition excluded from literature in the best +sense of the word. Good art is not only sincere; it is human, and +wholesome, and sound. + + + + +II + +LITERARY EXPRESSION + + +So much, then, for what literature must express; it is well now to +examine for a little the manner of expression. To feel genuine emotion +is not all that is required of a writer. Among artists cannot be +reckoned + + One born with poet's heart in sad eclipse + Because unmatched with poet's tongue; + Whose song impassioned struggles to his lips, + Yet dies, alas! unsung. + +He must be able to sing the song; to make the reader share the throbbing +of his heart. All men feel; the artist is he who can by the use of +conventions impart his feelings to the world. The musician uses +conventions of sound, the painter conventions of color, the sculptor +conventions of form, and the writer must employ the means most +artificial of all, the conventions of language. + +Here might be considered, if there were space, the whole subject of +artistic technique; but it is sufficient for our purposes to notice that +the test of technical excellence is the completeness with which the +means are adapted to the end sought. The crucial question in regard to +artistic workmanship is: "Does it faithfully and fully convey the +emotion which is the essence of the work?" A work of art must make +itself felt as well as intellectually understood; it must reach the +heart as well as the brain. If a picture, a statue, a piece of music, or +a poem provokes your admiration without touching your sensibilities, +there is something radically wrong with the work--or with you. + +First of all, then, expression must be adequate. If it is slovenly, +incomplete, unskillful, it fails to impart the emotion which is its +purpose. We have all sat down seething with excitement and endeavored to +get our feelings upon paper, only to discover that our command of +ourselves and of technical means was not sufficient to allow us to +phrase adequately that which yet we felt most sincerely. It is true that +style is in a sense a subordinate matter, but it is none the less an +essential one. It is manifestly of little consequence to the world what +one has to say if one cannot say it. We cannot be thrilled by the song +which the dumb would sing had he but voice. + +Yet it is necessary to remember that although expression must be +adequate, it must also be subordinate. It is a means and not an end, and +the least suspicion of its having been put first destroys our sense of +the reality of the feeling it embodies. If an actress in moments of +impassioned declamation is detected arranging her draperies, her art no +longer carries conviction. Nobody feeling the heart-swelling words of +Queen Katharine, for instance, could while speaking them be openly +concerned about the effective disposition of her petticoats. The reader +of too intricate and elaborate verse, such as the French forms of +triolet, rondeau, rondel, and so on, has an instinctive perception that +a poet whose attention was taken up with the involved and artfully +difficult versification could not have been experiencing any deep +passion, no matter how strongly the verse protests that he has. +Expression obviously artful instantly arouses suspicion that it has been +wrought for its own sake only. + +Technical excellence which displays the cleverness of the artist rather +than imparts the emotion which is its object, defeats its own end. A +book so elaborated that we feel that the author was absorbed in +perfection of expression rather than in what he had to express leaves us +cold and unmoved, if it does not tire us. The messenger has usurped the +attention which belonged to the message. It is not impossible that I +shall offend some of you when I say that Walter Pater's "Marius the +Epicurean" seems to me a typical example of this sort of book. The +author has expended his energies in exquisite excesses of language; he +has refined his style until it has become artfully inanimate. It is like +one of the beautiful glass flowers in the Harvard Museum. It is not a +living rose. It is no longer a message spoken to the heart of mankind; +it is a brilliant exercise in technique. + +Literature, then, is genuine emotion, adequately expressed. To be +genuine it must come from the imagination; and adequate expression is +that which in turn reaches the imagination. If it were not that the +phrase seems forbiddingly cumbersome, we might, indeed, define +literature as being such writings as are able to arouse emotion by an +appeal to the imagination. + +A sensational story, what the English call a "penny dreadful" or a +"shilling shocker" according to the cost of the bundle of cheap +excitement, may be an appeal to the emotions, but it aims to act upon +the senses or the nerves. Its endeavor is to work by the grossest and +most palpable means. It is an assault, so to say, upon the perceptions. +Books of this sort have nothing to do with imagination, either in reader +or writer. They would be ruled out by all the tests which we have given, +since they are not sincere, not convincing, not consistent, not true to +life. + +One step higher in the scale come romances of abounding fancy, of which +"She" may serve as an example. They are clever feats of intellectual +jugglery, and it is to the intellectual perceptions that they appeal. +Not, it is true, to the intellect in its loftiest moods, but the +understanding as distinguished from the feeling. No reader is really +moved by them. The ingenuity of the author amuses and absorbs the +attention. The dexterity and unexpectedness of the tale excite and +entertain. The pleasure experienced in reading these books is not far +removed from that experienced in seeing a clever contortionist. To read +them is like going to the circus,--a pleasant diversion, and one not +without a certain importance to this over-wrought generation. It is +amusement, although not of a high grade. + +Do not suppose, however, that I am saying that a story cannot have an +exciting plot and yet be literature. In the restricted sense in which +these lectures take the term, I should say that "The Adventures of +Captain Horn," an agreeable book which has been widely read of late, is +not literature; and yet "Treasure Island," upon which perhaps to some +extent the former was modeled, most certainly is literature. The +difference is that while Stockton in "Captain Horn" has worked with +clever ingenuity to entertain, Stevenson in "Treasure Island" so vividly +imagined what he wrote that he has made his characters human, informed +every page with genuine feeling, and produced a romance permanently +vital. The plot of those superb masterpieces of adventure, the +"D'Artagnan Romances," is as wild, perhaps as extravagant, as that of +the marrow-curdling tales which make the fortunes of sensational papers; +but to the excitement of adventure is added that unification, that +humanization, that perfection of imaginative realism which mark Dumas as +a genius. + +The difference of effect between books which are not literature and +those which are is that while these amuse, entertain, glance over the +surface of the mind, those touch the deepest springs of being. They +touch us æsthetically, it is true. The emotion aroused is impersonal, +and thus removed from the keen thrill which is born of actual +experiences; but it depends upon the same passions, the same +characteristics, the same humanity, that underlie the joys and sorrows +of real life. It is because we are capable of passion and of +disappointment that we are moved by the love and anguish of Romeo and +Juliet, of Francesca and Paolo. Our emotion is not identical with that +with which the heart throbs in personal love and grief; yet art which is +genuine awakes emotion thoroughly genuine. Books of sensationalism and +sentimentality may excite curiosity, or wonder, or amusement, or sham +feeling; but they must have at least some spark of sacred fire before +they can arouse in the intelligent reader this inner throb of real +feeling. + +The personal equation must be considered here. The same book must affect +different readers differently. From the sentimental maid who weeps in +the kitchen over "The Seventy Sorrows of Madelaine the Broken-hearted," +to her master in his library, touched by the grief of King Lear, is +indeed a far cry; and yet both may be deeply moved. It may be asked +whether we have arrived at a standard which will enable us to judge +between them. + +The matter is perhaps to be cleared up somewhat by a little common +sense. It is not hard to decide whether the kitchen-maid in question has +an imagination sufficiently well developed to bring her within the +legitimate grounds of inquiry; and the fiction which delights her +rudimentary understanding is easily ruled out. It is not so easy, +however, to dispose of this point entirely. There is always a +border-land concerning which doubts and disagreements must continue to +exist. In all matters connected with the feelings it is necessary to +recognize the fact that the practical is not likely to accord fully with +the theoretical. We define literature only to be brought face to face +with the difficulty which is universal in art, the difficulty of degree. +No book will answer, it may be, to a theoretical definition, no work +conform completely to required conditions. The composition which is a +masterpiece stands at one end of the list, and comes so near to the +ideal that there is no doubt of its place. At the other end there is the +rubbish, equally unquestioned in its worthlessness. The troublesome +thing is to decide where between comes the dividing line above which is +literature. We call a ring or a coin gold, knowing that it contains a +mixture of alloy. The goldsmith may have a standard, and refuse the name +gold to any mixture into which enters a given per cent of baser metal; +but in art this is impossible. Here each reader must decide for himself. +Whether works which lie near the line are to be considered literature is +a question to be decided individually. Each reader is justified in +making his own decision, provided only that he found it upon definite +principles. It is largely a question what is one's own responsiveness to +literature. There are those to whom Tolstoi's "War and Peace" is a work +of greatness, while others fail to find it anything but a chaotic and +unorganized note-book of a genius not self-responsible. "John Inglesant" +appeals to many persons of excellent taste as a novel of permanent +beauty, while to some it seems sentimental and artificial. Mr. Lowell +and others have regarded Sylvester Judd's "Margaret" as one of the +classics of American fiction; yet it has never appealed to the general +public, and an eminent literary man told me not long ago that he finds +it dull. To these and to all other varying opinions there is but one +thing to be said: Any man has a right to his judgment if it is founded +upon the logical application of definite principles. Any opinion which +is sincere and based upon standards must be treated with respect, +whether it is agreed with or not. + +It is difficult, on the other hand, to feel that there is any moral +excuse for prejudices which are the result of individual whims rather +than of deliberate judgment. An opinion should not be some burr caught +up by the garments unawares; but a fruit carefully selected as the best +on the tree. The fact is that the effort of forming an intelligent +judgment is more severe than most persons care to undertake unless +absolutely forced to it. It sometimes seems as if the whole tendency of +modern life were in the direction of cultivating mental dexterity until +the need of also learning mental concentration is in danger of being +overlooked. Men are trained to meet intellectual emergencies, but not to +endure continued intellectual strain. The difficulty which is to be +conquered by a sudden effort they are able to overcome, but when +deliberation and continuous mental achievement are required, the +weakness of their training is manifest. The men, and perhaps still more +the women, of to-day are ready to decide upon the merits of a book in +the twinkling of an eye; and it is to be acknowledged that these snap +judgments are reasonable far more often than could have been expected. +When it comes, however, to having a reason for the faith that is in +them, it is lamentable how many intelligent persons prove utterly +incapable of fairly and logically examining literature; and it must be +conceded that there should be some other test by which to decide whether +a book is to be included under the gracious name of literature than the +dogmatic assertion: "Well, I don't care what anybody says against it; I +like it!" + + * * * * * + +We have discussed the distinctions by which it may be decided what is to +be considered literature; and, did space warrant, we might go on to +examine the principles which determine the rank of work. They are of +course largely to be inferred from what has been said already. The merit +of literature will be chiefly dependent upon the closeness with which it +conforms to the rules which mark the nature of literature. The more +fully genuine its emotion, the more adequate its expression, the higher +the scale in which a book is to be placed. The more sane and healthful, +the more entirely in accord with the needs and springs of general human +life, the greater the work. Indeed, beyond this there is little to say +save that the nobility of intention, the ethical significance of the +emotion embodied, mark the worth and the rank of a composition. + +I have tried to define literature, and yet in the end my strongest +feeling is that of the inadequacy of my definition. He would be but a +lukewarm lover who was capable of framing a description which would +appear to him to embody fully the perfections of his mistress; and art +is a mistress so beautiful, so high, so noble, that no phrases can fitly +characterize her, no service can be wholly worthy of her. Life is full +of disappointment, and pain, and bitterness, and that sense of futility +in which all these evils are summed up; and yet even were there no other +alleviation, he who knows and truly loves literature finds here a +sufficient reason to be glad that he lives. Science may show man how to +live; art makes living worth his while. Existence to-day without +literature would be a failure and a despair; and if we cannot +satisfactorily define our art, we at least are aware how it enriches and +ennobles the life of every human being who comes within the sphere of +its wide and gracious influence. + + + + +III + +THE STUDY OF LITERATURE + + +When it is clearly understood what literature is, there may still remain +a good deal of vagueness in regard to the study of it. It is by no means +sufficient for intellectual development that one have a misty general +share in the conventional respect traditionally felt for such study. +There should be a clear and accurate comprehension why the study of +literature is worth the serious attention of earnest men and women. + +It might at first thought seem that of this question no discussion is +needed. It is generally assumed that the entire matter is sufficiently +obvious, and that this is all that there is to it. The obvious, however, +is often the last to be perceived; and such is the delusiveness of human +nature that to call a thing too plain to need demonstration is often but +a method of concealing inability to prove. Men are apt to fail to +perceive what lies nearest to them, while to cover their blindness and +ignorance they are ready to accept without reasoning almost any +assumption which comes well recommended. The demand for patent +medicines, wide-spread as it is, is insignificant in comparison to the +demand for ready-made opinions. Most men accept the general belief, and +do not trouble themselves to make it really theirs by examining the +grounds upon which it is based. We all agree that it is well to study +literature, it is probable; but it is to be feared that those of us who +can say exactly why it is well do not form a majority. + +The word "study," it may be remarked in passing, is not an entirely +happy one in this connection. It has, it is true, many delightful +associations, especially for those who have really learned how to study; +but it has, too, a certain doleful suggestiveness which calls up painful +memories of childhood. It is apt to bring to mind bitter hours when some +example in long division stood like an impassable wall between us and +all happiness; when complex fractions deprived life of all joy, or the +future was hopelessly blurred by being seen through a mist of tears and +irregular French verbs. The word "study" is therefore likely to seem to +indicate a mechanical process, full of weariness and vexation of spirit. +This is actually true of no study which is worthy of the name; and least +of all is it true in connection with art. The word as applied to +literature is not far from meaning intelligent enjoyment; it signifies +not only apprehension but comprehension; it denotes not so much +accumulation as assimilation; it is not so much acquirement as +appreciation. + +By the study of literature can be meant nothing pedantic, nothing +formal, nothing artificial. I should like to call the subject of these +talks "Experiencing Literature," if the verb could be received in the +same sense as in the old-fashioned phrase "experiencing religion." That +is what I mean. The study of literature is neither less nor more than +experiencing literature,--the taking it to heart and the getting to its +heart. + +To most persons to study literature means nothing more than to read. +There is, it is true, a vague general notion that it is the reading of +some particular class of books, not always over clearly defined. It is +not popularly supposed that the reading of an ordinary newspaper is part +of the study of literature; while on the other hand there are few +persons who can imagine that the perusal of Shakespeare, however casual, +can be anything else. Since literary art is in the form of written +works, reading is of course essential; but by study we mean something +more grave and more fruitful than the mere surface acquaintance with +books, no matter how high in the scale of excellence these may be. + +The study of literature, in the true signification of the phrase, is +that act by which the learner gets into the attitude of mind which +enables him to enter into that creative thought which is the soul of +every real book. It is easily possible, as every reader knows, to read +without getting below the surface; to take a certain amount of +intellectual account of that which we skim; to occupy with it the +attention, and yet not to be at all in the mood which is indispensable +for proper comprehension. It is this which makes it possible for the +young girl of the present day to read novels which her more +sophisticated brothers cannot look at without blushing to see them in +her hands--at least, we hope that it is this! We all have moments when +from mental weariness, indifference, indolence, or abstraction, we slide +over the pages as a skater goes over the ice, never for a moment having +so much as a glimpse of what is hidden beneath the surface. This is not +the thing about which we are talking. We mean by study the making our +own all that is contained in the books which we read; and not only all +that is said, but still more all that is suggested; all that is to be +learned, but above everything all that is to be felt. + +The object of the study of literature is always a means and not an end, +and yet in the development of the mind no means can fulfill its purpose +which is not an enjoyment. Goethe has said: "Woe to that culture which +points man always to an end, instead of making him happy by the way." No +study is of any high value which is not a delight in itself; and +equally, no study is of value which is pursued simply for itself. Every +teacher knows how futile is work in which the pupil is not +interested,--in other words, which is not a pleasure to him. The mind +finds delight in all genuine activity and acquirement; and the student +must take pleasure in his work or he is learning little. Some formal or +superficial knowledge he may of course accumulate. The learning of the +multiplication table is not to be set aside as useless because it is +seldom accompanied by thrills of passionate enjoyment. There must be +some drudgery in education; but at least what I have said certainly +holds good in all that relates to the deeper and higher development of +the mind. + +The study of literature, then, is both a duty and a delight; a pleasure +in itself and a help toward what is better. By it one approaches the +comprehension of those books which are to be ranked as works of art. By +it one endeavors to fit himself to enter into communication with the +great minds and the great imaginations of mankind. What we gain in this +may be broadly classified as pleasure, social culture, and a knowledge +of life. Any one of these terms might almost be made to include the +other two, but the division here is convenient in discussion. + +Pleasure in its more obvious meaning is the most superficial, although +the most evident, gain from art. In its simplest form this is mere +amusement and recreation. We read, we say, "to pass the time." There are +in life hours which need to be beguiled; times when we are unequal to +the fatigue or the worry of original thought, or when some present +reality is too painful to be faced. In these seasons we desire to be +delivered from self, and the self-forgetfulness and the entertainment +that we find in books are of unspeakable relief and value. This is of +course a truism; but it was never before so insistently true as it is +to-day. Life has become so busy, it is in a key so high, so nervously +exhaustive, that the need of amusement, of recreation which shall be a +relief from the severe nervous and mental strain, has become most +pressing. The advance of science and civilization has involved mankind +in a turmoil of multitudinous and absorbing interests from the pressure +of which there seems to us no escape except in self-oblivion; and the +most obvious use of reading is to minister to this end. + +At the risk of being tedious it is necessary to remark in passing that +herein lies a danger not to be passed over lightly. There is steadily +increasing the tendency to treat literature as if it had no other +function than to amuse. There is too much reading which is like +opium-eating or dram-drinking. It is one thing to amuse one's self to +live, and quite another to live to amuse one's self. It is universally +conceded, I believe, that the intellect is higher than the body; and I +cannot see why it does not follow that intellectual debauchery is more +vicious than physical. Certainly it is difficult to see why the man who +neglects his intellect while caring scrupulously for his body is on a +higher moral plane than the man who, though he neglect or drug his body, +does cultivate his mind. + +In an entirely legitimate fashion, however, books may be read simply for +amusement; and greatly is he to be pitied who is not able to lose +himself in the enchantments of books. A physical cripple is hardly so +sorrowful an object. Everybody knows the remark attributed to +Talleyrand, who is said to have answered a man who boasted that he had +never learned whist: "What a miserable old age you are preparing for +yourself." A hundredfold is it true that he who does not early cultivate +the habit of reading is neglecting to prepare a resource for the days +when he shall be past active life. While one is in the strength of youth +or manhood it is possible to fill the mind with interests of activity. +As long as one is engaged in affairs directly the need of the solace of +books is less evident and less pressing. It is difficult to think +without profound pity of the aged man or woman shut off from all +important participation in the work or the pleasure of the world, if the +vicarious enjoyment of human interests through literature be also +lacking. It is amazing how little this fact is realized or insisted +upon. There is no lack of advice to the young to provide for the +material comfort of their age, but it is to be doubted whether the +counsel to prepare for their intellectual comfort is not the more +important. Reading is the garden of joy to youth, but for age it is a +house of refuge. + + * * * * * + +The second object which one may have in reading is that of social +cultivation. It is hardly necessary to remark how large a part books +play in modern conversation, or how much one may add to one's +conversational resources by judicious reading. It is true that not a +little of the modern talk about books is of a quality to make the +genuine lover of literature mingle a smile with a sigh. It is the result +not of reading literature, so much as of reading about literature. It is +said that Boston culture is simply diluted extract of "Littell's Living +Age;" and in the same spirit it might be asserted that much modern talk +about books is the extract of newspaper condensations of prefaces. The +tale is told of the thrifty paupers of a Scotch alms-house that the +aristocrats among them who had friends to give them tea would steep and +re-steep the precious herb, then dry the leaves, and sell them to the +next grade of inmates. These in turn, after use, dried the much-boiled +leaves once again, and sold them to the aged men to be ground up into a +sort of false snuff with which the poor creatures managed to cheat into +feeble semblance of joy their withered nostrils. I have in my time heard +not a little so-called literary conversation which seemed to me to have +gone to the last of these processes, and to be a very poor quality of +thrice-steeped tea-leaf snuff! Indeed, it must be admitted that in +general society book talk is often confined to chatter about books which +had better not have been read, and to the retailing of second-hand +opinions at that. The majority of mankind are as fond of getting their +ideas as they do their household wares, at a bargain counter. It is +perhaps better to do this than to go without ideas, but it is to be +borne in mind that on the bargain counter one is sure to find only cheap +or damaged wares. + +Real talk about books, however, the expression of genuine opinions about +real literature, is one of the most delightful of social pleasures. It +is at once an enjoyment and a stimulus. From it one gets mental poise, +clearness and readiness of ideas, and mental breadth. It is so important +an element in human intercourse that it is difficult to conceive of an +ideal friendship into which it does not enter. There have been happy +marriages between men and women lacking in cultivation, but no marriage +relation can be so harmonious that it may not be enriched by a community +of literary tastes. A wise old gentleman whom I once knew had what he +called an infallible receipt for happy marriages: "Mutual love, a sense +of humor, and a liking for the same books." Certainly with these a good +deal else might be overlooked. Personally I have much sympathy with the +man who is said to have claimed a divorce on the ground that his wife +did not like Shakespeare and would read Ouida. It is a serious trial to +find the person with whom one must live intimately incapable of +intellectual talk. + +He who goes into general society at all is expected to be able to keep +up at least the appearance of talking about literature with some degree +of intelligence. This is an age in which the opportunities for what may +be called cosmopolitan knowledge are so general that it has come to be +the tacit claim of any society worth the name that such knowledge shall +be possessed by all. I do not, of course, mean simply that acquaintance +with foreign affairs which is to be obtained from the newspapers, even +all wisdom as set forth in their vexingly voluminous Sunday editions. I +mean that it is necessary to have with the thought of other countries, +with their customs, and their habits of thought, that familiarity which +is by most to be gained only by general reading. The multiplication of +books and the modern habit of travel have made an acquaintance with the +temper of different peoples a social necessity almost absolute. + +To a great extent is it also true that modern society expects a +knowledge of social conditions and æsthetic affairs in the past. This is +not so much history, formally speaking, as it is the result of a certain +familiarity with the ways, the habits of thought, the manners of bygone +folk. Professor Barrett Wendell has an admirable phrase: "It is only in +books that one can travel in time." What in the present state of society +is expected from the accomplished man or woman is that he or she shall +have traveled in time. He shall have gone back into the past in the same +sense as far as temper of mind is concerned that one goes to Europe; +shall have observed from the point of view not of the dry historian +only, but from that of the student of humanity in the broadest sense. It +is the humanness of dwellers in distant lands or in other times which +most interests us; and it is with this that he who would shine in social +converse must become familiar. + +The position in which a man finds himself who in the company of educated +men displays ignorance of what is important in the past is illustrated +by a story told of Carlyle. At a dinner of the Royal Academy in London, +Thackeray and Carlyle were guests, and at the table the talk among the +artists around them turned upon Titian. "One fact about Titian," a +painter said, "is his glorious coloring." "And his glorious drawing is +another fact about Titian," put in a second. Then one added one thing +in praise and another another, until Carlyle interrupted them, to say +with egotistic emphasis and deliberation: "And here sit I, a man made in +the image of God, who knows nothing about Titian, and who cares nothing +about Titian;--and that's another fact about Titian." But Thackeray, who +was sipping his claret and listening, paused and bowed gravely to his +fellow-guest. "Pardon me," he said, "that is not a fact about Titian. It +is a fact--and a very lamentable fact--about Thomas Carlyle." Attempts +to carry off ignorance under the guise of indifference or superiority +are common, but in the end nobody worth deceiving is misled by them. + +It is somewhat trite to compare the companionship of good books to that +of intellectual persons, and yet the constant repetition of a truth does +not make it false. To know mankind and to know one's self are the great +shaping forces which mould character. It has too often been said to need +to be insisted upon at any great length that literature may largely +represent experience; but it may fitly be added that in reading one is +able to choose the experiences to which he will be exposed. In life we +are often surrounded by what is base and ignoble, but this need not +happen to us in the library unless by our deliberate choice. Emerson +aptly says:-- + + Go with mean people and you think life is mean. Then read Plutarch, + and the world is a proud place, peopled with men of positive quality, + with heroes and demigods standing around us, who will not let us + sleep. + +It so often happens that we are compelled in daily life to encounter and +to deal with mean people that our whole existence would be in great +danger of becoming hopelessly sordid and mean were it not for the +blessed company of great minds with whom we may hold closest communion +through what they have written. + +One more point in regard to the social influence of reading should be +mentioned. Social ease and aplomb can of course be gained in no way save +by actual experience; but apart from this there is nothing else so +effective as familiarity with the best books. Sympathetic comprehension +of literature is the experience of life taken vicariously. It is living +through the consciousness of others, and those, moreover, who are the +cleverest and most far-reaching minds of all time. The mere man of books +brought into contact with the real world is confused and helpless; but +when once the natural shyness and bewilderment have worn off, he is able +to recall and to use the knowledge which he has acquired in the study, +and rapidly adapts himself to any sphere that he may find himself in. I +do not mean that a man may read himself into social grace and ease; but +surely any given man is at a very tangible advantage in society for +having learned from books what society is. + + + + +IV + +WHY WE STUDY LITERATURE + + +In all that is said in the last chapter we have dealt only with the +outward and accidental, barely touching upon the really significant and +deeper meanings of our subject. The third object which I named, the +gaining a knowledge of life, transcends all others. + +The desire to fathom the meaning of life is the most constant and +universal of human longings. It is practically impossible to conceive of +consciousness separated from the wish to understand self and the +significance of existence. This atom selfhood, sphered about by the +infinite spaces of the universe, yearns to comprehend what and where it +is. It sends its thought to the farthest star that watches the night, +and thence speeds it down the unsounded void, to search unweariedly for +the answer of the baffling, insistent riddle of life. Whatever man does +or dreams, hopes or fears, loves or hates, suffers or enjoys, has behind +it the eternal doubt, the question which man asks of the universe with +passionate persistence,--the meaning of life. + +Most of all does man seek aid in solving this absorbing mystery. Nothing +else interests the human like the human. The slatternly women leaning +out of tenement-house windows and gossiping across squalid courts talk +of their neighbors. The wisest philosopher studies the acts and the +thoughts of men. In the long range between these extremes there is every +grade of intelligence and cultivation; and in each it is the doings, the +thoughts, most of all the feelings, of mankind which elicit the keenest +interest. The motto of the Latin playwright is in reality the motto of +the race: "Nothing human is indifferent to me." + +We are all intensely eager to know what are the possibilities of +humanity. We seek knowledge of them as an heir questions searchingly +concerning the extent of the inheritance which has fallen to him. +Literature is the inventory of the heritage of humanity. Life is but a +succession of emotions; and the earnest mind burns with desire to learn +what emotions are within its possibilities. The discoverer of an +unsuspected capability of receiving delight, the realization of an +unknown sensation, even of pain, increases by so much the extent of the +possessions of the human being to whom he imparts it. As explorers in a +new country tell one another of the springs upon which they have +chanced, of the fertile meadows one has found, of the sterile rocks or +the luscious jungle, so men tell one another of their fresh findings in +emotion. The knowledge of life--this is the passionate quest of the +whole race of men. + +All that most deeply concerns man, all that reaches most penetratingly +to the roots of being, is recorded, so far as humanity has been able to +give to it expression, in art. Of all art, literature is perhaps the +most universally intelligible; or, if not that, it is at least the most +positively intelligible. Our interest in life shows itself in a burning +curiosity to know what goes on in the minds of our friends; to discover +what others make out of existence, what they find in its possibilities, +its limitations, its sorrows, and its delights. In varying degrees, +according to individual temperament, we pass life in an endeavor to +discover and to share the feelings of other human beings. We explain our +feelings, our motives; we wonder whether they look to others as they do +to us; we speculate whether others have found a way to get from life +more than we get; and above all are we consciously or unconsciously +eager to learn whether any other has contrived means of finding in life +more vivid sensations, more vibrant emotions, more far-reaching feelings +than those which we experience. It is in this insatiable curiosity that +our deepest interest in literature lies. + +Books explain us to ourselves. They reveal to us capabilities in our +nature before unsuspected. They make intelligible the meaning and +significance of mental experiences. There are books the constant +rereading of which presents itself to an imaginative man as a sort of +moral duty, so great is the illumination which they throw upon the inner +being. I could name works which I personally cannot leave long neglected +without a feeling of conscious guilt. It is of books of this nature that +Emerson says that they + + Take rank in our life with parents and lovers and passionate + experiences, so medicinal, so stringent, so revolutionary, so + authoritative,--books which are the work and the proof of faculties so + comprehensive, so nearly equal to the world which they paint, that + though one shuts them with meaner ones, he feels the exclusion from + them to accuse his way of living.--_Books._ + +There are probably none of us who have lived in vital relations to +literature who cannot remember some book which has been an epoch in our +lives. The times and the places when and where we read them stand out in +memory as those of great mental crises. We recall the unforgettable +night in which we sat until the cold gray dawn looked in at the window +reading Lessing's "Nathan the Wise," the sunny slope where we +experienced Madame de Gasparin's "Near and Heavenly Horizons," the +winter twilight in the library when that most strenuous trumpet blast of +all modern ethical poetry, "Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came," first +rang in the ears of the inner self. We all have these memories. There +are books which must to us always be alive. They have spoken to us; we +have heard their very voices; we know them in our heart of hearts. + +That desire for sympathy which is universal is another strong incentive +to acquaintance with literature. The savage who is less miserable in +fear or in suffering if he find a fellow whose living presence saves him +from the awful sense of being alone is unconsciously moved by this +desire. The more fully the race is developed the more is this craving +for human companionship and human appreciation conscious. We know how +impossible it is ever completely to blend our consciousness for the +smallest instant with that of any other human being. The nearest +approach to this is the sharing with another some common feeling. There +are blissful moments when some other is absorbed in the same emotion as +that which we feel; when we seem to be one with the heart and the mind +of another creature because the same strong passion sways us both. These +are the mountain-tops of existence. These are the times which stand out +in our remembrance as those in which life has touched in seeming the +divine impossible. + +It is of the greatest rarity, however, that we find, even in our closest +friends, that comprehension and delicate sympathy for which we long. +Indeed, such is human egotism that it is all but impossible for any one +so far to abandon his own personality as to enter fully into the more +delicate and intangible feelings of his fellow. A friend is another +self, according to the proverb, but it is apt to be himself and not +yourself. To find sympathy which comes from a knowledge that our inmost +emotions are shared we turn to books. Especially is this true in +bereavement and in sorrow. The touch of a human hand, the wistful look +in the eye of the friend who longs to help, or the mere presence of some +beautiful and responsive spirit, is the best solace where comfort is +impossible; but even the tenderest human presence may jar, while in +books there is a consolation and a tenderness unhampered by the baffling +sense of a consciousness still outside of our own no matter how +strenuously it longs to be in perfect unity. I knew once a mother who +had lost her only child, and who used to sit for hours pressing to her +heart Plutarch's divinely tender letter to his wife on the death of his +own little one. It was almost as if she felt her baby again in her arms, +and the leather covers of the book were stained with tears consecrated +and saving. Who could count the number to whom "In Memoriam" has carried +comfort when living friends had no message? The critical defects of that +poem are not far to seek; but it would ill become us to forget how many +grief-laden hearts it has reached and touched. The book which lessens +the pain of humanity is in so far higher than criticism. + +Josiah Quincy used in his old age to relate how his mother, left a young +widow by the death of her husband within sight of the shores of America +when on his return from a mission to England, found comfort in the +soothing ministration of books:-- + + She cultivated the memory of my father, even in my earliest childhood, + by reading me passages from the poets, and obliging me to learn by + heart and repeat such as were best adapted to her own circumstances + and feelings. Among others the whole leave-taking of Hector and + Andromache, in the sixth book of Pope's Homer, was one of her favorite + lessons.... Her imagination, probably, found consolation in the + repetition of lines which brought to mind and seemed to typify her own + great bereavement. + + And think'st thou not how wretched we shall be,-- + A widow I, a helpless orphan he? + + These lines, and the whole tenor of Andromache's address and + circumstances, she identified with her own sufferings, which seemed + relieved by the tears my repetition of them drew from her. + +This comforting power of literature is one which need not perhaps have +been enlarged upon so fully, but it is one which has to do with the most +intimate and poignant relations of life. + +It is largely in virtue of the sympathy which it is possible to feel for +books that from them we not only receive a knowledge of the capacities +of human emotion, but we are given actual emotional experience as well. +For literature has a twofold office. It not only shows the possibilities +of life, but it may make these possibilities realities. If art simply +showed us what might be without aiding us further, it would be but a +banquet of Tantalus. We must have the substance as well as the shadow. +We are born not only with a craving to know what emotions are the +birthright of man, but with an instinctive desire to enter into that +inheritance. We wish to be all that it is possible for men to be. The +small boy who burns to be a pirate or a policeman when he grows up, is +moved by the idea that to men of these somewhat analogous callings come +a richness of adventure and a fullness of sensation which are not to be +found in ordinary lives. The lad does not reason this out, of course; +but the instinctive desire for emotion speaks in him. We are born with +the craving to know to the full the emotions of the race. It is to few +of us in modern civilized life that circumstances permit a widely +extended experience in actual mental sensations. The commonplace +actualities of every-day life show plain and dull beside the almost +infinite possibilities of existence. The realization of the contrast +makes not a few mortals unhappy and dissatisfied; but those who are +wiser accept life as it is, and turn to art for the gratification of the +instinctive craving which is unsatisfied by outward reality. + +It may be that fate has condemned us to the most humdrum of existences. +We trade or we teach or are lawyers or housekeepers, doctors or nurses, +or the curse of the gods has fallen upon us and we are condemned to the +dreariness of a life of pleasure-seeking. We cannot of ourselves know +the delights of the free outlaw's life under "the greene shaw,"--the +chase of the deer, the twang of the bowstring, the song of the minstrel, +the relish of venison pasty and humming nut-brown ale, are not for us in +the flesh. If we go into the library, however, take down that volume +with the cover of worn brown leather, and give up the imagination to the +guidance of the author, all these things become possible to the inner +sense. We become aware of the reek of the woodland fire, the smell of +the venison roasting on spits of ash-wood, the chatter of deep manly +voices, the cheery sound of the bugle-horn afar, the misty green light +of the forest, the soft sinking feel of the moss upon which in +imagination we have flung ourselves down, while Will Scarlet teases +Friar Tuck yonder, and Allan-a-Dale touches light wandering chords on +his harp.--Ah, where are the four walls of the library, where is the +dull round of cares and trifles which involve us day by day? We are in +merry Sherwood with bold Robin Hood, and we know what there was felt and +lived. + +We cannot in outward experience know how a great and generous heart must +feel, broken by ingratitude and unfaith, deceived and tortured through +its noblest qualities, outraged in its highest love. The poet says to +us: "Come with me; and through the power of the imagination, talisman +more potent than the ring of Solomon, we will enter the heart of +Othello, and with him suffer this agony. We will endure the torture, +since behind it is the exquisite delight of appeasing that insatiable +thirst for a share in human emotions. Or would you taste the passion of +young and ardent hearts, their woe at parting, and their resolved +devotion which death itself cannot abate? We will be one with Romeo and +one with Juliet." Thus, if we will, we may go with him through the +entire range of mortal joys and sorrows. We live with a fullness of +living beside which, it may be, our ordinary existence is flat and pale. +We find the real life, the life of the imagination; and we recognize +that this is after all more vital than our concern over the price of +stocks, our petty bother about the invitation to the Hightops' ball on +the twenty-fourth, or the silly pang of brief jealousy which we +experienced when we heard that Jack Scribbler's sonnet was to appear in +the next number of the magazine which had just returned our own poem +"with thanks." The littlenesses of the daily round slip out of sight +before the nobility of the life possible in the imagination. + +It is not necessary to multiply examples of the pleasures possible +through the imagination. Every reader knows how varied and how +enchanting they are. To enter into them is in so far to fulfill the +possibilities of life. The knowledge which is obtained through books is +not the same, it is true, as that which comes from actual doing and +enduring. Perhaps if the imagination were sufficiently developed there +would be little difference. There have been men who have been hardly +able to distinguish between what they experienced in outward life and +what belonged solely to the inner existence. Coleridge and Wordsworth +and Keats made no great or sharply defined distinction between the +things which were true in fact and those that were true in imagination. +To Blake the events of life were those which he knew through +imagination, while what happened in ordinary, every-day existence he +regarded as the accidental and the non-essential. + +It will probably be thought, however, that those who live most +abundantly are not likely to feel the need of testing existence and +tasting emotions through the medium of letters. The pirate, when decks +are red and smoke of powder is in the air, is not likely to retire to +his cabin for a session of quiet and delightful reading; the lover may +peruse sentimental ballads or make them, but on the whole everything +else is subordinate to the romance he is living. It is when his +lady-love keeps him at a distance that he has time for verse; not when +she graciously allows him near. It is told of Darwin that his absorption +in science destroyed not only his love of Shakespeare but even his power +of enjoying music. The actual interests of life were so vivid that the +artistic sense was numbed. The imagination exhausted itself in exploring +the unknown world of scientific knowledge. It is to be noted that boys +who go deeply into college sports, especially if they are on the +"teams," are likely to become so absorbed in the sporting excitement +that literature appears to them flat and tame. The general rule is that +he who lives in stimulating and absorbing realities is thereby likely to +be inclined to care less for literature. + +It is to be remembered, however, that individual experience is apt to be +narrow, and that it may be positively trivial and still engross the +mind. That one is completely given up to affairs does not necessarily +prove these affairs to be noble. It is generally agreed, too, that the +mind is more elastic which is reached and developed by literature; and +that even the scientist is likely to do better work for having ennobled +his perceptions by contact with the thoughts of master spirits. Before +Darwin was able to advance so far in science as to have no room left for +art, he had trained his faculties by the best literature. At least it is +time enough to give up books when life has become so full of action as +to leave no room for them. This happens to few, and even those of whom +it is true cannot afford to do without literature as an agent in the +development and shaping of character. + +The good which we gain from the experiences of life we call insight. No +man or woman ever loved without thereby gaining insight into what life +really is. No man has stood smoke-stained and blood-spattered in the +midst of battle, caught away out of self in an ecstasy of daring, +without thereby learning hitherto undreamed-of possibilities in +existence. Indeed this is true of the smallest incident. Character is +the result of experience upon temperament, as ripple-marks are the +result of the coming together of sand and wave. In life, however, we are +generally more slow to learn the lessons from events than from books. +The author of genius has the art so to arrange and present his truths as +to impress them upon the reader. The impressions of events remain with +us, but it is not easy for ordinary mortals so to realize their meaning +and so to phrase it that it shall remain permanent and clear in the +mind. The mental vision is clouded, moreover, by the personal element. +We are seldom able to be perfectly frank with ourselves. Self is ever +the apologist for self. Knowledge without self-honesty is as a torch +without flame; yet of all the moral graces self-honesty is perhaps the +most difficult to acquire. In its acquirement is literature of the +highest value. A man can become acquainted with his spiritual face as +with his bodily countenance only by its reflection. Literature is the +mirror in which the soul learns to recognize its own lineaments. + +Above all these personal reasons which make literature worthy of the +serious attention of earnest men and women is the great fact that upon +the proper development and the proper understanding of it depend largely +the advancement and the wise ordering of civilization. Stevenson spoke +words of wisdom when he said:-- + + One thing you can never make Philistine natures understand; one thing, + which yet lies on the surface, remains as unseizable to their wits as + a high flight of metaphysics,--namely, that the business of life is + mainly carried on by the difficult art of literature, and according to + a man's proficiency in that art shall be the freedom and fullness of + his intercourse with other men. + +In a fine passage in a little-known pamphlet, James Hannay touches upon +the relation of literature to life and to the practical issues of +society:-- + + A notion is abroad that that only is "practical" which can be measured + or eaten. Show us its net result in marketable form, the people say, + and we will recognize it! But what if there be something prior to all + such "net results," something higher than it? For example, the writing + of an old Hebrew Prophet was by no manner of means "practical" in his + own times! The supply of figs to the Judean markets, the price of oil + in the synagogue-lamps, did not fluctuate with the breath of those + inspired songs! But in due time the prophet dies, stoned, perhaps, ... + and in the course of ages, his words do have a "practical" result by + acting on the minds of nations.... In England what has not happened + from the fact that the Bible was translated? We have seen the + Puritans--we know what we owe to them--what the world owes to them! A + dozen or two of earnest men two centuries ago were stirred to the + depths of their souls by the visions of earnest men many centuries + before that; do you not see that the circumstance has its practical + influence in the cotton-markets of America at this hour?--Quoted in + Espinasse's _Literary Recollections_. + +It is impossible to separate the influences of literature from the +growth of society and of civilization. It is because of the reaching of +the imagination into the unknown vast which incloses man that life is +what it is. The order that is given to butcher or baker or +candlestick-maker is modified by the fact that Homer and Dante and +Shakespeare sang; that the prophets and the poets and the men of +imagination of whatever time and race have made thought and feeling what +they are. "The world of imagination," Blake wrote, "is the world of +eternity." Whatever of permanent interest and value man has achieved he +has reached through this divine faculty, and it is only when man learns +to know and to enter the world of imagination that he comes into actual +contact with the vital and the fundamental in human life. Easily abused, +like all the best gifts of the gods, art remains the noblest and the +most enduring power at work in civilization; and literature is its most +direct embodiment. To it we go when we would leave behind the sordid, +the mean, and the belittling. When we would enter into our birthright, +when we remember that instead of being mere creatures of the dust we are +the heirs of the ages, then it is through books that we find and possess +the treasures of the race. + + + + +V + +FALSE METHODS + + +The most common intellectual difficulty is not that of the lack of +ideas, but that of vagueness of ideas. Most persons of moderately good +education have plenty of thoughts such as they are, but there is a +nebulous quality about these which renders them of little use in +reasoning. This makes it necessary to define what is meant by the Study +of Literature, as in the first place it was necessary to define +literature itself. Many have a formless impression that it is something +done with books, a sort of mysterious rite known only to the initiated, +and probably a good deal like the mysteries of secret societies,--more +of a theory than an actuality. Others, who are more confident of their +powers of accurate thinking, have decided that the phrase is merely a +high-sounding name for any reading which is not agreeable, but which is +recommended by text-books. Some take it to be getting over all the books +possible, good, bad, and indifferent; while still others suppose it to +be reading about books or their authors. There are plenty of ideas as to +what the study of literature is, but the very diversity of opinion +proves that at least a great many of these must be erroneous. + +In the first place the study of literature is not the mere reading of +books. Going on a sort of Cook's tour through literature, checking off +on lists what one has read, may be amusing to simple souls, but beyond +that it means little and effects little. As the question to be asked in +regard to a tourist is how intelligently and how observantly he has +traveled, so the first consideration in regard to a reader is how he +reads. + +The rage for swiftness which is so characteristic of this restless time +has been extended to fashions of reading. By some sort of a vicious +perversion, the old saw that he who runs may read seems to have been +transposed to "He who reads must run." In other words there is too often +an assumption that the intellectual distinction of an individual is to +be estimated by the rapidity with which he is able to hurry through the +volumes he handles. Intellectual assimilation takes time. The mind is +not to be enriched as a coal barge is loaded. Whatever is precious in a +cargo is taken carefully on board and carefully placed. Whatever is +delicate and fine must be received delicately, and its place in the mind +thoughtfully assigned. + +One effect of the modern habit of swift and careless reading is seen in +the impatience with which anything is regarded which is not to be taken +in at a glance. The modern reader is apt to insist that a book shall be +like a theatre-poster. He must be able to take it all in with a look as +he goes past it on a wheel, and if he cannot he declares that it is +obscure. W. M. Hunt said, with bitter wisdom: "As print grows cheap, +thinkers grow scarce." The enormous increase of books has bred a race of +readers who seem to feel that the object of reading is not to read but +to have read; not to enjoy and assimilate, but to have turned over the +greatest possible number of authors. This idea of the study of +literature is as if one selected as the highest social ideal the +afternoon tea, where the visitor is presented to numberless strangers +and has an opportunity of conversing rationally with nobody. + +A class of self-styled students of literature far more pernicious than +even the record-breaking readers is that of the gossip-mongers. These +are they who gratify an innate fondness of gossip and scandal under the +pretext of seeking culture, and who feed an impertinent curiosity in the +name of a noble pursuit. They read innumerable volumes filled with the +more or less spicy details of authors; they perhaps visit the spots +where the geniuses of the world lived and worked. They peruse eagerly +every scrap of private letters, journals, and other personal matter +which is available. For them are dragged to light all the imperfect +manuscripts which famous novelists have forgotten to burn. For them was +perpetrated the infamy of the publication of the correspondence of Keats +with Miss Brawne; to them Mrs. Stowe appealed in her foul book about +Byron, which should have been burned by the common hangman. It is they +who buy the newspaper descriptions of the back bedroom of the popular +novelist and the accounts of the misunderstanding between the poet and +his washerwoman. They scent scandal as swine scent truffles, and degrade +the noble name of literature by making it an excuse for their petty +vulgarity. + +The race is by no means a new one. Milton complained of it in the early +days of the church, when, he says:-- + + With less fervency was studied what St. Paul or St. John had written + than was listened to one that could say: "Here he taught, here he + stood, this was his stature, and thus he went habited," and, "O happy + this house that harbored him, and that cold stone whereon he rested, + this village where he wrought a miracle." + +Schopenhauer, too, has his indignant protest against this class:-- + + Petrarch's house in Arqua, Tasso's supposed prison in Ferrara, + Shakespeare's house in Stratford, Goethe's house in Weimar, with its + furniture, Kant's old hat, the autographs of great men,--these things + are gaped at with interest and awe by many who have never read their + works. + +All this is of course a matter of personal vanity. Small souls pride +themselves upon having these things, upon knowing intimate details of +the lives of prominent persons. They endeavor thus to attach themselves +to genius, as burrs cling to the mane of a lion. The imagination has +nothing to do with it; there is in it no love of literature. It is +vanity pure and simple, a common vulgar vanity which substitutes +self-advertisement and gossip-mongering for respect and appreciation. +Who can have tolerance for the man whose proudest boast is that he was +in a crowd presented to some poet whose books he never read; for the +woman who claims attention on the ground that she has from her +seamstress heard particulars of the domestic infelicities of a great +novelist; or for the gossip of either sex who takes pride in knowing +about famous folk trifles which are nobody's business but their own? + +A good many text-books encourage this folly, and there are not a few +writers who pass their useless days in grubbing in the dust-heaps of the +past to discover the unessential and unmeaning incidents in the lives of +bygone worthies. They put on airs of vast superiority over mortals who +scorn their ways and words; they have only pitying contempt for readers +who suppose that the works of an author are what the world should be +concerned with instead of his grocery bills and the dust on his library +table. Such meddlers have no more to do with literature than the spider +on the eaves of kings' houses has to do with affairs of state. + +It is not that all curiosity about famous men is unwholesome or +impertinent. The desire to know about those whose work has touched us is +natural and not necessarily objectionable. It is outside of the study of +literature, save in so far as it now and then--less often, I believe, +than is usually assumed--may help us to understand what an author has +written; yet within proper limits it is to be indulged in, just as we +all indulge now and then in harmless gossip concerning our fellows. It +is almost sure to be a hindrance rather than a help in the study of +literature if it goes much beyond the knowledge of those circumstances +in the life of an author which have directly affected what he has +written. There are few facts in literary history for which we have so +great reason to be devoutly thankful as that so little is known +concerning the life of the greatest of poets. We are able to read +Shakespeare with little or no interruption in the way of detail about +his private affairs, and for this every lover of Shakespeare's poetry +should be grateful. + +The study of literature, it must be recognized farther, is not the study +of the history of literature. The development of what are termed +"schools" of literature; the change in fashions of expression; the +modifications in verse-forms and the growth and decay of this or that +phase of popular taste in books, are all matters of interest in a way. +They are not of great value, as a rule, yet they will often help the +reader to a somewhat quicker appreciation of the force and intention of +literary forms. It is necessary to have at least a general idea of the +course of literary and intellectual growth through the centuries in +order to appreciate and comprehend literature,--the point to be kept in +mind being that this is a means and not in itself an end. It is +necessary, for instance, for the student to toil painfully across the +wastes of print produced in the eighteenth century, wherein there is +little really great save the works of Fielding; and where the reader +has to endure a host of tedious books in order properly to appreciate +the manly tenderness of Steele, the boyishly spontaneous realism of +Defoe, the kindly humanity of Goldsmith, and the frail, exquisite pipe +of Collins. The rest of the eighteenth century authors most of us read +chiefly as a part of the mechanics of education. We could hardly get on +intelligently without a knowledge of the polished primness of Addison, +genius of respectability; the vitriolic venom of Swift, genius of +malignity; the spiteful perfection of Pope, genius of artificiality; or +the interminable attitudinizing of Richardson, genius of sentimentality. +These authors we read quite as much as helps in understanding others as +for their own sake. We do not always have the courage to acknowledge it, +but these men do not often touch our emotions, even though the page be +that of Swift, so much the greatest of them. We examine the growth of +the romantic spirit through the unpoetic days between the death of +Dryden and the coming of Blake and Coleridge and Wordsworth; and from +such examination of the history of literature we are better enabled to +form standards for the actual estimate of literature itself. + +There is a wide and essential difference between really entering into +literature and reading what somebody else has been pleased to say of it, +no matter how wise and appreciative this may be. Of course the genuine +student has small sympathy with those demoralizing flippancies about +books which are just now so common in the guise of smart essays upon +authors or their works; those papers in which adroit literary hacks +write about books as the things with which they have meddled most. The +man who reads for himself and thinks for himself realizes that these +essayists are the gypsy-moths of literature, living upon it and at the +same time doing their best to destroy it; and that the reading of these +petty imitations of criticism is about as intellectual as sitting down +in the nursery to a game of "Authors." + +Even the reading of good and valuable papers is not the study of +literature in the best sense. There is much of profit in such admirable +essays as those, for instance, of Lowell, of John Morley, or of Leslie +Stephen. Excellent and often inspiring as these may be, however, it is +not to be forgotten that as criticisms their worth lies chiefly in the +incitement which they give to go to the fountain-head. The really fine +essay upon a masterpiece is at its best an eloquent presentment of the +delights and benefits which the essayist has received from the work of +genius; it shows the possibilities and the worth within the reach of +all. Criticisms are easily abused. We are misusing the most sympathetic +interpretation when we receive it dogmatically. In so far as they make +us see what is high and fine, they are of value; in so far as we depend +upon the perceptions of the critic instead of our own, they are likely +to be a hindrance. It is easier to think that we perceive than it is +really to see; but it is well to remember that a man may be plastered +from head to feet with the opinions of others, and yet have no more +genuine ideas of his own than has a bill-board because it is covered +with posters. Genuine emotion is born of genuine conviction. A reader is +really touched by a work of art only as he enters into it and +comprehends it sympathetically. Another may point the way, but he must +travel it for himself. Reading an imaginative work is like wooing a +maiden. Another may give the introduction, but for real acquaintance and +all effective love-making the suitor must depend upon himself if he +would be well sped. Critics may tell us what they admire, but the vital +question is what we in all truth and sincerity admire and appreciate +ourselves. + + + + +VI + +METHODS OF STUDY + + +We have spoken of what the study of literature is not, but negations do +not define. It is necessary to look at the affirmative side of the +matter. And first it is well to remark that what we are discussing is +the examination of literature,--literature, that is, in the sense to +which we have limited the term by definition: "The adequate expression +of genuine emotion." It is not intended to include trash, whether that +present itself as undisguised rubbish or whether it mask under +high-sounding names of Symbolism, Impressionism, Realism, or any other +affected nomenclature whatever. It has never been found necessary to +excuse the existence of the masterpieces of literature by a labored +literary theory or a catchpenny classification. It is generally safe to +suspect the book which must be defended by a formula and the writers who +insist that they are the founders of a school. There is but one school +of art--the imaginative. + +"But," it may be objected, "in an age when the books of the world are +numbered by millions, when it is impossible for any reader to examine +personally more than an insignificant portion even of those thrust upon +his notice, how is the learner to judge what are worthy of his +attention?" To this it is to be answered that there are works enough +universally approved to keep the readiest reader more than busy through +the span of the longest human life. We shall have occasion later to +speak of especial authors and of especial books. Here it is enough to +say that certainly at the start the student must be content to accept +the verdict of those who are capable of judging for him. Herein lies one +of the chief benefits to be derived from critics and essayists. As the +learner advances, he will find that as his taste and appreciation +advance with them will develop an instinct of choice. In the end he +should be able almost at a glance to judge rightly whether a book is +worthy of attention. In the meanwhile he need not go astray if he follow +the lead of trustworthy experts. + +In accepting the opinions of others it is of course proper to use some +caution, and above all things it is important to be guided by common +sense. The market is full of quack mental as well as of quack physical +nostrums. There is a large and enterprising body of publishers who seem +persuaded that they have reduced all literature to a practical +industrial basis by furnishing patent outsides for newspapers and patent +insides for aspiring minds. In these days one becomes intellectual by +prescription, and it is impossible to tell how soon will be advertised +the device of inoculation against illiteracy. Common sense and a sense +of humor save one from many dangers, and it is well to let both have +full play. + +I have spoken earlier in these talks of the pleasure of literary study. +One fundamental principle in the selection of books is that it is idle +to read what is not enjoyed. For special information one may read that +which is not attractive save as it serves the purpose of the moment; but +in all reading which is of permanent value for itself, enjoyment is a +prime essential. Reading which is not a pleasure is a barren mistake. +The first duty of the student toward literature and toward himself is +the same,--enjoyment. Either take pleasure in a work of art or let it +alone. + +It is idle to force the mind to attend to works which it does not find +pleasurable, and yet it is necessary to read books which are approved as +the masterpieces of literature. Here is a seeming contradiction; but it +must be remembered that it is possible to arouse the mind to interest. +The books which are really worth attention will surely attract and hold +if they are once properly approached and apprehended. If a mind is +indolent, if it is able to enjoy only the marshmallows and chocolate +caramels of literature, it is not to be fed solely on literary +sweetmeats. Whatever is read should be enjoyed, but it by no means +follows that whatever can be enjoyed should be read. It is possible to +cultivate the habit of enjoying what is good, what is vital, as it is +easy to sink into the stupid and slipshod way of caring for nothing +which calls for mental exertion. It requires training and purpose. The +love of the best in art is possessed as a gift of nature by only a few, +and the rest of us must labor for it. The full appreciation of the work +of a master-mind comes to no one without effort. The reward of the +student of literature is great, but his labor also is great. Literature +is not like an empty public square, which even a blind beggar may cross +almost unconsciously. It more resembles an enchanted castle beset with +spell-infested forests and ghoul-haunted mountains; a place into which +only that knight may enter who is willing to fight his way through +dangers and difficulties manifold; yet a place, too, of infinite riches +and joys beyond the imaginings of dull souls. + +It is a popular fallacy that art is to be appreciated without especial +education. Common feeling holds that the reader, like the poet, is born +and not made. It is generally assumed that one is endowed by nature with +an appreciation of art as one is born with a pug nose. The only element +of truth in this is the fact that all human powers are modified by the +personal equation. One is endowed at birth with perceptions fine and +keen, while another lacks them; but no matter what one's natural powers, +there must be cultivation. This cultivation costs care, labor, and +patience. It is, it is true, labor which is in itself delightful, and +one might easily do worse than to follow it for itself without thought +of other end; but it is still labor, and labor strenuous and long +enduring. + +It is first necessary, then, to make an endeavor to become interested in +whatever it has seemed worth while to read. The student should try +earnestly to discover wherein others have found it good. Every reader +is at liberty to like or to dislike even a masterpiece; but he is not in +a position even to have an opinion of it until he appreciates why it has +been admired. He must set himself to realize not what is bad in a book, +but what is good. The common theory that the critical faculties are best +developed by training the mind to detect shortcomings is as vicious as +it is false. Any carper can find the faults in a great work; it is only +the enlightened who can discover all its merits. It will seldom happen +that a sincere effort to appreciate a good book will leave the reader +uninterested. If it does, it is generally safe to conclude that the mind +is not ready for this particular work. There must be degrees of +development; and the same literature is not adapted to all stages. If +you cannot honestly enjoy a thing you are from one cause or another in +no condition to read it. Either the time is not ripe or it has no +message for your especial temperament. To force yourself to read what +does not please you is like forcing yourself to eat that for which you +have no appetite. There may be some nourishment in one case as in the +other, but there is far more likely to be indigestion. + +An essential condition of profitable reading is that it shall be +intelligent. The extent to which some persons can go on reading without +having any clear idea of what they read is stupefyingly amazing! You may +any day talk in society with persons who have gone through exhaustive +courses of reading, yet who from them have no more got real ideas than a +painted bee would get honey from a painted flower. Fortunately ordinary +mortals are not so bad as this; but is there one of us who is not +conscious of having tobogganed down many and many a page without pausing +thoroughly to seize and master a single thought by the way? + +It is well to make in the mind a sharp distinction between apprehending +and comprehending. The difference is that between sighting and bagging +your game. To run hastily along through a book, catching sight of the +meaning of the author, getting a general notion of what he would +convey,--casually apprehending his work,--is one thing; it is quite +another to enter fully into the thoughts and emotions embodied, to make +them yours by thorough appreciation,--in a word to comprehend. The +trouble which Gibbon says he took to get the most out of what he read +must strike ordinary readers with amazement:-- + + After glancing my eye over the design and order of a new book, I + suspended the perusal until I had finished the task of + self-examination; till I had resolved in a solitary walk all that I + knew or believed or had thought on the subject of the whole work or of + some particular chapter; I was then qualified to discern how much the + author added to my original stock; and if I was sometimes satisfied by + the agreement, I was sometimes armed by the opposition, of our ideas. + +It often happens that the average person does not read with sufficient +deliberation even to apprehend what is plainly said. If there be a +succession of particulars, for instance, it is only the exceptional +reader who takes the time to comprehend fully each in turn. Suppose the +passage to be the lines in the "Hymn before Sunrise in the Vale of +Chamouni:"-- + + Your strength, your speed, your fury, and your joy, + Unceasing thunder, and eternal foam. + +The ordinary student gets a general and probably a vague impression of +cataracts, dashing down from the glacier-heaped hills; and that is the +whole of it. A poet does not put in a succession of words like this +merely to fill out his line. Coleridge in writing undoubtedly realized +the torrent so fully in his imagination that it was as if he were +beholding it. "What strength!" was his first thought. "What speed," was +the next. "What fury; yet, too, what joy!" Then the ideas of that fury +and that joy made it seem to him as if the noise of the waters was the +voice in which these emotions were embodied, and as if the unceasing +thunder were a sentient cry; while the eternal foam was the visible sign +of the mighty passions of the "five wild torrents, fiercely glad." + +In the dirge in "Cymbeline," Shakespeare writes:-- + + Fear no more the frown o' the great, + Thou art past the tyrant's stroke; + Care no more to clothe and eat; + To thee the reed is as the oak; + The sceptre, learning, physic, must + All follow this, and come to dust. + +As you read, do you comprehend the exquisite propriety of the succession +of the ideas? Death has removed Fidele from the possibility of +misfortune; even the lords of the world can trouble no longer. Nay, +more; it has done away with all need of care for the sordid details of +every-day life, food and raiment. All that earth holds is now alike +indifferent to the dead; the pale, wind-shaken reed is neither more nor +less important than the steadfast and enduring oak. And to this, the +thought runs on, must come even the mighty, the sceptred ones of earth. +Not learning, which is mightier than temporal power, can save from this; +not physic itself, of which the mission is to fight with death, can in +the end escape the universal doom. + + All follow this, and come to dust. + +Hurried over as a catalogue, to take one example more, how dull is the +following from Marlowe's "Jew of Malta;" but how sumptuous it becomes +when the reader gloats over the name of each jewel as would do the Jew +who is speaking:-- + + The wealthy Moor, that in the eastern rocks + Without control can pick his riches up, + And in his house heap pearls like pebble-stones, + Receive them free, and sell them by the weight + Bags of fiery opals, sapphires, amethysts, + Jacinths, hard topaz, grass-green emeralds, + Beauteous rubies, sparkling diamonds, + And seld-seen costly stones of so great price + As one of them indifferently rated, + And of a carat of this quantity, + May serve, in peril of calamity, + To ransom great kings from captivity. + +I have not much sympathy with the trick of reading into an author all +sorts of far-fetched meanings of which he can never have dreamed; but, +as it is only by observing these niceties of language that a writer is +able to convey delicate shades of thought and feeling, so it is only by +appreciation of them that the reader is able to grasp completely the +intention which lies wrapped in the verbal form. + +To read intelligibly, it is often necessary to know something of the +conditions under which a thing was written. There are allusions to the +history of the time or to contemporary events which would be meaningless +to one ignorant of the world in which the author lived. To see any point +to the fiery and misplaced passage in "Lycidas" in which Milton +denounces the hireling priesthood and the ecclesiastic evils of his day, +one must understand something of theological politics. We are aided in +the comprehension of certain passages in the plays of Shakespeare by +familiarity with the conditions of the Elizabethan stage and of the +court intrigues. In so far it is sometimes an advantage to know the +personal history of a writer, and the political and social details of +his time. For the most part the portions which require elaborate +explanation are not of permanent interest or at least not of great +importance. The intelligent reader, however, will not wish to be tripped +up by passages which he cannot understand, and will therefore be likely +to inform himself at least sufficiently to clear up these. + +Any reader, moreover, must to some extent know the life and customs of +the people among whom a work is produced. To one who failed to +appreciate wherein the daily existence of the ancient Greeks differed +from that of moderns, Homer would hardly be intelligible. It would be +idle to read Dante under the impression that the Italy of his time was +that of to-day; or to undertake Chaucer without knowing, at least in a +general way, how his England was other than that of our own time. The +force of language at a given epoch, the allusions to contemporary +events, the habits of thought and custom must be understood by him who +would read comprehendingly. + +When all is said there will still remain much that must depend upon +individual experience. If one reads in Lowell:-- + + And there the fount rises; ... + No dew-drop is stiller + In its lupin-leaf setting + Than this water moss-bounded; + +one cannot have a clear and lively idea of what is meant who has not +actually seen a furry lupin-leaf, held up like a green, hairy hand, with +its dew-drop, round as a pearl. The context, of course, gives a general +impression of what the poet intended, but unless experience has given +the reader this bit of nature-lore, the color and vitality of the +passage are greatly lessened. One of the priceless advantages to be +gained from a habit of careful reading is the consciousness of the +significance of small things, and in consequence the habit of observing +them carefully. When we have read the bit just quoted, for instance, we +are sure to perceive the beauty of the lupin-leaf with its dew-pearl if +it come in our way. The attention becomes acute, and that which would +otherwise pass unregarded becomes a source of pleasure. The most sure +way to enrich life is to learn to appreciate trifles. + +There is a word of warning which should here be spoken to the +over-conscientious student. The desire of doing well may lead to +overdoing. The student, in his anxiety to accomplish his full duty by +separate words, often lets himself become absorbed in them. He drops +unconsciously from the study of literature into the study of philology. +There have been hundreds of painfully learned men who have employed the +whole of their misguided lives in encumbering noble books with +philological excrescences. I do not wish to speak disrespectfully of the +indefatigable clan characterized by Cowper as + + Philologists, who chase + A panting syllable through time and space; + Start it at home, and hunt it in the dark, + To Gaul, to Greece and into Noah's ark. + +These gentlemen are extremely useful in their way and place; but the +study of philology is not the study of literature. It is at best one of +its humble bond-slaves. A philologist may be minutely acquainted with +every twig in the family-tree of each obsolete word in the entire range +of Elizabethan literature, and yet be as darkly and as completely +ignorant of that glorious world of poetry as the stokers in an ocean +steamer are of the beauty of the sunset seen from the deck. It is often +necessary to know the derivation of a term, and perhaps something of +its history, in order to appreciate its force in a particular usage; but +to go through a book merely to pick out examples for philologic research +is like picking to pieces a mosaic to examine the separate bits of +glass. + +While, moreover, attention to the force and value of details is insisted +upon, it must never be forgotten that the whole is of more value than +any or all of its parts. The reader must strive to receive the effect of +a book not only bit by bit, and page by page, and chapter by chapter, +but as a book. There should be in the mind a complete and ample +conception of it as a unit. It is not enough to appreciate the best +passages individually. The work is not ours until it exists in the mind +as a beautiful whole, as single and unbroken as one of those Japanese +crystal globes which look like spheres of living water. He who knows the +worth and beauty of passages is like an explorer. He is neither a +conqueror nor a ruler of the territory he has seen until it is his in +its entirety. + +I believe that to comparatively few readers does it occur to make +deliberate and conscious effort to realize works as wholes. The +impression which a book leaves in the thought is of course in some sense +a result of what the book is as a unit; but this is seldom sharply clear +and vivid. The greatest works naturally give the most complete +impression, and the power of producing an effect as a whole is one of +the tests of art. The writer of genius is able so to choose what is +significant, and so to arrange his material that the appreciative +reader cannot fail to receive some one grand and dominating impression. +It is hardly possible, for instance, for any intelligent person to fail +to feel the cumulative passion of "King Lear." The calamities which come +upon the old man connect themselves in the mind of the reader so closely +with one central idea that it is rather difficult to escape from the +dominant idea than difficult to find it. In "Hamlet," on the other hand, +it is by no means easy to gain any complete and adequate grasp of the +play as a unit without careful and intimate study. It is, moreover, not +sure that one has gained a full conception of a work as a whole because +one has an impression even so strong as that which must come to any +receptive reader of "King Lear" or "Othello." To be profoundly touched +by the story is possible without so fully holding the tragedy +comprehendingly in the mind that its poignant meaning kindles the whole +imagination. We have not assimilated that from which we have received +merely fragmentary impressions. The appreciative reading of a really +great book is a profound emotional experience. Individual portions and +notable passages are at best but as incidents of which the real +significance is to be perceived only in the light of the whole. + +The power of grasping a work of art as a unit is one which should be +deliberately cultivated. It is hardly likely to come unsought, even to +the most imaginative. It must rest, in the first place, upon a reading +of books as a whole. Whatever in any serious sense is worth reading +once is worth rereading indefinitely. It is idle to hope to grasp a +thing as a whole until one has become familiar with its parts. When once +the details are clear in the mind, it is possible to read with a +distinct and deliberate sense of the share that each passage bears in +the entire purpose. It is necessary, and I may add that it is +enchanting, to reread until the detached points gather themselves +together in the inner consciousness as molecules in a solution gather +themselves into a crystal. The delight of being able to realize what an +author had in mind as a whole is like that of the traveler who at last, +after long days of baffling mists which allowed but broken glimpses here +and there, sees before him the whole of some noble mountain, stripped +clean of clouds, standing sublime between earth and heaven. + +Whatever effect a book has must depend largely upon the sympathy between +the reader and the author. To read sympathetically is as fundamental a +condition of good reading as is to read intelligently. It is well known +how impossible it is to talk with a person who is unresponsive, who will +not yield his own mood, and who does not share another's point of view. +On the other hand, we have all tried to listen to speakers with whom it +was not in our power to find ourselves in accord, and the result was +merely unprofitable weariness. For the time being the reader must give +himself up to the mood of the writer; he must follow his guidance, and +receive not only his words but his suggestions with fullest acquiescence +of perception, whatever be the differences of judgment. What Hawthorne +has said of painting is equally applicable to literature:-- + + A picture, however admirable the painter's art, and wonderful his + power, requires of the spectator a surrender of himself, in due + proportion with the miracle which has been wrought. Let the canvas + glow as it may, you must look with the eye of faith, or its highest + excellence escapes you. There is always the necessity of helping out + the painter's art with your own resources of sensibility and + imagination. Not that these qualities shall really add anything to + what the master has effected; but they must be put so entirely under + his control and work along with him to such an extent that, in a + different mood, when you are cold and critical instead of sympathetic, + you will be apt to fancy that the loftier merits of the picture were + of your own dreaming, not of his creating. Like all revelations of the + better life, the adequate perception of a great work demands a gifted + simplicity of vision.--_Marble Faun_, xxxvii. + +Often it is difficult to find any meaning in what is written unless the +reader has entered into the spirit in which it was composed. I seriously +doubt, for instance, whether the ordinary person, coming upon the +following catch of satyrs, by Ben Jonson, is able to find it much above +the level of the melodies of Mother Goose:-- + + "Buz," quoth the blue fly, + "Hum," quoth the bee; + Buz and hum they cry, + And so do we. + In his ear, in his nose, + Thus, do you see? + He ate the dormouse; + Else it was he. + +If you are not able to make much out of this, listen to what Leigh Hunt +says of it:-- + + It is impossible that anything could better express than this, either + the wild and practical joking of the satyrs, or the action of the + thing described, or the quaintness and fitness of the images, or the + melody and even harmony, the intercourse, of the musical words, one + with another. None but a boon companion, with a very musical ear, + could have written it.--_A Jar of Honey._ + +If the reader has the key to the mood in which this catch is written, if +he has given himself up to the sportive spirit in which "rare old Ben" +conceived it, it is possible to find in it the merit which Hunt points +out; but without thus giving ourselves up to the leadership of the poet +it is hardly possible to make of it anything at all. The example is of +course somewhat extreme, but the principle is universal. + +It is always well in a first reading to give one's self up to the sweep +of the work; to go forward without bothering over slight errors or small +details. Notes are not for the first or the second perusal so much as +for the third and so on to the hundredth. Dr. Johnson is right when he +says:-- + + Notes are often necessary, but they are necessary evils. Let him that + is yet unacquainted with the powers of Shakespeare, and who desires to + feel the highest pleasures that the drama can give, read every play + from the first scene to the last, with utter negligence of all his + commentators. When his fancy is once on the wing, let it not stoop to + correction or explanation. + +One of the great obstacles to the enjoyment of any art is the too +conscientious desire to enjoy. We are constantly hindered by the +conventional responsibility to experience over each classic the proper +emotion. The student is often so occupied in painful struggles to feel +that which he has been told to feel that he remains utterly cold and +unmoved. It is like going to some historic locality of noble suggestion, +where an officious guide moves the visitor from one precious spot to +another, saying in effect: "Here such an event happened. Now thrill. +Sixpence a thrill, please." For myself, being of a somewhat contumacious +character, I have never been able to thrill to order, even if a shilling +instead of sixpence were the price of the luxury; and in the same way I +am unable to follow out a prescribed set of emotions at the command of a +text-book on literature. Perhaps my temperament has made me unjustly +skeptical, but I have never been able to have much faith in the +genuineness of feelings carried on at the ordering of an emotional +programme. The student should let himself go. On the first reading, at +least, let what will happen so you are swept along in full enjoyment. It +is better to read with delight and misunderstand, than to plod forward +in wise stupidity, understanding all and comprehending nothing; gaining +the letter and failing utterly to achieve the spirit. The letter may be +attended to at any time; make sure first of the spirit. I do not mean +that one is to read carelessly; but I do mean that one is to read +enthusiastically, joyously, and, if it be possible, even passionately. + +The best test of the completeness with which one has entered into the +heart of a book is just this keenness of enjoyment. Fully to share the +mood of the author is to share something of the delight of creation. It +is as if in the mind of the reader this work of beauty and of immortal +significance was springing into being. This enjoyment, moreover, +increases with familiarity. If you find that you do not care to take up +again a masterpiece because you have read it once, you may pretty safely +conclude that you have never truly read it at all. You have been over +it, it may be, and gratified some superficial curiosity; but you have +never got to its heart. Does one claim to be won to the heart of a +friend and yet to be willing never to see that friend more? + +One may, of course, outgrow even a masterpiece. There are authors who +are genuine so far as they go, who may be enjoyed at one stage of +growth, yet who as the student advances become insufficient and +unattractive. The man who does not outgrow is not growing. One does not +healthily tire of a real book, however, until he has become greater than +that book. The interest which becomes weary of a masterpiece is more +than half curiosity, and at best is no more than intellectual. It is not +imaginative. Margaret Fuller confessed that she tired of everything she +read, even of Shakespeare. She thereby unconsciously discovered the +quality of mind which prevented her from being a great woman instead of +merely a brilliant one. She fed her intellect upon literature; but she +failed because literature does not reach to its highest function unless +its appeal to the intellect is the means of touching and arousing the +imagination; because the end of all art is not the mind but the +emotions. + +It may seem that enough has already been required to make reading the +most serious of undertakings; yet there is still one requirement more +which is of the utmost importance. He is unworthy to share the delights +of great work who is not able to respect it; he has no right to meddle +with the best of literature who is not prepared to approach it with some +reverence. In the greatest books the master minds of the race have +graciously bidden their fellows into their high company. The honor +should be treated according to its worth. Irreverence is the deformity +of a diseased mind. The man who cannot revere what is noble is innately +degraded. When writers of genius have given us their best thoughts, +their deepest imaginings, their noblest emotions, it is for us to +receive them with bared heads. He is greatly to be pitied who, in +reading high imaginative work, has never been conscious of a sense of +being in a fine and noble presence, of having been admitted into a place +which should not be profaned. Only that soul is great which can +appreciate greatness. Remember that there is no surer measure of what +you are than the extent to which you are able to rise to the heights of +supreme books; the extent to which you are able to comprehend, to +delight in, and to revere, the masterpieces of literature. + + + + +VII + +THE LANGUAGE OF LITERATURE + + +Whatever intelligence man imparts to man, at least all beyond the +crudest rudimentary beginnings, must be conveyed by conventions. There +must have been an agreement, tacit or explicit, that a certain sign +shall stand for a certain idea; and when that idea is to be expressed, +this sign must be used. In order that the meaning of any communication +may be understood, it is essential that the means of expression be +appreciated by hearer as well as by speaker. We have agreed that in +English a given sound shall represent a given idea; and to one who knows +this tongue the specified sound, either spoken or suggested by letters, +calls that idea up. To one unacquainted with English, the sound is +meaningless, because he is not a party to the agreement which has fixed +for it a conventional significance; or it may awake in his thought an +idea entirely different, because he belongs to a nation where tacit +agreement has fixed upon another meaning. The word "dot," for instance, +has by English-speaking folk been appropriated to the notion of a +trifling point or mark; while those who speak French, writing and +pronouncing the word in the same way, take it to indicate a dowry. In +order to communicate with any man, it is necessary to know what is the +set of conventions with which he is accustomed to convey and to receive +ideas. + +The principle holds also in art. There is a conventional language in +sound or color or form as there is in words. It is broader as a rule, +because oftener founded upon general human characteristics, because more +directly and obviously borrowed from nature, and because not so warped +and distorted by those concessions to utility which have modified the +common tongues of men. Indeed, it might at first thought seem that the +language of art is universal, but a little reflection will show that +this is not the case. The sculpture of the Aztecs, for instance, is in +an art language utterly different from that of the sculpture of the +Greeks. If you recall the elaborately intricate uncouthness of the gods +of old Yucatan, you will easily appreciate that the artists who shaped +these did not employ the same artistic conventions as did the sculptors +who breathed life into the Venus of Melos, or who embodied divine +serenity and beauty in the Elgin marbles. To the Greeks those twisted +and thick-lipped Aztec deities, clutching one another by their crests of +plumes, or grasping rudely at one another's arms, would have conveyed no +sentiment of beauty or of reverence; while it is equally to be supposed +that the Aztec would have remained hardly moved before the wonders of +Greek sculpture. The Hellenic art conventions, it is true, were more +directly founded upon nature, and therefore more readily understood; +but even this would not have overcome the fact that one nation had one +art language and the other another. Those of you who were at the +Columbian Exposition will remember how the music in the Midway Plaisance +illustrated this same point. The weird strain of one or another savage +or barbaric folk came to the ear with a strangeness which showed how +ignorant we are of the language of the music of these dwellers in far +lands. To us it was bizarre or moving, but we could form little idea how +it struck the hearers to whom it was native and familiar. It was even +all but impossible to know whether a given strain was felt by the savage +performers to be grave or gay. Of all the varieties of sound which there +surprised the ear, that evolved by the Chinese appeared most harsh and +unmelodious. The almond-eyed Celestial seemed to delight in a +concatenation of crash and caterwauling, mingled in one infernal +cacophony at which the nerves tingled and the hair stood on end. Yet it +is on record that when in the early days of European intercourse with +China, the French missionary Amiot played airs by Rossini and Boieldieu +to a Chinese mandarin of intelligence and of cultivation according to +eastern standards, the Oriental shook his head disapprovingly. He +politely expressed his thanks for the entertainment, but when pressed to +give an opinion of the music he was forced to reply: "It is sadly devoid +of meaning and expression, while Chinese music penetrates the soul." +After we have smiled at the absurdity, from our point of view, of the +penetration of the soul by Chinese music, we reflect that after all our +music is probably as absurd to them as theirs to us. We perhaps recall +the fact that even the cultivated Japanese, with their sensitive feeling +for art, and their readiness to adopt occidental customs, complain of +the effect of dividing music into regular bars, and making it, as they +say, "chip-chop, chip-chop, chip-chop." The fact is that every +civilization makes its art language as it makes its word language; and +he who would understand the message must understand the conventions by +which it is expressed. + +We are apt to forget this fact of the conventionality of all language. +We become so accustomed both to the speech of ordinary intercourse and +to that of familiar art, that we inevitably come to regard them as +natural and almost universal. No language, however, is natural, unless +it be fair to apply that word to the most primitive signs of savages. It +is an arbitrary thing, and as such it must be learned. We acquire the +ordinary tongue of our race almost unconsciously, and while we are too +young to reason about it. We gain the language of art later and more +deliberately, although of course we may owe much to our early +surroundings in this as in every other respect. The point to be kept in +mind is that we do learn it; that it is not the gift of nature. This is +of course true of all art; but here our concern is only with the fact +that literature has as truly its own peculiar language as music or +painting or sculpture,--its language, that is, distinct from the +language of ordinary daily or common speech. + +The conventions which serve efficiently to convey ordinary ideas and +matter-of-fact statements, are not sufficient for the expression of +emotions. The man who has to tell the price of pigs and potatoes, the +amount of coal consumed in a locomotive engine, or the effect of +political complications upon the stock-market, is able to serve himself +sufficiently well with ordinary language. The novelist who has to tell +of the bewitchingly willful worldliness of Beatrix Esmond, of the +fateful and tragic experiences of Donatello and Miriam, the splendidly +real impossibilities of the career of D'Artagnan and his three friends, +the passion of Richard Feverel for Lucy, of Kmita for Olenka, of Marius +for Cosette; the dramatist who endeavors to make his readers share the +emotions of Lear and Cordelia, of Caliban and Desdemona, of Viola and +Juliet; the poet who would picture the emotions of Pompilia, of Lancelot +and Guinevere, of Porphyrio and Madeline, of Prometheus and Asia,--all +these require an especial language. + +The conveying from mind to mind of emotion is a delicate task. It is not +difficult to make a man understand the price of oysters, but endeavor to +share with a fellow-being the secrets of a moment of transcendent +feeling, and you have an undertaking so complex, and so all but +impossible, that if you can perfectly succeed in it you may justly call +yourself the first writer of your age. This is the making of the +intangible tangible; the highest creative act of the imagination. The +cleverness and the skill of man have been exhausted in devising means to +impart to readers the thought and feeling, the passion and emotion, +which sway the hearts of mankind. It is not necessary here to go into +those devices which belong especially to the domain of rhetoric,--the +mechanics of style. They are designated in the old-fashioned text-books +by tongue-twisting Greek names which most of us have learned, and which +all of us have forgotten. It is not with them that I am here concerned. +They are meant to affect the reader unconsciously. It is with those +matters which appeal to the conscious understanding that we have now to +do; the conventions which are the language of literature as Latin was +the language of Cæsar or Greek the tongue of Pericles. + +I have spoken already of the necessity of understanding what is said in +literature; this is, however, by no means the whole of the matter. It is +of even greater importance to be clearly aware of what is implied. We +test the imaginative quality of what is written by its power of +suggestion. The writer who has imagination will have so much to say that +he is forced to make a phrase call up a whole train of thought, a word +bring vividly to the mind of the reader a picture or a history. This is +what critics mean when they speak of the marvelous condensation of +Shakespeare; and in either prose or verse the criterion of imaginative +writing is whether it is suggestive. Imagination is the realizing +faculty. It is the power of receiving as true the ideal. It is the +accepting as actual that which is conjured up by the inner vision; the +making vital, palpitant, and present that which is known to be +materially but a dream. That which is written when the poet sees the +unseen palpably before his inner eye is so filled with the vitality and +actuality of his vision that it fills the mind of the reader as a tenth +wave floods and overflows a hollow in the rocks of the shore. When Keats +says of the song of the nightingale that it is + + The same that oft-times hath + Charm'd magic casements, opening on the foam + Of perilous seas in faery lands forlorn, + +all the romance and witchery of faery-lore are in this single phrase. +The reader feels the glow of delight, the fascination of old tales which +have pleased mankind from the childhood of the race. Into two lines the +poet has condensed the fragrance of a thousand flowers of folk-lore. + +In the best literature what is said directly is often of less importance +than what is meant but not said. In dealing with imaginative writers, it +is necessary to keep always in mind the fact that the literal meaning is +but a part, and often not the greater part. The implied, the indirect, +is apt to be that for the sake of which the work is written. + +In its earlier stages all language is largely made up of comparisons. +The fact that every tongue is full of fossil similes has been constantly +commented upon, and this fact serves to illustrate how greatly the force +of a word may be diminished if its original meaning is lost sight of. +If, in ordinary conversation, to take a common illustration, some +old-fashioned body now speak of a clergyman as a "pastor," it is to be +feared that the word connotes little, unless it be a suspicion of rustic +seediness in apparel, a certain provincial narrowness, and perhaps a +conventional piety. When the word was still in its prime, it carried +with it the force of its derivation; it spoke eloquently of one who +ministered spiritual food to his followers, as a shepherd ministers to +his flock. A pastor may now be as good as a pastor was then, but the +title has ceased to do him justice. The freshness and force of words get +worn off in time, as does by much use the sharpness of outline of a +coin. We need constantly to guard against this tendency of language. We +speak commonly enough in casual conversation of "a sardonic smile," but +the idea conveyed is no more than that of a forced and heartless grin. +As far back as the days of Homer, some imaginative man compared the +artificial and sinister smile of a cynic to the distortions and +convulsions produced by a poisonous herb in Sardinia; and from its very +persistence we may fancy how forcible and striking was the comparison in +its freshness. Of course, modern writers do not necessarily keep in mind +the derivation of every word and phrase which they employ; but they do +at least use terms with so much care for propriety and exactness that it +is impossible to seize the whole of their meaning, unless we appreciate +the niceties of their language. Ruskin says rightly:-- + + You must get yourself into the habit of looking intensely at words, + and assuring yourself of their meaning, syllable by syllable, letter + by letter.... You might read all the books in the British Museum (if + you could live long enough), and remain an utterly "illiterate," + uneducated person; but if you read ten pages of a good book, letter by + letter,--that is to say, with real accuracy,--you are forevermore in + some measure an educated person.--_Of Kings' Treasuries._ + +Unless our attention has been especially called to the fact, there are +few of us who at all realize how carelessly it is possible to read. We +begin in the nursery to let words pass without attaching to them any +idea which is really clear. We nourish our infant imaginations upon +Mother Goose, and are content to go all our days in ignorance even of +the meaning of a good many of the words so fondly familiar in pinafore +days. We are all acquainted with the true and thrilling tale how + + Thomas T. Tattamus took two tees + To tie two tups up to two tall trees; + +but how many of us know what either a "tee" or a "tup" is? We have all +been stirred in our susceptible youth by the rhyme wherein is recounted +the exciting adventure of the four and twenty tailors who set forth to +slay a snail, but who retreated in precipitate confusion when + + She put out her horns like a little Kyloe cow; + +but it is to be feared that the proportion of us is not large who have +taken the trouble to ascertain what is a Kyloe cow. Or take the +well-worn ditty:-- + + Cross-patch, + Draw the latch, + Sit by the fire and spin. + +Have you ever stopped to reflect that "draw the latch" means to pull in +the latch-string, and that in the days of homely general hospitality to +which this contrivance belonged the image presented by the verse was +that of a misanthropic hag, shutting herself off from her neighbors and +sulking viciously by her fire behind a door rudely insulting the caller +with the empty hole of the latch-string? + +Perhaps this seems trifling; and it may easily be insisted that these +rhymes become familiar to us while we are still too young to think of +the exact meaning of anything. The question then is whether we do better +when we are older. We are accustomed, very likely, to hear in common +speech the phrase "pay through the nose." Do you know what that means, +or that it goes back to the days of the Druids? When you hear the phrase +"where the shoe pinches" do you recall Plutarch's story? Does the +anecdote of St. Ambrose come to mind when the saying is "At Rome do as +the Romans do"? It happens every few years that the newspapers are full +of more or less excited talk about a "gerrymander." Does the word bring +before the inner eye that uncouth monster wherewith the caricaturist of +his day vexed the soul of Governor Gerry? I have tried to select +examples which are not remote from the talk of every day. It seems to me +that these illustrate well enough how apt we are to accept words and +phrases as we accept a silver dollar, with very little idea of the +intrinsic worth of what we are getting. This may be made to do well +enough in practical buying and selling, but it is eminently +unsatisfactory in matters intellectual or æsthetic. In the study of +literature approximations are apt to be pretty nearly worthless. + +The most obvious characteristic in literary language is that of +allusion. Constantly does the reader of imaginative works encounter +allusions to the Bible, to mythology, to history, to folk-lore, and to +literature itself. To comprehend an author it is needful to realize +fully what he had in mind when using these. They are the symbols of +thoughts and feelings which are not to be expressed in ordinary ways. +When we are familiar with the matter alluded to we see by the sudden and +vivid light which is cast over the page by the comparison or the +suggestion how expressive and comprehensive this form of language may +be. To the reader who is ignorant the allusion is of course a +stumbling-block and a rock of offense. It is like a sentence in an +unknown tongue, which not only conceals its meaning but gives one an +irritated sense of being shut out of the author's counsels. + +It is probable that in English literature the allusions to the Bible are +more numerous than any other. We shall have occasion later to speak of +the place and influence of the King James version upon the literature of +our tongue, and here we have to do only with those cases in which a +scriptural reference is made part of the special language of an author. +Again and again it happens that a writer takes advantage of the +associations which cluster about a phrase or an incident of the Bible, +and by a simple touch brings up in the mind of the understanding reader +all the sentiments connected with the original. + +With many of the more common of these phrases it is impossible for any +one who associates with educated persons not to be familiar. They have +become part and parcel of the common speech of the time. We speak of the +"widow's mite," of a "Judas' kiss," of "the flesh-pots of Egypt," of "a +still, small voice," of a "Jehu," a "perfect Babel," a "Nimrod," of +"bread upon the waters," and of a "Delilah." The phrases have to a +considerable extent acquired their own meaning, so that even one who is +not familiar with the Scriptures is not likely to have difficulty in +getting from them a general idea. To the reader who is acquainted with +the force and origin of these terms, however, they have a vigor and +significance which for others they must lack. The name Jehu brings up to +him not merely a driver on a New England stage-coach, but the figure of +the newly crowned usurper rushing down to the slaughter of King Joram, +his master, when the watchman upon the wall looked out and said: "The +driving is like the driving of Jehu, the son of Nimshi; for he driveth +furiously." The phrase "bread upon the waters" affords a good +illustration here. Perhaps most readers are likely to know the origin of +the quotation, and probably the promise which concludes it. The number +is smaller who realize the figure to be that of the oriental farmer +casting abroad the seed-rice over flooded fields, sowing for the harvest +which he shall find "after many days." The phrase "a still, small voice" +has become dulled by common use,--one might almost say profane, since +the quotation is of a quality which should render it too dignified and +noble for careless employment. It speaks to the reader who knows its +origin of that magnificently impressive scene on Horeb when Elijah stood +on the mount before the Lord:-- + + And behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the + mountain, and brake in pieces the rocks before the Lord; but the Lord + was not in the wind: and after the wind an earthquake; but the Lord + was not in the earthquake: and after the earthquake a fire; but the + Lord was not in the fire: and after the fire a still, small voice. And + it was so, when Elijah heard it, that he wrapped his face in his + mantle, and went out and stood in the entering in of the cave. And + behold, there came a voice unto him, and said: "What doest thou here, + Elijah?"--_1 Kings_ xix. 11-13. + +It is not necessary to dwell upon this class of allusions. The reader +who expects to get from them their full force must know the original; +and while in ordinary speech these phrases are used carelessly and with +little regard for their full significance, they are in the work of +imaginative writers to be taken for all that they can and should convey. + +There are other Biblical allusions which are less common and less +obvious. When in the "Ode on the Nativity," Milton speaks of + + ----that twice batter'd god of Palestine, + +the verse means much to the reader who recalls the double fall of the +fish-tailed god Dagon before the captured ark of Israel, but to others +it is likely to mean nothing whatever. To be ignorant of the tale of +Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego is to miss completely the force of +Hazlitt's remark that certain artists are so absorbed in their own +productions that "they walked through collections of the finest works +like the Children in the Fiery Furnace, untouched, unapproached." Not to +know the declaration of St. Paul of what he had suffered for his +faith[1] is to lose the point of Tennyson's verse + + Not in vain, + Like Paul with beasts, I fought with death. + +Prose and poetry are alike full of scriptural phraseology. In short, for +the understanding of the language of allusion in English literature a +knowledge of the English Bible is neither more nor less than essential. + +[Footnote 1: If after the manner of men I have fought with beasts at +Ephesus, what advantageth it me, if the dead rise not?--_1 Cor._ xv. +32.] + +Another class of allusions frequent in literature is the mythological. +Here also we find phrases which have passed so completely into every-day +currency that we hear and use them almost without reflecting upon their +origin. "Scylla and Charybdis," "dark as Erebus," "hydra-headed," and +"Pandora's box," are familiar examples. We speak of "a herculean task" +without in the least calling to mind the labors of Hercules, and employ +the phrase "the thread of life" without seeming to see the three grisly +Fates, spinning in the chill gray dusk of their cave. We have gone so +far as to condense a whole legend into a single word, and then to ignore +the story. We say "lethean," "mercurial," "aurora," and "bacchanalian," +without recalling their real significance. It is obvious how a +perception of the original meaning of these terms must impart vividness +to their use or to their understanding. There are innumerable instances, +more particular, in which it is essential to know the force of a +reference to old myths, lest the finer meaning of the author be +altogether missed. In "The Wind-Harp" Lowell wrote:-- + + I treasure in secret some long, fine hair + Of tenderest brown.... + I twisted this magic in gossamer strings + Over a wind-harp's Delphian hollow. + +In the phrase "a wind-harp's Delphian hollow" the poet has suggested all +the mysterious and fateful utterances of the abyss from which the +Delphic priestess sucked up prophecies, and he has prepared the +comprehending reader for the oracular murmur which swells from the +instrument upon which have been stretched chords twisted from the hair +of the dead loved one. To miss this suggestion is to lose a vital part +of the poem. When Keats writes of "valley-lilies whiter still than +Leda's love," unless there come instantly to the mind the image of the +snowy swan whose form Jove took to win Leda, the phrase means nothing. +The woeful cry in "Antony and Cleopatra," + + The shirt of Nessus is upon me; teach me, + Alcides, thou mine ancestor, thy rage, + +is full of keen-edged horror when one recalls the garment poisoned with +his own blood by which the centaur avenged himself on Hercules. In a +flash it brings up the picture of the demigod tearing his flesh in more +than mortal agony, and calling to Philoctetes to light the funeral pyre +that he might be consumed alive. It is not needful to multiply examples +since they so frequently present themselves to the reader. The only +point to be made is that here we have another well defined division of +literary language. + +Allusion to history is another characteristic form of the language of +literature. References to classic story are perhaps more common than +those to general or modern, but both are plentiful. Sometimes the form +is that of a familiar phrase, as "a Cadmean victory," "a Procrustean +bed," "a crusade," "a Waterloo," and so on. Phrases like these are +easily understood, although it is hardly possible to get their full +effect without a knowledge of their origin. What, however, would this +passage in Gray's "Elegy" convey to one unfamiliar with English +history?-- + + Some village Hampden, that with dauntless breast + The little tyrant of his fields withstood; + Some mute, inglorious Milton here may rest; + Some Cromwell, guiltless of his country's blood. + +It is necessary to know about the majestic figure of ivory and gold +which the Athenian sculptor wrought, or one misses the meaning of +Emerson's couplet,-- + + Not from a vain or shallow thought + His awful Jove young Phidias brought. + +Shakespeare abounds in examples of this use of allusions to history to +produce a clear or vivid impression of some emotion or thought. + + I will make a Star-chamber matter of it. + + _Merry Wives_, i. 1. + + Though Nestor swear the jest be laughable. + + _Merchant of Venice_, i. 1. + + Even such a man, so faint, so spiritless, + So dull, so dead in look, so woe-begone, + Drew Priam's curtain in the dead of night, + And would have told him half his Troy was burnt. + + _2 Henry IV._, i. 1. + +The reader must know something of the Star-chamber, of the gravity and +wisdom of Nestor, of the circumstances of the tragic destruction of +Troy, or these passages can have little meaning for him. + +Sometimes references of this class are less evident, as where Byron +speaks of + + The starry Galileo with his woes; + +or where Poe finely compresses the whole splendid story of antiquity +into a couple of lines:-- + + To the glory that was Greece + And the grandeur that was Rome. + +If we have in mind the varied and inspiring story of Greece and Rome, +these lines unroll before us like a matchless panorama. We linger over +them to let the imagination realize the full richness of their +suggestion. The heart beats more quickly, and we find ourselves +murmuring over and over to ourselves with a kindling sense of warmth and +glow:-- + + To the glory that was Greece + And the grandeur that was Rome. + +Poe affords an excellent example of this device of historical allusion +carried to its extreme. In "The Fall of the House of Usher," there is a +stanza which reads:-- + + Wanderers in that happy valley + Through two luminous windows saw + Spirits moving musically + To a lute's well-tunèd law, + Round about a throne, where sitting + (Porphyrogene!) + In state his glory well-befitting, + The ruler of the realm was seen. + +If the reader chance to know that in the great palace of Constantine the +Great at Constantinople there was a building of red porphyry, which by +special decree was made sacred to motherhood, and that here the princes +of the blood were born, being in recognition called "porphyrogene," +there will come to him the vision which Poe desired to evoke. The word +will suggest the regal splendors of the Byzantine court at a time when +the whole world babbled of its glories, and will give to the verse a +richness of atmosphere which could hardly be produced by any piling up +of specific details. The reader who is not in possession of this +information can only stumble over the word as I did in my youth, with an +aggrieved feeling of being shut out from the inner mysteries of the +poem. I spoke of this as an extreme instance of the use of this form of +literary language, because the knowledge needed to render it +intelligible is more unusual and special than that generally appealed to +by writers. It is one of those bold strokes which are tremendously +effective when they succeed, but which are likely to fail with the +ordinary reader. + +After historic allusion comes that to folk-lore, which used to be a good +deal appealed to by imaginative writers. Some knowledge of old beliefs +is often essential to the comprehension of earlier authors. Suckling, +for instance, says very charmingly:-- + + But oh, she dances such a way! + No sun upon an Easter day + Is half so fine a sight! + +The reference, of course, is to the superstition that the sun on Easter +morning danced for joy at the coming of the day when the Lord arose. To +get the force of the passage, it is necessary to put one's self into the +mood of those who believed this pretty legend. In the same way it is +only to one who is acquainted with the myth of the lubber fiend, the +spirit who did the work of the farm at night for the wage of a bowl of +cream set for him beside the kitchen fire, that there is meaning in the +lines in "L'Allegro:"-- + + Tells how the grudging goblin sweat + To earn his cream-bowl duly set, + When in one night, ere glimpse of morn, + His shadowy flail hath thresh'd the corn + That ten day-laborers could not end; + And, stretch'd out all the chimney's length, + Basks at the fire his hairy strength; + And crop-full out of doors he flings, + Ere the first cock his matin rings. + +There is much of this folk-lore language in Shakespeare, and in our own +time Browning has perhaps more of it than any other prominent author. +It may be remarked in passing, that Browning, who loved odd books and +read a good many strange old works which are not within general reach, +is more difficult in this matter of allusion than any other +contemporary. References of this class are generally a trouble to the +ordinary reader, and especially are young students likely to be unable +to understand them readily. + +The last class of allusions, and one which in books written to-day is +especially common, is that which calls up passages or characters in +literature itself. We speak of a "quixotic deed;" we allude to a thing +as to be taken "in a Pickwickian sense;" we have become so accustomed to +hearing a married man spoken of as a "Benedick," that we often forget +the brisk and gallant bachelor of "Much Ado about Nothing," and how he +was transformed into "Benedick the married man" almost without his own +consent. When an author who weighs his words employs allusions of this +sort, it is needful to know the originals well if we hope to get the +real intent of what is written. In "Il Penseroso," Milton says:-- + + Sometime let gorgeous Tragedy + In sceptered pall come sweeping by, + Presenting Thebes or Pelops' line, + Or the tale of Troy divine. + +There should pass before the mind of the reader all the fateful story of +the ill-starred house of Labdacus: the horrible history of OEdipus, +involved in the meshes of destiny; the deadly strife of his sons, and +the sublime self-sacrifice of Antigone; all the involved and passionate +tragedies of the descendants of Pelops: Agamemnon, the slaughter of +Iphigenia, the vengeance of Clytemnestra, the waiting of Electra, the +matricide of Orestes and the descent of the Furies upon him; and after +this should come to mind the oft-told tale of Troy in all its fullness. +Milton was not one to use words inadvertently or without a clear sense +of all that they implied. He desired to suggest all the rich and tragic +histories which I have hinted at, to move the reader, and to show how +stirring and how pregnant is tragedy when dealing with high themes. In +two lines he evokes all that is most potent in Grecian poetry. Or again, +when Wordsworth speaks of + + The gentle Lady married to the Moor, + And heavenly Una with her milk-white lamb, + +it is not enough to glance at a foot-note and discover that the allusion +is to Desdemona, and to the first canto of Spenser's "Faerie Queene." +The reader is expected to be so familiar with the poems referred to that +the spirit of one and then of the other comes up to him in all its +beauty. An allusion of this sort should be like a breath of perfume +which suddenly calls up some dear and thrilling memory. + +Enough has been said to show that the language of literature is a +complicated and in some respects a difficult one. Literature in its +highest and best sense is of an importance and of a value so great as to +justify the assumption that no difficulties of language are too great if +needed for the full expression of the message which genius bears to +mankind. In other words, the writer who can give to his fellows works +which are genuinely imaginative is justified in employing any +conventions which will really aid in expression. It is the part of his +readers to acquaint themselves with the means which he finds it best to +employ; and to be grateful for the gift of the master, whatever the +trouble it costs to appreciate and to enter into its spirit. If we are +wise, if we have a proper sense of values, we shall find it worth our +while to familiarize ourselves with scriptural phrases, with mythology, +history, folk-lore, or whatever will aid us in seizing the innermost +significance of masterpieces. + +It is important, moreover, to know literary language before the moment +comes for using it. Information grubbed from foot-notes at the instant +of need may be better than continued ignorance, but it is impossible to +thrill and tingle over a passage in the middle of which allusions must +be looked up in the comments of the editor. It is like feeling one's way +through a poem in a foreign tongue when one must use a lexicon for every +second word. The feelings cannot carry the reader away if they must bear +not only the intangible imagination but a solidly material dictionary. +As has been said in a former page, notes should not be allowed to +interrupt a first reading. It is often a wise plan to study them +beforehand, so as to have their aid at once. It is certainly idle to +expect a vivid first impression if one stops continually to look up +obscure points; one cannot soar to the stars with foot-notes as a +flying-machine. + +One danger must here be noted. The student may so fill his mind with +concern about the language that he cannot give himself up to the author. +The language is for the work, and not the work for the language. The +teacher who does not instruct the student in the meaning and value of +allusion fails of his mission; but the teacher who makes this the limit, +and fails to impress upon the learner the fact that all this is a means +to an end, commits a crime. I had rather intrust a youth to an +instructor ill-informed in the things of which we have been speaking, +and filled with a genuine love and reverence for beauty as far as he +could apprehend it, than to a preceptor completely equipped with +erudition, and filled with Philistine satisfaction over this knowledge +for its own sake. No amount of learning can compensate for a lack of +enthusiasm. The object of reading literature is not only to understand +it, but to experience it; not only to apprehend it with the intellect, +but to comprehend it with the emotions. To understand it is necessary +and highly important; but this is not the best thing. When the gods send +us gifts, let us not be content with examining the caskets. + + + + +VIII + +THE INTANGIBLE LANGUAGE + + +We have spoken of the tangible language of literature; we have now to do +with that which is intangible. Open and direct allusion is neither the +more important nor the more common form of suggestion. He who has +trained himself to recognize references to things historical, +mythological, and so on, has not necessarily become fully familiar with +literary language. Phrase by phrase, and word by word, literature is a +succession of symbols. The aim of the imaginative writer is constantly +to excite the reader to an act of creation. He only is a poet who can +arouse in the mind a creative imagination. Indeed, one is tempted to +indulge here in an impossible paradox, and to say that he only is a poet +who can for the time being make his reader a poet also. The object of +that which is expressed is to arouse the intellect and the emotions to +search for that which is not expressed. The language of allusion is +directed to this end, but literature has also its means far more subtile +and far more effective. + +Suggestion is still the essence of this, but it is suggestion conveyed +more delicately and impalpably. Sometimes it is so elusive as almost to +seem accidental or even fanciful. The choice of a single word gives to +a sentence a character which without it would be entirely wanting; a +simple epithet modifies an entire passage. In Lincoln's "Gettysburg +Address," for instance, after the so concise and forceful statement of +all that has brought the assembly together, the speaker declares "that +we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain." The +adverb is the last of which an ordinary mind might have thought in this +connection, and yet once spoken, it is the one inevitable and supreme +word. It lifts the mind at once into an atmosphere elevated and noble. +By this single word Lincoln seems to say: "With the dead at our feet, +and the future for which they died before us, lifted by the +consciousness of all that their death meant, of all that hangs upon the +fidelity with which we carry forward the ideals for which they laid down +life itself, we '_highly_ resolve that their death shall not have been +in vain.'" The phrase is one of the most superb in American literature. +It is in itself a trumpet-blast clear and strong. Or take Shakespeare's +epithet when he speaks of "death's dateless night." To the appreciative +reader this is a word to catch the breath, and to touch one with the +horror of that dull darkness where time has ceased; where for the +sleeper there is neither end nor beginning, no point distinguished from +another; night from which all that makes life has been utterly swept +away. "Death's dateless night"! + +It is told of Keats that in reading Spenser he shouted aloud in delight +over the phrase "sea-shouldering whales." The imagination is taken +captive by the vigor and vividness of the image of the great monsters +shouldering their mighty way through opposing waves as a giant might +push his path through a press of armed men, forging onward by sheer +force and bulk. The single word says more than pages of ordinary, +matter-of-fact description. The reader who cannot appreciate why Keats +cried out over this can hardly be said to have begun truly to understand +the effect of the epithet in imaginative writing. + +Hazlitt cites the lines of Milton:-- + + Him followed Rimmon, whose delightful seat + Was fair Damascus, on the fertile banks + Of Abbana and Pharphar, lucid streams; + +and comments: "The word lucid here gives to the idea all the sparkling +effect of the most perfect landscape," In each of the following passages +from Shakespeare the single italicized word is in itself sufficient to +give distinction:-- + + Enjoy the _honey-heavy_ dew of slumber. + + _Julius Cæsar_, ii. 1. + + When love begins to sicken and decay + It useth an _enforcèd_ ceremony. + + _Ib._, iv. 2. + + After life's _fitful_ fever he sleeps well. + + _Macbeth_, iii. 2. + +It would lead too far to enter upon the suggestiveness which is the +result of skillful use of technical means; but I cannot resist the +temptation to call attention to the great effect which may result from a +wise repetition of a single word, even if that word be in itself +commonplace. I know of nothing else in all literature where so +tremendous an effect is produced by simple means as by the use of this +device is given in the familiar lines:-- + + To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow, + Creeps in this petty pace from day to day + To the last syllable of recorded time. + + _Macbeth_, v. + +The suggestion of heart-sick realization of the following of one day of +anguish after another seems to sum up in a moment all the woe of years +until it is almost more than can be borne. + +In many passages appreciation is all but impossible unless the language +of suggestion is comprehended. To a dullard there is little or nothing +in the line of Chaucer:-- + + Up roos the sonne, and up roos Emelye. + +It is constantly as important to read what is not written as what is set +down. Lowell remarks of Chaucer: "Sometimes he describes amply by the +merest hint, as where the Friar, before setting himself softly down, +drives away the cat. We know without need of more words that he has +chosen the snuggest corner." The richest passages in literature are +precisely those which mean so much that to the careless or the obtuse +reader they seem to mean nothing. + +The great principle of the need of complete comprehension of which we +have spoken before meets us here and everywhere. It is necessary to read +with a mind so receptive as almost to be creative: creative, that is, in +the sense of being able to evoke before the imagination of the reader +those things which have been present to the inner vision of the writer. +The comprehension of literary language is above all else the power of +translating suggestion into imaginative reality. + +When we read, for instance:-- + + Like waiting nymphs the trees present their fruit; + +the line means nothing to us unless we are able with the eye of the mind +to see the sentient trees holding out their branches like living arms, +tendering their fruits. When Dekker says of patience:-- + + 'Tis the perpetual prisoner's liberty, + His walks and orchards; + +we do not hold the poet's meaning unless there has come to us a lively +sense of how the wretch condemned to life-long captivity may by patience +find in the midst of his durance the same buoyant joy which swells in +the heart of one who goes with the free step of a master along his own +walks and through his richly fruited orchards. + +Almost any page of Shakespeare might be given bodily here in +illustration. Take, for instance, the talk of Lorenzo and Jessica as in +the moonlit garden at Belmont they await the return of Portia. + + _Lor._ The moon shines bright. In such a night as this, + When the sweet wind did gently kiss the trees, + And they did make no noise,--in such a night + Troilus, methinks, mounted the Trojan walls, + And sighed his soul toward the Grecian tents, + Where Cressid lay that night. + _Jes._ In such a night + Did Thisbe fearfully o'ertrip the dew, + And saw the lion's shadow ere himself, + And ran dismayed away. + _Lor._ In such a night + Stood Dido with a willow in her hand + Upon the wild sea-banks, and waved her love + To come again to Carthage. + _Jes._ In such a night + Medea gathered the enchanted herbs + That did renew old Æson. + +The question is how this is read. Do we go over the enchanting scene +mechanically and at speed, as if it were the account of a political +disturbance on the borders of Beloochistan? Do we take in the ideas with +crude apprehension, satisfied that we are doing our duty to ourselves +and to literature because the book which we are thus abusing is +Shakespeare? That is one way not to read. Again, we may, with laborious +pedantry, discover that all the stories alluded to in this passage are +from Chaucer's "Legends of Good Women;" that for a single particular +Shakespeare has apparently gone to Gower, but that most of the details +he has invented himself. We may look up the accounts of the legendary +personages mentioned, compare parallel passages in which they are named, +and hunt for the earliest reference to the willow as a sign of woe. +There is nothing necessarily vicious in all this. It is a sort of busy +idleness which is somewhat demoralizing to the mind, but it is not +criminal. It has, it is true, no especial relation to the genuine and +proper enjoyment of the poetry. That is a different affair! The reader +should luxuriate through the exquisite verse, letting the imagination +create fully every image, every emotion. The sense should be steeped in +the beauty of that garden, softly distinct in the golden splendors of +the moon; there should come again the feeling which has stolen over us +on some June night, so lovely that it seemed impossible but that dreams +should come true, and in sheer delight of the time we have involuntarily +sighed, "In such a night as this!"--as if all that is bewitching and +romantic might happen when earth and heaven were attuned to harmony so +complete. We should take in the full mood of the lines:-- + + When the sweet wind did gently kiss the trees, + And they did make no noise. + +The image of the amorous wind, subduing its riotous glee lest it be +overheard, and stealing as it were on tiptoe to kiss the trees, warm and +willing in the sweet-scented dusk, makes in the mind the very atmosphere +of the sensuous, luscious, moonlit garden at Belmont. We are ready to +give our fancy over to the mood of the lovers, and with them to call up +the potent images of folk immortal in the old tales:-- + + In such a night + Troilus, methinks, mounted the Trojan walls, + And sighed his soul toward the Grecian tents, + Where Cressid lay that night. + +If we share the imaginings of the poet, we shall seem to see before us +the sheen of the weather-stained Grecian tents, silvered by the +moonlight there below the wall where we stand,--we shall seem to stretch +unavailing arms toward that far corner of the camp where Cressid must be +sleeping,--we shall feel a sigh swell our bosom, and our throat +contract. + + In such a night + Did Thisbe fearfully o'ertrip the dew, + And saw the lion's shadow ere himself, + And ran dismayed away. + +The realizing reader moves with timorous eagerness to meet Pyramus, +feeling under foot the dew-wet grass and on the cheek the soft night +wind, and suddenly, with that awful chill of fright which is like an +actual grasp upon the heart, to see the shadow of the lion silhouetted +on the turf. He sees with the double vision of the imagination the +shrinking, terror-smitten Thisbe, arrested by the shadow at her feet, +while also he seems to look through her eyes at the beast which has +called up her gaze from the shade to the reality. He trembles with her +in a brief-long instant, and then flees in dismay. + +Now all this is almost sure to seem to you to be rather closely allied +to that pest of teachers of composition which is known as "fine +writing." I realize that my comment obscures the text with what is +likely to seem a mist of sentimentality. There are two reasons why this +should be so,--two, I mean, besides the obvious necessity of failure +when we attempt to translate Shakespeare into our own language. In the +first place, the feelings involved belong to the elevated, poetic mood, +and not at all to dry lecturing. In the second place, and what is of +more importance, these emotions can be fairly and effectively conveyed +only by suggestion. It is not by specifying love, passion, hate, fear, +suspense, and the like, that an author brings them keenly to the mind; +but by arousing the reader's imagination to create them. It follows that +in insisting upon the necessity of understanding what is connoted as +well as what is denoted in what one reads, I am but calling attention to +the fact that this is the only way in which the most significant message +of a writer may be understood at all. The best of literature must be +received by suggestion or missed altogether. + +Often ideas which are essential to the appreciation of even the simplest +import of a work are conveyed purely by inference. Doubtless most of you +are familiar with Rossetti's poem, "Sister Helen." A slighted maiden is +by witchcraft doing to death her faithless lover, melting his waxen +image before the fire, while he in agony afar wastes away under the eyes +of his newly wedded bride as the wax wastes by the flame. Her brother +from the gallery outside her tower window calls to her as one after +another the relatives of the dying man come to implore her mercy. The +first is announced in these words:-- + + Oh, it's Keith of Eastholm rides so fast, ... + For I know the white mane on the blast. + +There follows the plea of the rider, and again the brother speaks:-- + + Here's Keith of Westholm riding fast, ... + For I know the white plume on the blast. + +When the second suppliant has vainly prayed pity, and the third appears, +the boy calls to his sister:-- + + Oh, it's Keith of Keith now that rides fast, ... + For I know the white hair on the blast. + +We see first a rider who is not of importance enough to overpower in the +mind of the boy the effect of his horse, and we feel instinctively that +some younger member of the house has been sent on this errand. Then +comes the second brother, and the boy is impressed by the knightly +plume, by the trappings of the rider rather than by his personality. An +older and more important member of the family has been dispatched as the +need has grown greater. It is not, however, until the old man comes, +with white locks floating on the wind, that the person of the messenger +seizes the attention; it is evident that the head of the house of Keith +has come, and that a desperate climax is at hand. + +When one considers the care with which writers arrange details like +this, of how much depends upon the reader's comprehending them, one +knows not whether to be the more angry or the more pitiful in thinking +of the careless fashion in which literature is so commonly skimmed over. + +It is essential, then, to read carefully and intelligently; and it is no +less essential to read imaginatively and sympathetically. Of course the +intelligent comprehension of which I am speaking cannot be reached +without the use of the imagination. No author can fulfill for you the +office of your own mind. In order to accompany an author who soars it is +necessary to have wings of one's own. Pegasus is a sure guide through +the trackless regions of the sky, but he drags none up after him. The +majority of readers are apt unconsciously to assume that a work of +imaginative literature is a sort of captive balloon in which any +excursionist who is in search of a novel sensation may be wafted +heavenward for the payment of a small fee. They sit down to some famous +book prepared to be raised far above earth, and they are not only +astonished but inclined to be indignant that nothing happens. They feel +that they have been defrauded, and that like the prophet Jonah they do +well to be angry. The reputation of the masterpiece they regard as a +sort of advertisement from which the book cannot fall away without +manifest dishonesty on the part of somebody. They are there; they are +ready to be thrilled; the reputation of the work guarantees the +thrilling; and yet they are unmoved. Straightway they pronounce the +reputation of that book a snare and a delusion. They do not in the least +appreciate the fact that they have not even learned the language in +which the author has written. Literature shows us what we may create for +ourselves; it suggests and inspires; it awakens us to the possibilities +of life; but the actual act of creation must every mind do for itself. +The hearing ear and the responsive imagination are as necessary as the +inspired voice to utter high things. You are able appreciatively to read +imaginative works when you are able, as William Blake has said:-- + + To see the world in a grain of sand, + And a heaven in a wild flower; + Hold infinity in the palm of your hand, + And eternity in an hour. + +The language of literature is in reality a tongue as foreign to +every-day speech as is the tongue of the folk of another land. It is +necessary to learn it as one learns a foreign idiom; and to appreciate +the fact that even when it is acquired what we read does not accomplish +for us the possibilities of emotion, but only points out the way in +which we may rise to them for ourselves. + + + + +IX + +THE CLASSICS + + +The real nature of a classic is perhaps to the general mind even more +vague than that of literature. As long as the term is confined to Greek +and Roman authors, it is of course simple enough; but the moment the +word is given its general and legitimate application the ordinary reader +is apt to become somewhat uncertain of its precise meaning. It is not +strange, human nature being what it is, that the natural instinct of +most men is to take refuge in the idea that a classic is of so little +moment that it really does not matter much what it is. + +While I was writing these talks, a friend said to me: "I know what I +would do if I were to speak about literature. I would tell my audience +squarely that all this talk about the superiority of the classics is +either superstition or mere affectation. I would give them the straight +tip that nobody nowadays really enjoys Homer and Chaucer and Spenser and +all those old duffers, and that nobody need expect to." I disregarded +the slang, and endeavored to treat this remark with absolute sincerity. +It brought up vividly the question which has occurred to most of us how +far the often expressed admiration of the classics is genuine. It is +impossible not to see that there is a great deal of talk which is purely +conventional. We know well enough that the ordinary reader does not take +Chaucer or Spenser from the shelf from year's end to year's end. It is +idle to deny that the latest novel has a thousand times better chance of +being read than any classic, and since there is always a latest novel +the classics are under a perpetual disadvantage. How far, then, was my +friend right? We live in an age when we dare to question anything; when +doubt examines everything. We claim to test things on their merits; and +if the reverence with which old authors have been regarded is a mere +tradition and a fetish, it is as well that its falsity be known. + +Is it true that the majority of readers find the works of the great +writers of the past dull and unattractive? I must confess that it is +true. It is one of those facts of which we seldom speak in polite +society, as we seldom speak of the fact that so large a portion of +mankind yield to the temptations of life. It is more of an affront, +indeed, to intimate that a man is unfamiliar with Shakespeare than to +accuse him of having foully done to death his grandmother. Whatever be +the facts, we have tacitly agreed to assume that every intelligent man +is of course acquainted with certain books. We all recognize that we +live in a society in which familiarity with these works is put forward +as an essential condition of intellectual, and indeed almost of social +and moral, respectability. One would hesitate to ask to dinner a man +who confessed to a complete ignorance of "The Canterbury Tales;" and if +one's sister married a person so hardened as to own to being +unacquainted with "Hamlet," one would take a good deal of pains to +prevent the disgraceful fact from becoming public. We have come to +accept a knowledge of the classics as a measure of cultivation; and yet +at the same time, by an absurd contradiction, we allow that knowledge to +be assumed, and we accept for the real the sham while we are assured of +its falsity. In other words, we tacitly agree that cultivation shall be +tested by a certain criterion, and then allow men unrebuked to offer in +its stead the flimsiest pretext. We piously pretend that we all read the +masterpieces of literature while as a rule we do not; and the plain fact +is that few of us dare rebuke our neighbors lest we bring to light our +own shortcomings. + +Such a state of things is sufficiently curious to be worth examination; +and there would also seem to be some advisability of amendment. If it is +not to be supposed that we can alter public sentiment, we may at least +free ourselves from the thralldom of superstition. If this admiration of +the classics which men profess with their lips, yet so commonly deny by +their acts, is a relic of old-time prejudice, if it be but a mouldy +inheritance from days when learning was invested with a sort of +supernatural dignity, it is surely time that it was cast aside. We +should at least know whether in this matter it is rational to hold by +common theory or by common practice. + +In the first place it is necessary to supply that definition of a +classic which is so generally wanting. In their heart of hearts, +concealed like a secret crime, many persons hide an obstinate conviction +that a classic is any book which everybody should have read, yet which +nobody wishes to read. The idea is not unallied to the notion that +goodness is whatever we do not wish to do; and one is as sensible as the +other. It has already been said that the object of the study of +literature is to enjoy and to experience literature; to live in it and +to thrill with its emotions. It follows that the popular idea just +mentioned is neither more nor less sensible than the theory that it is +better to have lived than to live, to have loved than to love. Whatever +else may be said, it is manifest that this popular definition of a +classic as a book not to read but to have read is an absurd +contradiction of terms. + +Equally common is the error that a classic is a book which is merely +old. One constantly hears the word applied to any work, copies of which +have come down to us from a former generation, with a tendency to assume +that merit is in direct proportion to antiquity. To disabuse the mind +from this error nothing is needed but to examine intelligently the +catalogue of any great library. Therein are to be found lists of +numerous authors whose productions have accidentally escaped submergence +in the stream of time, and are now preserved as simple and innocuous +diet for book-worms insectivorous or human. These writings are not +classics, although there is a tribe of busy idlers who devote their +best energies to keeping before the public works which have not +sufficient vitality to live of themselves,--editors who perform, in a +word, the functions of hospital nurses to literary senilities which +should be left in decent quiet to die from simple inanition. Mere age no +more makes a classic of a poor book than it makes a saint of a sinner. + +A classic is more than a book which has been preserved. It must have +been approved. It is a work which has received the suffrages of +generations. Out of the innumerable books, of the making of which there +was no end even so long ago as the days of Solomon, some few have been +by the general voice of the world chosen as worthy of preservation. +There are certain writings which, amid all the multitudinous +distractions of practical life, amid all the changes of custom, belief, +and taste, have continuously pleased and moved mankind,--and to these we +give the name Classics. + +A book has two sorts of interest; that which is temporary, and that +which is permanent. The former depends upon its relation to the time in +which it is produced. In these days of magazines there is a good deal of +talk about articles which are what is called timely. This means that +they fall in with some popular interest of the moment. When a war breaks +out in the Soudan, an account of recent explorations or travels in that +region is timely, because it appeals to readers who just then are eager +to increase their information concerning the scene of the disturbance. +When there is general discussion of any ethical or emotional topic, the +novel or the poem making that topic its theme finds instant response. +Often a book of no literary merit whatever speeds forward to notoriety +because it is attached, like a barnacle on the side of a ship, to some +leading issue of the day. At a time when there is wide discussion of +social reforms, for instance, a man might write a rubbishy romance +picturing an unhuman and impossible socialism, and find the fiction +spring into notoriety from its connection with the theme of popular talk +and thought. Books which are really notable, too, may owe their +immediate celebrity to connection with some vital topic of the day. +Their hold upon later attention will depend upon their lasting merit. + +The permanent interest and value of a book are precisely those qualities +which have been specified as making it literature. As time goes on all +temporary importance fails. Nothing becomes more quickly obsolete than +the thing which is merely timely. It may retain interest as a curious +historic document. It will always have some value as showing what was +read by large numbers at a given period; but nobody will cherish the +merely timely book as literature, although in its prime it may have had +the widest vogue, and may have conferred upon its author a delicious +immortality lasting sometimes half his lifetime. Permanent interest +gives a book permanent value, and this depends upon appeal to the +permanent characteristics and emotions of humanity. + +While the temporary excitement over a book continues, no matter how +evanescent the qualities upon which this excitement depends, the reader +finds it difficult to realize that the work is not genuine and vital. It +is not easy to distinguish the permanent from the momentary interest. +With the passage of time extraneous attractions fade, and the work is +left to depend upon its essential value. The classics are writings +which, when all factitious interests that might have been lent to them +by circumstances are stripped away, are found still to be of worth and +importance. They are the wheat left in the threshing-floor of time, when +has been blown away the chaff of sensational scribblings, noisily +notorious productions, and temporary works of what sort soever. It is of +course not impossible that a work may have both kinds of merit; and it +is by no means safe to conclude that a book is not of enduring worth +simply because it has appealed to instant interests and won immediate +popularity. "Don Quixote," on the one hand, and "Pilgrim's Progress," on +the other, may serve as examples of works which were timely in the best +sense, and which yet are permanent literature. The important point is +that in the classics we have works which, whether they did or did not +receive instant recognition, have by age been stripped of the +accidental, and are found worthy in virtue of the essential that +remains. They are books which have been proved by time, and have endured +the test. + +The decision what is and what is not literature may be said to rest +with the general voice of the intellectual world. Vague as the phrase +may sound, it really represents the shaping power of the thought of the +race. It is true that here as in all other matters of belief the general +voice is likely to be a confirmation and a repetition of the voice of +the few; but whether at the outset indorsed by the few or not, a book +cannot be said to be fairly entitled to the name "classic" until it has +received this general sanction. Although this sanction, moreover, be as +intangible as the wind in a sail, yet like the wind it is decisive and +effective. + +The leaders of thought, moreover, have not only praised these books and +had their judgment indorsed by the general voice, but they have by them +formed their own minds. They are unanimous in their testimony to the +value of the classics in the development of the perceptions, +intellectual and emotional. So universally true is this that to repeat +it seems the reiteration of a truism. The fact of which we have already +spoken, the fact that those who in theory profess to respect the +classics, do yet in practice neglect them utterly, makes it necessary to +examine the grounds upon which this truism rests. If the classics are +the books which the general voice of the best intelligence of the race +has declared to be permanently valuable, if the highest minds have +universally claimed to have been nourished and developed by them, why is +it that we so often neglect and practically ignore them? + +In the first place there are the obstacles of language. There are the +so to say technical difficulties of literary diction and form which have +been somewhat considered in the preceding talks. There are the greater +difficulties of dealing with conceptions which belong to a different +mental world. To a savage, the intellectual and emotional experiences of +a civilized man would be incomprehensible, no matter in how clear speech +they were expressed. To the unimaginative man the life of the world of +imagination is pretty nearly as unintelligible as to the bushman of +Australian wilds would be the subtly refined distinctions of that now +extinct monster, the London æsthete. The men who wrote the classics +wrote earnestly and with profound conviction that which they profoundly +felt; it is needful to attain to their elevation in point of view before +what they have written can be comprehended. This is a feat by no means +easy for the ordinary reader. To one accustomed only to facile and +commonplace thoughts and emotions it is by no means a light undertaking +to rise to the level of the masters. Readers to whom the rhymes of the +"poet's corner" in the newspapers, for instance, are thrillingly sweet, +are hardly to be expected to be equal to the emotional stress of +Shelley's "Prometheus Unbound;" it is not to be supposed that those who +find "Over the Hills to the Poor-House" soul-satisfying will respond +readily to the poignant pathos of the parting of Hector and Andromache. +The admirers of "Curfew must not ring to-night" and the jig-saw school +of verse in general are mentally incapable of taking the attitude of +genuinely imaginative work. The greatest author can do but so much for +his reader. He may suggest, but each mind must for itself be the +creator. The classics are those works in which the geniuses of the world +have most effectively suggested genuine and vital emotions; but every +reader must feel those emotions for himself. Not even the music of the +spheres could touch the ear of a deaf man, and for the blind the beauty +of Grecian Helen would be no more than ugliness. As Mrs. Browning puts +it:-- + + What angel but would seem + To sensual eyes, ghost-dim? + +The sluggish mind is incapable of comprehending, the torpid imagination +incapable of realizing; and the struggle to attain to comprehension and +to feeling is too great an exertion for the mentally indolent. + +It is no less true, that to the mind unused to high emotions the vivid +life of imaginative literature is disconcerting. The ordinary reader is +as abashed in the presence of these deep and vibrant feelings which he +does not understand, and cannot share, as would be an English +washerwoman to whom a duchess paid a ceremonious afternoon call. The +feeling of inadequacy, of being confronted with an occasion to the +requirements of which one is utterly unequal, is baffling and unpleasant +to the last degree. In this difficulty of comprehending, and in this +inability to feel equal to the demands of the best literature, lies the +most obvious explanation of the common neglect of the classics. + +It is also true that genuine literature demands for its proper +appreciation a mood which is fundamentally grave. Even beneath the +humorous runs this vein of serious feeling. It is not possible to read +Cervantes or Montaigne or Charles Lamb sympathetically without having +behind laughter or smiles a certain inner solemnity. Hidden under the +coarse and roaring fun of Rabelais lurk profound observations upon life, +which no earnest man can think of lightly. The jests and "excellent +fooling" of Shakespeare's clowns and drolls serve to emphasize the deep +thought or sentiment which is the real import of the poet's work. +Genuine feeling must always be serious, because it takes hold upon the +realities of human existence. + +It is not that one reading the classics must be sad. Indeed, there is +nowhere else fun so keen, humor so exquisite, or sprightliness so +enchanting. It is only that human existence is a solemn thing if viewed +with a realization of its actualities and its possibilities; and that +the great aim of real literature is the presentation of life in its +essentials. It is not possible to be vividly conscious of the mystery in +the midst of which we live and not be touched with something of awe. +From this solemnity the feeble soul shrinks as a silly child shrinks +from the dark. The most profound feeling of which many persons are +capable is the instinctive desire not to feel deeply. To such readers +real literature means nothing, or it means too much. It fails to move +them, or it wearies them by forcing them to feel. + +Yet another reason for the neglect of the classics is the irresistible +attractiveness which belongs always to novelty, which makes a reader +choose whatever is new rather than anything which has been robbed of +this quality by time. Every mind which is at all responsive is sensitive +to this fascination of that which has just been written. What is new +borrows importance from the infinite possibilities of the unknown. The +secret of life, the great key to all the baffling mysteries of human +existence, is still just beyond the bound of human endeavor, and there +is always a tingling sense that whatever is fresh may have touched the +longed-for solution to the riddle of existence. This zeal for the new +makes the old to be left neglected; and while we are eagerly welcoming +novelties which in the end too often prove to be of little or no value, +the classics, of tried and approved worth, stand in forlorn +dust-gathering on the higher shelves of the library. + +A. Conan Doyle is reported as saying in a speech before a literary +society:-- + + It might be no bad thing for a man now and again to make a literary + retreat, as pious men make a spiritual one; to forswear absolutely for + a month in the year all ephemeral literature, and to bring an + untarnished mind to the reading of the classics.--_London Academy_, + December 5, 1896. + +The suggestion is so good that if it does not seem practical, it is so +much the worse for the age. + + + + +X + +THE VALUE OF THE CLASSICS + + +It is sufficiently evident that the natural inclinations of the ordinary +man are not toward imaginative literature, and that unless there were +strong and tangible reasons why it is worth while to cultivate an +appreciation and a fondness for them, the classics would be so little +read that they might as well be sent to the junk-shop at once, save for +the occasional mortal whom the gods from his birth have endowed with the +precious gift of understanding high speech. These reasons, moreover, +must apply especially to the classics as distinguished from books in +general. Briefly stated, some of them are as follows:-- + +The need of a knowledge of the classics for the understanding of +literary language has already been spoken of at some length. This is, of +course, a minor and comparatively extraneous consideration, but it is +one not to be left wholly out. It is not difficult, however, to get a +superficial familiarity with famous writings by means of literary +dictionaries and extract books; and with this a good many persons are +apparently abundantly content. The process bears the same relation to +the actual study of the originals that looking at foreign photographic +views does to traveling abroad. It is undoubtedly better than nothing, +although it is by no means the real thing. It gives one an intellectual +understanding of classic and literary allusions, but not an emotional +one. Fully to appreciate and enjoy the allusions with which literature +is filled, it is essential to have gained knowledge directly from the +originals. + +One reason why references to the classics are so frequent in literary +language, is that in these writings are found thought and emotional +expression in their youth, so to say. Even more important than learning +the force of these allusions is the coming in contact with this fresh +inspiration and utterance. That into which a man steps full grown can +never be to him the same as that in which he has grown up. We cannot +have with the thing which we have known only in its complete form the +same intimate connection as with that which we have watched from its +very beginnings. To that with which we have grown we are united by a +thousand delicate and intangible fibres, fine as cobweb and strong as +steel. The student who attempts to form himself solely upon the +literature of to-day misses entirely the childhood, the youth, the +growth of literary art. He comes full grown, and generally +sophisticated, to that which is itself full grown and sophisticated. It +is not possible for him to become himself a child, but he may go back +toward the childhood of emotional expression and as it were advance step +by step with the race. He may feel each fresh emotional discovery as if +it were as new to him as it was in truth new for the author who +centuries ago expressed it so well that the record has become immortal. + +I do not know whether what I mean is fully clear, and it is of course +difficult to give examples where the matter is so subtle. It is certain, +however, that any reader of early literature must be conscious how in +the simplicity and naïveté of the best old authors we find things which +are now hackneyed and all but commonplace said with a freshness and +conviction which makes them for the first time real to us. Many emotions +have been so long recognized and expressed in literature that there +seems hardly to be a conceivable phase in which they have not been +shown, and hardly a conceivable phrase in which they have not been +embodied. It appears impossible to express them now with the freshness +and sincerity which belonged to them when they were first imprisoned in +words. So true is this that were it not that the personal impress of +genius and the experience of the imaginative writer always give +vitality, literature would cease from the face of the earth, and become +a lost art. + +It is the persuasion and vividness of first discovery which impart to +the folk-song its charm and force. The early ballads often put to shame +the poetry of later days. The unsophisticated singers of these lays had +never been told that it was proper for them to have any especial +emotions; they had never heard talk about this feeling or that, and art +did not consciously exist for them as other than the spontaneous and +sincere expression of what really moved them. That which they felt too +strongly to repress, they said without any self-consciousness. Their +artistic forms were so simple as to impose no hindrance to the +instinctive desire for revealing to others what swelled in their very +hearts. The result is that impressiveness and that convincingness which +can come from nothing but perfect sincerity. Innumerable poets have put +into verse the sentiments of the familiar folk-song, "Waly, waly;" yet +it is not easy to find in all the list the same thing said with a +certain childlike directness which goes to the heart that one finds in +passages like this:-- + + O waly, waly, but love be bonny + A little time while it is new; + But when 'tis auld, it waxeth cauld, + And fades awa' like morning dew! + +What later singer is there who has surpassed in pathos that makes the +heart ache the exquisite beauty of "Fair Helen"? + + I would I were where Helen lies; + Night and day on me she cries; + Oh, that I were where Helen lies + On fair Kirconnell Lea!... + + I would I were where Helen lies; + Night and day on me she cries; + And I am weary of the skies, + Since my love died for me. + +The directness and simplicity which are the charm of folk-song and +ballad are far more likely to be found in early literature than in that +which is produced under conditions which foster self-consciousness. They +belong, it is true, to the work of all really great writers. No man can +produce genuinely great art without being completely possessed by the +emotions which he expresses; so that for the time being he is not wholly +removed from the mood of the primitive singers. Singleness of purpose +and simplicity of expression, however, are the birthright of those +writers who have been pioneers in literature. It is chiefly in their +work that we may hope to experience the delight of finding emotions in +the freshness of their first youth, of gaining something of that +realization of perception which is fully only his who first of mortal +men discovers and proclaims some new possibility of human existence. + +Another quality of much importance in primitive writings and the early +classics is complete freedom from sentimentality. As certain parasites +do not attack young trees, so sentimentality is a fungus which never +appears upon a literature until it is well grown. It is not until a +people is sufficiently cultivated to appreciate the expression of +emotions in art that it is capable of imitating them or of simulating +that which it has learned to regard as a desirable or noble feeling. As +cultivation advances, there is sure to be at length a time when those +who have more vanity than sentiment begin to affect that which it has +come to be considered a mark of high cultivation to feel. We all know +this vice of affectation too well, and I mention it only to remark that +from this literature in its early stages is far more apt to be free than +it is in its later and more consciously developed phases. + +The blight which follows sentimentality is morbidity; and one of the +most important characteristics of the genuine classics is their +wholesome sanity. By sanity I mean freedom from the morbid and the +diseased; and the quality is one especially to be prized in these days +of morbid tendencies and diseased eccentricities. There is much in many +of the classics which is sufficiently coarse when measured by later and +more refined standards; but even this is free from the gangrene which +has developed in over-ripe civilizations. Rabelais chose the dung-hill +as his pulpit; in Shakespeare and Chaucer and Homer and in the Bible +there are many things which no clean-minded man would now think of +saying; but there is in none of these any of that insane pruriency which +is the chief claim to distinction of several notorious contemporary +authors. Neither is there in classic writers the puling, sentimental, +sickly way of looking at life as something all awry. The reader who sits +down to the Greek poets, to Dante, to Chaucer, to Molière, to +Shakespeare, to Cervantes, to Montaigne, to Milton, knows at least that +he is entering an atmosphere wholesome, bracing, and manly, free alike +from sentimentality and from all morbid and insane taint. + +Besides a knowledge of literary language, we must from the classics gain +our standards of literary judgment. This follows from what has been said +of temporary and permanent interest in books. Only in the classics do we +find literature reduced to its essentials. The accidental associations +which cluster about any contemporary work, the fleeting value which +this or that may have from accidental conditions, the obscurity into +which prejudice of a particular time may throw real merit, all help to +make it impossible to learn from contemporary work what is really and +essentially bad or good. It is from works which may be looked at +dispassionately, writings from which the accidental has been stripped by +time, that we must inform ourselves what shall be the standard of merit. +It is only from the classics that we may learn to discriminate the +essential from the incidental, the permanent from the temporary; and +thus gain a criterion by which to try the innumerable books poured upon +us by the inexhaustible press of to-day. + +Nor do we gain only standards of literature from the classics, but +standards of life as well. In a certain sense standards of literature +and of life may be said to be one, since our estimate of the truth and +the value of a work of art and our judgment of the meaning and value of +existence can hardly be separated. The highest object for which we study +any literature being to develop character and to gain a knowledge of the +conditions of being, it follows that it is for these reasons in especial +that we turn to the classics. These works are the verdicts upon life +which have been most generally approved by the wisest men who have +lived; and they have been tested not by the experiences of one +generation only, but by those of succeeding centuries. For wise, +wholesome, and comprehensive living there is no better aid than a +familiar, intimate, sympathetic knowledge of the classics. + + + + +XI + +THE GREATER CLASSICS + + +There are, then, clear and grave reasons why the classics are worthy of +the most intelligent and careful attention. The evidence supports +cultivated theory rather than popular practice. We are surely right in +the most exacting estimate of the place that they should hold in our +lives; and in so far as we neglect them, in so far we are justly +condemned by the general if vague opinion of society at large. They are +the works to which apply with especial force whatever reasons there are +which give value to literature; they are the means most efficient and +most readily at hand for the enriching and the ennobling of life. + +It is impossible here to specify to any great extent what individual +books among the classics are of most importance. This has been done over +and over, and it is within the scope of these talks to do little more +than to consider the general relation to life of the study of +literature. Some, however, are of so much prominence that it is +impossible to pass them in silence. There are certain works which +inevitably come to the mind as soon as one speaks of the classics at +all; and of these perhaps the most prominent are the Bible, Homer, +Dante, Chaucer, and Shakespeare. The Greek tragedians, Boccaccio, +Molière, Cervantes, Montaigne, Spenser, Milton, Ariosto, Petrarch, +Tasso, and the glorious company of other writers, such as the +Elizabethan dramatists and the few really great Latin authors, it seems +almost inexcusable not to discuss individually, yet they must be passed +over here. The simple lists of these men and their works give to the +mind of the genuine book-lover a glow as if he had drunk of generous +wine. No man eager to get the most from life will pass them by; but in +these talks there is not space to consider them particularly. + +Although it is only with its literary values that we have at present any +concern, it is somewhat difficult to speak of the Bible from a merely +literary point of view. Those who regard the Bible as an inspired oracle +are apt to forget that it has too a literary worth, distinct from its +religious function, and they are inclined to feel somewhat shocked at +any discussion which even for the moment leaves its ethical character +out of account. On the other hand, those who look upon the Scriptures as +the instrument of a theology of which they do not approve are apt in +their hostility to be blind to the literary importance and excellence of +the work. There is, too, a third class, perhaps to-day, and especially +among the rising generation, the most numerous of all, who simply +neglect the Bible as dull and unattractive, and made doubly so by the +iteration of appeals that it be read as a religious guide. Undoubtedly +this feeling has been fostered by the injudicious zeal of many of the +friends of the book, who have forced the Scriptures forward until they +have awakened that impulse of resistance which is the instinctive +self-preservation of individuality. In all these classes for different +reasons praise of the Bible is likely to awaken a feeling of opposition; +yet the fact remains that from a purely literary point of view the Bible +is the most important prose work in the language. + +The rational attitude of the student toward the Scriptures is that which +separates entirely the religious from the literary consideration. I wish +to speak on the same footing to those who do and those who do not regard +the Bible as a sacred book, with those who do and those who do not +receive its religious teachings. Let for the moment these points be +waived entirely, and there remains the splendid literary worth of this +great classic; there remains the fact that it has shaped faith and +fortune for the whole of Europe and America for centuries; and +especially that the English version has been the most powerful of all +intellectual and imaginative forces in moulding the thought and the +literature of all English-speaking peoples. One may regard the +theological effects of the Scriptures as altogether admirable, or one +may feel that some of them have been narrowing and unfortunate; one may +reject or accept the book as a religious authority; but at least one +must recognize that it is not possible to enter upon the intellectual +and emotional heritage of the race without being acquainted with the +King James Bible. + +"Intense study of the Bible," Coleridge has said most justly, "will keep +any writer from being vulgar in point of style." He might almost have +added that appreciative study of this book will protect any reader from +vulgarity in literature and life alike. The early sacred writings of any +people have in them the dignity of sincere conviction and imaginative +emotion. The races to which these books have been divine have revered +them as the word of the Deity, but it is the supreme emotion which +thrills through them that has touched their readers and made possible +and real the claim of inspiration. Every responsive reader must vibrate +with the human feeling of which they are full. We are little likely to +have anything but curiosity concerning the dogmas of the ancient Hindoo +or Persian religion, yet it is impossible to read the ecstatic hymns of +the Vedas or the exalted pages of the Zend-Avesta without being +profoundly moved by the humanity which cries out in them. Of the Bible +this is especially true for us, because the book is so closely connected +with the life and development of our branch of the human family. + +If it were asked which of the classics a man absolutely must know to +attain to a knowledge of literature even respectable, the answer +undoubtedly would be: "The Bible and Shakespeare." He must be +familiar--familiar in the sense in which we use that word in the phrase, +"mine own familiar friend, in whom I trusted"--with the greatest plays +of Shakespeare, and with the finer portions of the Scriptures. I do not +of course mean all of the Bible. Nobody, no matter how devout, can be +expected to find imaginative stimulus in strings of genealogies such as +that which begins the Book of Chronicles, or in the minute details of +the Jewish ceremonial law. I mean the simple directness of Genesis and +Exodus; the straightforward sincerity of Judges and Joshua; the +sweetness and beauty of Ruth and Esther; the passionately idealized +sensuousness of Canticles; the shrewdly pathetic wisdom of Ecclesiastes; +the splendidly imaginative ecstasies of Isaiah; the uplift of the +Psalms; the tender virility of the Gospels; the spiritual dithyrambics +of the Apocalypse. No reader less dull than a clod can remain unreverent +and unthrilled in the presence of that magnificent poem which one +hesitates to say is surpassed by either Homer or Dante, the Book of Job. +The student of literature may be of any religion or of no religion, but +he must realize, and realize by intimate acquaintance, that, taken as a +whole, the Bible is the most virile, the most idiomatic, the most +imaginative prose work in the language. + +The appearance of literary editions of portions of the Bible for general +reading is an encouraging sign that there is to-day a reaction from the +neglect into which the book has fallen. Unfortunately, these editions +follow for the most part the text of the Revised Version, which may be +excellent from a theological point of view, but which from a literary +one stands in much the same relation to the King James version as the +paraphrases of Dryden stand to the original text of Chaucer. The +literary student is concerned with the book which has been in the hands +and hearts of writers and thinkers of preceding generations; with the +words which have tinctured the prose masterpieces and given color to the +poetry of our tongue. To attempt to alter the text now is for the +genuine literary student not unlike modernizing Shakespeare. + +The Bible is a library in itself, so great is its variety; and it is +practically indispensable as a companion in literary study. To neglect +it is one of the most grave errors possible to the student. It has, it +is true, its serious and obvious defects, and from a literary point of +view the New Testament is infinitely less interesting than the Old; but +taken all in all, it is a great and an enchanting book, permanent in its +worth and permanent in its interest. + +To go on to talk of Homer is at once to bring up the much-vexed question +of reading translations. It seems to me rather idle in these days to +take time to discuss this. Whatever decision be arrived at, the fact +remains that the general reader will not read the classics in the +original. However great the loss, he must take them in the English +version, or let them alone. Even the most accomplished graduates of the +best colleges are not always capable of appreciating in Greek the +literary flavor of the works which they can translate pretty accurately. +There is no longer time in these busy and over-crowded days for the +student so to saturate himself with a dead language that it shall be as +familiar to him as his own tongue. The multiplicity of present +impressions renders it all but impossible to get completely into the +atmosphere of a civilization bygone. A few of the men trained in foreign +schools in the most scholarly fashion have probably arrived at the power +of feeling sensitively the literary quality of the classics in the +original; but for the ordinary student, this is entirely out of the +question. It is sad, but it is an inevitable human limitation. Emerson, +as is well known, boldly commended the practice of reading translations. +His sterling sense probably desired the consistency of having theory +agree with practice where there is not the slightest hope of making +practice agree with theory. Whether we like it or do not like it, the +truth is that most persons will take the Greek and Latin authors in +translation or not at all. + +And certainly they must be read in some tongue. No genuine student of +literature will neglect Homer or the Greek tragedians. The old Greeks +were by no means always estimable creatures. They not infrequently did +those things which they ought not to have done, and left undone those +things which they ought to have done; but the prayer-book did not then +exist, so that in spite of all there was plenty of health in them. They +were not models in morals, while they were entirely unacquainted with +many modern refinements; but they were eminently human. They were sane +and wholesome beings, manly and womanly; so that a reader is in far +better company with the heroes of Homer in their vices than he is with +the morbid creations of much modern fiction in their moments of the most +conscious and painfully elaborated virtue. Herein, it seems to me, lies +the greatest value of Greek literature. Before he can be anything else +thoroughly and soundly, a man must be healthily human. Hot-house virtue +is on the whole about as dangerous a disease as open-air vice; and it is +far more difficult to cure. Unless a man or a woman be genuine, he or +she is nothing, and the mere appearance of good or evil is not of +profound consequence. To be sane and human, to think genuine thoughts, +and to do genuine deeds, is the beginning of all real virtue; and +nothing is more conducive to the development of genuineness than the +company of those who are sound and real. If we are with whole-souled +folk, we cannot pose, even to ourselves; and it seems to me that the +reader who, with full and buoyant imagination, puts himself into the +company of the Greeks of Homer or Æschylus or Euripides or Sophocles +cannot be content, for the time being at least, to be anything but a +simply genuine human creature himself. + +Of course I do not mean that the reader reasons this out. Consciously to +think that we will be genuine is dangerously near a pose in itself. It +is that he finds himself in a company so thoroughly manly, so real and +virile, that he instinctively will take long breaths, and without +thinking of it lay aside the conventional pose which self is so apt to +impose upon self. We do not, while reading, lose in the least the power +of judging between right and wrong. We realize that Ulysses, delightful +old rascal though he is, is an unconscionable trickster. We are no more +likely to play fast and loose with domestic ties because the Grecian +heroes, and even the Greek gods, left their morals at home for their +wives to keep bright while they went abroad to take their pleasure. +Manners and standards in those days were not altogether the same that +they are now; but right is right in Homer, and wrong is wrong, as it is +in the work of every really great poet since the world began. The whole +of Greek poetry, like Greek sculpture, has an enchanting and wholesome +open-air quality; and even when it is nude it is not naked. We miss much +of the beauty by losing the wonderful form, and no translation ever +approached the original, but we get always the mood of sanity and +reality. + +The mood of Dante seems sometimes more difficult for the modern reader +than that of the Greeks. The high spiritual severity, the passionate +austerity of the Florentine, are certainly far removed from the busy, +practical temper of to-day. Far away as they are in time, the Greeks +were after all men of tangible deeds, of practical affairs; they knew +the taste of ginger hot i' the mouth, and took hold upon life with a +zest thoroughly to be appreciated in this materialistic age. Dante, on +the other hand, has the burning solemnity of the prophets of the Old +Testament, so that the point of view of the "Divine Comedy" is not far +removed from that of Isaiah. Of all the greatest classics the "Divine +Comedy" is probably the least read to-day, at any rate in this country. +The translations of it are for the most part hopelessly unsatisfactory, +the impossibility of setting poetry over from the honeyed Italian into a +language of a genius so different as the English being painfully obvious +even to those little critical. There is a great deal that is obscure, +and yet more which cannot be understood without a good deal of special +historical information; so that it is impossible to read Dante for the +first time without that frequent reference to the notes which is so +unfortunate and undesirable in a first reading. It is practically +necessary to go over the notes with care once or twice before attempting +the poem. Get the information first, and then plunge into the poetry. It +is a plunge into a sea whereof the brine is bitter, the waters +piercingly cold, and where not infrequently the waves roll high; but it +is a plunge invigorating and life-giving. The man who has once read +Dante with sympathy and delight can never again be wholly common and +unclean, no matter into what woful faults and follies he may thereafter +fall. + +To come nearer home, readers are somewhat foolishly apt to feel that it +is about as difficult to read Chaucer as it is to read Homer or Dante. +As a matter of fact any intelligent and educated person should be able +to master the theories of the pronunciation of Chaucerian English in a +couple of mornings, and to read him with ease and pleasure in a week or +two at most. It is a pity that there is not a good complete edition of +Chaucer pointed and accented, so that the reader might not be troubled +with any consciousness of effort; but after all, the difficulty lies +more in the idea than in the fact. When one has mastered the language of +the thirteenth century, in company how enchanting does he find himself! +The sweetness, the wholesomeness, the kindliness, the sincerity, the +humor, and the humanity of Chaucer can hardly be over-praised. + +Of Shakespeare,--"our myriad-minded Shakespeare,"--it seems almost +needless to speak. Concerning his poetry one may be silent because the +theme is so wide, and because writers so many and so able have already +discoursed upon the subject so eloquently. To attempt to-day to explain +why men should read Shakespeare is like entering into an argument to +prove that men should delight in the sunshine or to explain that the sea +is beautiful and wonderful. If readers to-day neglect this supreme +classic it is not from ignorance of its importance. It may be from a +want of realization of the pleasure and inspiration which the poet +affords. Those who have not tested it may doubt as one heart-whole +doubts the joys of love, and in either case only experience can make +wise. + +Dryden's words may suffice here and stand for all the quotations which +might be made:-- + + To begin with Shakespeare. He was the man who of all modern and + perhaps ancient poets had the largest and most comprehensive soul. All + the images of nature were still present to him, and he drew them not + laboriously, but luckily: when he describes anything you more than see + it, you feel it. + + The man who does not read and delight in this poet is scarcely to be + considered intellectually alive at all, as far as there is any + connection between the mind and literature; and the highest + intellectual crime of which an English-speaking man is capable is to + leave his Shakespeare to gather dust upon his shelves unread. + +In all this I do not wish to be understood as holding that we are always +to read the classics, or that we are to read nothing else. To live up to +the requirements of the society of Apollo continuously would be too +fatiguing even for the Muses. We cannot be always in a state of +exaltation; but we cannot in any high sense live at all without becoming +familiar with what exalted living is. The study of the classics calls +for conscious and often for strong endeavor. We do not put ourselves +thoroughly into the mood of other times and of remote conditions without +effort. Indeed, it requires effort to lift our less buoyant imaginations +to the level of any great work. The sympathetic reading of any supremely +imaginative author is like climbing a mountain,--it is not to be +accomplished without strain, but it rewards one with the breath of an +upper air and a breadth of view impossible in the valley. For him who +prefers the outlook of the earth-worm to that of the eagle the classics +have no message and no meaning. For him who is not content with any view +save the widest, these are the mountain peaks which lift to the highest +and noblest sight. + + + + +XII + +CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE + + +We speak of the classics, of ancient literature, and of contemporary +literature, but in reality all literature is one. We divide it into +sections for convenience of study, but it is a notable error to forget +that it is consecutive from the dawn of civilization to the present. It +is true that in applying the term to works of our own time it is both +customary and necessary to employ the word with a meaning wider than +that which it has elsewhere. It is often difficult to distinguish in +contemporary productions that which is of genuine and lasting merit from +that which is simply meretricious and momentary, and still harder to +force others to recognize such distinction when made. It is therefore +inevitable that the name literature should have a broader signification +than when applied to work which has been tested and approved by time. + +There are few things more perplexing than the attempt to choose from the +all but innumerable books of our own day those which are to be +considered as genuine. If we are able to keep vividly in mind what +qualities make a thing literature, it is possible to have some not +inadequate idea of what contemporary writings most completely fulfill +the given conditions. We are able to speak with assurance of the work +of a Tennyson or a Browning; and to feel that we have witnessed the +birth of classics of the future. Beside these, however, stand the +enormous multitude of books which are widely read, much talked about, +and voluminously advertised; books which we cannot openly dispraise +without the risk of being sneered at as captious or condemned as +conceited. There are the poems which publishers inform the public in +column-long advertisements, bristling with the testimonials of men and +women who make writing their business, are the finest productions since +Shakespeare; there are the novels which prove themselves to be works of +genius by selling by the hundreds of thousands of copies and very likely +being given to the purchasers of six bars of some patent soap; there are +the thin and persecuted looking volumes of "prose poems" or rhyming +prose which are looked upon by small bands of devoted followers as the +morsel of leaven which is to leaven the whole lump; there are, in short, +all those perplexing writings which have merit of some kind and in some +degree, yet to decide the genuine and lasting merit of which might tax +the wisdom and the patience of a Solomon of Solomons. + +I have already spoken of the effect which temporary qualities are sure +to have in determining the success of an author. The history of books is +full of instances of works which have in their brief day filled the +reading world with noisy admiration, but which have in the end been +found destitute of enduring merit. While transient fame is at its +height, while enthusiastically injudicious admirers are praising and +judiciously enthusiastic publishers are reëchoing their plaudits, it is +a well-trained mind that is able to form a sound and rational judgment, +and to distinguish between the ephemeral and the abiding. The only hope +lies in a careful and discriminating application of standards deduced +from the classics. He who desires to judge the books of to-day must +depend upon comparison with the books of yesterday. He must be able to +feel toward the literature of the past as if it were of the present, and +toward that of the present as if it were of the past. + +It is not to the popular verdict upon a work that one can look for aid +in deciding upon real merit. In time the general public accepts the +verdict of the few, but at first it is the noisy opinion of the many, +voluble and undiscriminating, which is heard. The general public is +always affected more by the accidental than by the permanent qualities +of a work, and it is more often imposed upon by shams than touched by +real feeling. It is easy to recognize conventional signs for sentiment, +and it is not difficult for the ordinary reader to persuade himself that +he experiences emotions which are explicitly set forth for him. Popular +taste and popular power of appreciation are not inaccurately represented +by those eminently successful journals which in one column give the +fashions and receipts for cake and in the next detailed directions for +experiencing all the sensations of culture. Sentimentality is always +more instantly and more widely effective than sentiment. Sentimentality +finds a ready response from the fact that it only calls upon us to seem, +while sentiment demands that for the time being at least we shall be. + +It is necessary here to say that I do not wish to be misunderstood. I do +not mean in the least to speak with scorn or contempt of the lack of +power justly to discriminate and to appreciate which comes from either +natural disability or lack of opportunities of cultivation. Narrowness +of comprehension and appreciation is a misfortune, but it is not +necessarily a fault. I mean only to point out that it is a thing to be +outgrown if possible. Of the pathos of lives which are denied their +desire in this I am too keenly aware to speak of such otherwise than +tenderly. For the young women who put their sentiments up in curl-papers +and the young men who wax the mustaches of their minds I have no +patience whatever; but for those who are seeking that which seems to +them the best, even though they blunder and mistakenly fall prostrate +before Dagon, the great god of the Philistines, it is impossible not to +feel sympathy and even admiration. In what I have been saying of the +fallibility of popular opinion I have not meant to cast scorn on any +sincerity, no matter where it is to be found; but merely to point out +that the general voice of the public, even when sincere, is greatly to +be distrusted. + +Whatever contemporary literature may be, however mistaken may be the +popular verdict, and however difficult it may be for the most careful +criticism to determine what is of lasting and what of merely ephemeral +merit, the fact remains that it is the voice of our own time, and as +such cannot be disregarded. To devote attention exclusively to the +classics is to get out of sympathy with the thought of our own +generation. It is idle to expend energy in learning how to live if one +does not go on to live. The true use of literature is not to make +dreamers; it is not to make the hold upon actual existence less firm. In +the classics one learns what life is, but one lives in his own time. It +follows that no man can make his intellectual life full and round who +does not keep intelligently in touch with what is thought and what is +written by the men who are alive and working under the same conditions. + +Contemporary literature is the expression of the convictions of the time +in which it is written. The race having advanced so far, this is the +conclusion to which thinkers have come in regard to the meaning of life. +Contemporary literature is like news from the front in war-time. It is +sometimes cheering, sometimes depressing, often enough inaccurate, but +continually exciting. It is the word which comes to us of the progress +of the eternal combat against the unknown forces of darkness which +compass humanity around. There are many men who make a good deal of +parade of never reading books of their own time. They are sometimes men +of no inconsiderable powers of intellect and of much cultivation; but it +is hardly possible to regard them as of greater contemporary interest +than are the mummies of the Pharaohs. They may be excellent in their day +and generation, but they have deliberately chosen that their generation +shall be one that is gone and their day a day that is ended. They may be +interesting relics, but relics they are. It is often wise to wait a time +for the subsiding of the frenzy of applause which greets a book that is +clever or merely startling. It is not the lover of literature who reads +all the new books because they are new, any more than it is he who +neglects the old because they are old; but if we are alive and in +sympathy with our kind, we cannot but be eager to know what the +intellectual world is thinking, what are the fresh theories of life, +born of added experience, what are the emotions of our own generation. +We cannot, in a word, be in tune with our time without being interested +in contemporary literature. + +It is here that the intellectual character of a man is most severely +tested. Here he is tried as by fire, and if there be in him anything of +sham or any flaw in his cultivation it is inevitably manifest. It is +easy to know what to read in the classics; they are all explicitly +labeled by the critics of succeeding generations. When it comes to +contemporary work a reader is forced largely to depend upon himself. +Here he must judge by his individual standards; and here he both must +and will follow his own inclinations. It is not always possible for a +man accurately to appraise his mental advancement by the classics he +reads, because his choice may there be influenced by conventional +rather than by personal valuation; but if he will compare with the +established classics the books which he genuinely likes and admires +among the writings of his own time, he may come at an estimate of his +mental state as fair as a man is ever likely to form of himself. + +It is, then, easy to see that there is a good deal of danger in dealing +with current work. It is necessary to be in sympathy with the thought of +the day, but it is only too common to pay too dear for this. It is +extremely hard, for instance, to distinguish between genuine literary +taste and curiosity when writings are concerned which have the fresh and +lively interest which attaches to those things about which our fellows +are actually talking and thinking. It is of course allowable to gratify +a healthy curiosity, but it is well to recognize that such reading is +hardly likely to promote mental growth. There is no law, civil or moral, +against indulging the desire to know what is in any one of those books +which are written to be talked about at ladies' luncheons; and it is not +impossible that the readers who give their time to this unwholesome +stuff would be doing something worse if they were not reading it. The +only point upon which I wish to insist is that such amusement is neither +literary nor intellectual. + +There is, moreover, the danger of allowing the mind to become fixed upon +the accidental instead of the permanent. I have spoken of the fact that +the temporary interest of a book may be so great as to blind the reader +to all else. When "Uncle Tom's Cabin" was new, it was practically +impossible for the readers of that day to see in it anything but a fiery +tract against slavery. To-day who reads "Ground Arms" without being +chiefly impressed with its arguments against war? It is as controversial +documents that these books were written. If they have truth to life, if +they adequately express human emotion, they will be of permanent value +after this temporary interest has passed. The danger is that the passing +interest, which is natural and proper in itself, shall blind us to false +sentiment, to unjust views of life, to sham emotion. We are constantly +led to forget the important principle that books of our own time must be +judged by the standards which are afforded by the books which are of all +time. + +There has never been a time when self-possession and sound judgment in +dealing with contemporary literature were more important than they are +to-day. The immeasurably prolific press of the nineteenth century is +like a fish-breeding establishment where minnows are born by the million +a minute. There are so many books that the mind becomes bewildered. The +student who might have the strength of mind to form an intelligent +opinion of five books is utterly incapable of doing the same by five +thousand. We are all constantly led on to read too many things. It has +been again and again remarked that our grandfathers were better educated +than their grandsons because they knew thoroughly the few works which +came in their way. We have become the victims of over-reading until the +modern mind seems in danger of being destroyed by literary gluttony. + +It is well in dealing with contemporary work to be especially +self-exacting in insisting that a book is not to be read once which is +not to be read a second time. This may seem to be a rule made merely for +the sake of having a proper theory, yet it is to be taken literally and +observed exactly. It is true that the temptation is so great to read +books which are talked about, that we are all likely to run through a +good many things which we know to be really unworthy of a single +perusal, and of course to go over them again would be a waste of more +time. Where to draw the line between the permanent and the ephemeral is +a point which each must settle for himself. If, on the whole, it seem to +a man well to pay the price in time and in the risk of forming bad +mental habits, it is his right to do this, but pay the price he must and +will. + + * * * * * + +It is hardly possible to discuss contemporary literature without +speaking of that which is not literature,--the periodicals. One of the +conditions of the present time which most strongly affects the relations +of ordinary readers to reading in general is the part which periodicals +of one sort or another play in modern life. The newspaper enters so +intimately into existence to-day that no man can escape it if he would, +and with innumerable readers it is practically the sole mental food. It +is hardly necessary to say that there is no more relation between the +newspaper and literature than there would be between two persons +because they both wear hats. Both books and journals are expressed in +printed words, and that is about all that there is in common. It is +necessary to use the daily paper, but its office is chiefly a mechanical +one. It is connected with the purely material side of life. This is not +a fault, any more than it is the fault of a spade that it is employed to +dig the earth instead of being used to serve food with. It is not the +function of the newspapers to minister to the intellect or the +imagination in any high sense. They fulfill their mission when they are +clean and reliable in material affairs. What is beyond this is a +pretense at literature under impossible conditions, assumed to beguile +the unwary, and harmless or vicious, according to circumstances. It is +seen at its worst in the Sunday editions, with their sheets as many + + --as autumnal leaves that strow the brooks + In Vallombrosa. + +It is safe to say that for the faithful reader of the Sunday newspaper +there is no intellectual salvation. Like the Prodigal Son, he is fain to +fill his belly with the husks which the swine do eat, and he has not the +grace even to long for the more dignified diet of fatted calf. + +The newspaper habit is pretty generally recognized as demoralizing, and +in so far it may be in a literary point of view less dangerous than the +magazine habit. The latter is often accompanied by a self-righteous +conviction that it is a virtue. There is a class who take on airs of +being of the intellectual elect on the strength of reading all the +leading magazines; who are as proud of having four serials in hand at +once as is a society belle of being able to drive as many horses; who +look with a sort of pitying contempt upon persons so old-fashioned as to +neglect the magazines in favor of books, and who in general are as +proudly patronizing in their attitude toward literature as they are +innocent of any connection with it. This is worse than too great a +fondness for journalism, and of course this is an extreme type; but it +is to be feared that at their best the magazines represent mental +dissipation. + +It is true that genuine literature is often published in periodicals; +and there are many editors who deeply regret that the public will not +allow them to print a great deal more. As things are, real literature in +the magazines is the exception rather than the rule. The general +standard of magazine excellence is the taste of the intellectually +_nouveaux riches_--for persons who have entered upon an intellectual +heritage which they are not fitted rightly to understand or employ are +as common as those who come to material wealth under the same +conditions. It is to this class, which is one of the most numerous, and +still more one of the most conspicuous in our present civilization, that +most of the magazines address themselves. The genuinely cultivated +reader finds in the monthlies many papers which he looks through as he +looks through the newspaper, for the sake of information, and less often +he comes upon imaginative work. The serials which are worth reading at +all are worthy of being read as a whole, and not in the distorted and +distorting fashion of so many words a month, according to the size of +the page of a particular periodical. Reading a serial is like plucking a +rose petal by petal; the whole of the flower may be gathered, but its +condition is little likely to be satisfactory. While the magazines, +moreover, are not to be looked to for a great deal of literature of +lasting value, they not only encourage the habit of reading indifferent +imitations, but they foster a dangerous and demoralizing inability to +fix the attention for any length of time. The magazine-mind is a thing +of shreds and patches at best; incapable of grasping as a whole any +extended work. Literature holds the mirror up to nature, but the +magazine is apt to show the world through a toy multiplying-glass, which +gives to the eye a hundred minute and distorted images. + +It may seem that I do scant justice to the magazines. It is certainly to +be remembered that in the less thickly settled parts of this great +inchoate country, where libraries are not, the magazine is often a +comfort and even an inspiration. It is to be acknowledged that, with the +enormous mass of half-educated but often earnest and sincere souls, the +periodical has done and may still do a great deal of good. The child +must play with toys before it is fitted to grasp the tools of +handicraft, and enjoyment of the chromo may be a healthy and legitimate +stage on the way to an appreciation of the masters of painting. It is +not a reproach to call a man a toy-vender or a maker of chromos; nor do +I see that what I have been saying is to be interpreted as reflecting on +the makers of periodicals. It must be remembered that the publication of +a magazine is a business enterprise in the same sense that the selling +of carpets or calicoes is a business enterprise. The manufacturer of +magazines must please the general public with what he prints, as the +manufacturer must satisfy the ordinary buyer by the designs of his +fabrics. In either case it is the taste of the intellectual +_bourgeoisie_ which is the standard of success. The maker of periodicals +can no more afford to appeal to the taste of the cultivated few than can +the thrifty maker of stuffs. What is sold in open market must be adapted +to the demands of the open market. It is simply legitimate business +prudence which keeps most magazines from attempting to print literature. +They publish, as a rule, all the literature that the public will +have,--modified, unhappily, by the difficulty of getting it to publish +in a world where literature cannot be made to order. A book, it is to be +remembered, is a venture; a magazine is an enterprise. The periodical +must pay or it must be discontinued. + +The moral of the whole matter is that the only thing to do is to accept +magazines for what they are; neither to neglect them completely, nor to +give to them that abundant or exclusive attention which they cannot even +aim under existing conditions at deserving. They may easily be dangerous +intellectual snares; but the wise student will often find them +enjoyable, and sometimes useful. + + + + +XIII + +NEW BOOKS AND OLD + + +The quality of "timeliness" is one of the things which makes it +especially difficult to distinguish among new books. There is in this +day an ever increasing tendency to treat all topics of popular +discussion in ways which profess to be imaginative, and especially in +the narrative form. The novel with a theory and the poem with a purpose +are so enveloped with the glamour of immediate interest that they appear +to be of an importance far beyond that which belongs to their real +merit. Curiosity to know what these books have to say upon the questions +which most deeply interest or most vitally affect humanity is as natural +as it is difficult to resist. The desire to see what a book which is +talked about is like is doubly hard to overcome when it is so easily +excused under the pretense of gaining light on important questions. Time +seems to be proving, however, that the amount of noise made over these +theory-mongering romances is pretty nearly in adverse ratio to their +worth. We are told in Scripture that wisdom calleth in the streets, and +no man regardeth, but the opposite seems to be true of the clamors of +error. The very vehemence of these books is the quality which secures +to them attention; and it is impossible wholly to ignore them, and yet +to keep in touch with the time. + +It is the more difficult to evade pretentious and noisily worthless +writings because of the great ingenuity of the advertising devices which +force them upon the attention. The student of genuine literature +naturally does not allow himself to be led by these, no matter how +persuasive they may be. The man who bases his choice of books upon the +advertisements is like him who regulates the health of his family by the +advice of a patent-medicine almanac. It is not easy, however, to escape +entirely from the influence of advertising. If we have seen a book +talked about in print, been confronted with its title on a dazzling +poster, if it has been recommended by the chief prize-fighter in the +land, or damned by the admiration of Mr. Gladstone, we are any of us +inclined to read it, just to see what it is like. The ways by which new +publications are insinuated upon the attention are, too, so impalpably +effective, so cunningly unexpected, that we take our opinion from them +without realizing that we have not originated it. The inspiration and +stress of soul which in Greece begot art, bring forth in our day +advertising, and no man can wholly escape its influence. + +Innumerable are the methods by which authors, whose sole claim to genius +is this skill in advertising, keep themselves and their books before the +public. Eccentricities of manner and of matter are so varied as to +provoke wonder that mental fertility of resource so remarkable should +not produce results really great and lasting. Some writers claim to be +founders of schools, and talk a good deal about their "modernity," a +word which really means stale sensationalism revamped; others insist in +season and out of season that they have discovered the only true theory +of art, and that literature is only possible upon the lines which they +lay down. It is unfortunately to be observed that the theory invariably +follows the practice; that they first produce queer books, and then +formulate a theory which excuses them. Still others call attention to +themselves by a variety of artifices, from walking down Piccadilly +mooning over a sunflower to driving through the Bois de Boulogne in +brocade coat, rose-pink hat, and cravat of gold-lace, like Barbey +d'Aurevilly. No man ever produced good art who worked to advertise +himself, and fortunately the day of these charlatans is usually short. I +have spoken in another place of the danger of confounding an author and +his work; and of course this peril is especially great in the case of +writers of our own time. I may add that the parading of authors is a +vice especially prevalent in the nineteenth century. Mrs. Leo Hunter +advertises herself, and incidentally the celebrities whom she captures, +and the publishers not infrequently show a disposition to promote the +folly for the sake of their balance-sheet. If Apollo and the Muses +returned to earth they would be bidden instantly to one of Mrs. Hunter's +Saturday five o'clocks, and a list of the distinguished guests would be +in the Sunday papers. That is what many understand by the encouragement +of literature. + +Another method of securing notice, which is practiced by not a few +latter-day writers, is that of claiming startling originality. Many of +the authors who are attempting to take the kingdom of literary +distinction by violence lay great stress upon the complete novelty of +their views or their emotions. Of these, it is perhaps sufficient to say +that the men who are genuine insist that what they say is true, not that +they are the first to say it. In all art that is of value the end sought +is the work and not the worker. Perhaps most vicious of all these +self-advertisers are those who force themselves into notice by thrusting +forward whatever the common consent of mankind has hitherto kept +concealed. It is chiefly to France that we owe this development of +recent literature so-called. If a French writer wishes to be effective, +it is apparently his instant instinct to be indecent. The trick is an +easy one. It is as if the belle who finds herself a wall-flower at a +ball should begin loudly to swear. She would be at once the centre of +observation. + +Of books of these various classes Max Nordau has made a dismal list in +"Degeneration," a book itself discouragingly bulky, discouragingly +opinionated, discouragingly prejudiced and illogical, and yet not +without much rightness both of perception and intention. He says of the +books most popular with that portion of society which is most in +evidence, that they + + diffuse a curious perfume, yielding distinguishable odors of incense, + eau de Lubin, and refuse, one or the other preponderating + alternately.... Books treating of the relations of the sexes, with no + matter how little reserve, seem too dully moral. Elegant titillation + only begins where normal sexual relations leave off.... Ghost-stories + are very popular, but they must come on in scientific disguise, as + hypnotism, telepathy, or somnambulism. So are marionette plays, in + which seemingly naïve but knowing rogues make used-up old ballad + dummies babble like babies or idiots. So are esoteric novels in which + the author hints that he could say a deal about magic, fakirism, + kabbala, astrology, and other white and black arts if he chose. + Readers intoxicate themselves in the hazy word-sequences of symbolic + poetry. Ibsen dethrones Goethe; Maeterlinck ranks with Shakespeare; + Nietzsche is pronounced by German and even French critics to be the + leading German writer of the day; the "Kreutzer Sonata" is the Bible + of ladies, who are amateurs in love, but bereft of lovers; dainty + gentlemen find the street ballads and gaol-bird songs of Jules Jouy, + Bruant, MacNab, and Xanroff very _distingué_ on account of "the warm + sympathy pulsing in them," as the phrase runs; and society persons, + whose creed is limited to baccarat and the money market, make + pilgrimages to the Oberammergau Passion-Play, and wipe away a tear + over Paul Verlaine's invocations to the Virgin.--_Degeneration_, ii. + +This is a picture true of only a limited section of modern society, a +section, moreover, much smaller in America than abroad. Common sense and +a sense of humor save Americans from many of the extravagances to be +observed across the ocean. There are too many fools, however, even in +this country. To secure immediate success with these readers a writer +need do nothing more than to produce erotic eccentricities. There are +many intellectually restless persons who suppose themselves to be +advancing in culture when they are poring over the fantastic +imbecilities of Maeterlinck, or the nerve-rasping unreason of Ibsen; +when they are sailing aloft on the hot-air balloons of Tolstoi's +extravagant theories, or wallowing in the blackest mud of Parisian slums +with Zola. Dull and jaded minds find in these things an excitement, as +the jaded palate finds stimulation in the sting of fiery sauces. There +are others, too, who believe that these books are great because they are +so impressive. The unreflective reader measures the value of a book not +by its permanent qualities but by its instantaneous effect, and an +instantaneous effect is very apt to be simple sensationalism. + +It is not difficult to see the fallacy of these amazing books. A +blackguard declaiming profanely and obscenely in a drawing-room can +produce in five minutes more sensation than a sage discoursing +learnedly, delightfully, and profoundly could cause in years. Because a +book makes the reader cringe it by no means follows that the author is a +genius. In literature any writer of ordinary cleverness may gain +notoriety if he is willing to be eccentric enough, extravagant enough, +or indecent enough. An ass braying attracts more attention than an +oriole singing. The street musician, scraping a foundling fiddle, vilely +out of tune, compels notice; but the master, freeing the ecstasy +enchanted in the bosom of a violin of royal lineage, touches and +transports. All standards are confounded if notoriety means excellence. + +There is a sentence in one of the enticing and stimulating essays of +James Russell Lowell which is applicable to these writers who gain +reputation by setting on edge the reader's teeth. + + There is no work of genius which has not been the delight of + mankind.--_Rousseau and the Sentimentalists._ + +Notice: the delight of mankind; not the sensation, the pastime, the +amazement, the horror, or the scandal of mankind,--but the delight. This +is a wise test by which to try a good deal of the best advertised +literature of the present day. Do not ask whether the talked-of book +startles, amuses, shocks, or even arouses simply; but inquire, if you +care to estimate its literary value, whether it delights. + +It is necessary, of course, to understand that Mr. Lowell uses the word +here in its broad signification. He means more than the simple pleasure +of smooth and sugary things. He means the delight of tragedy as well as +of comedy; of "King Lear" and "Othello" as well as of "Midsummer Night's +Dream;" but he does not mean the nerve-torture of "Ghosts" or the mental +nausea of "L'Assommoir." By delight he means that persuasion which is an +essential quality of all genuine art. The writer who makes his readers +shrink and quiver may produce a transient sensation. His notoriety is +noisily proclaimed by the trumpets of to-day; but the brazen voice of +to-morrow will as lustily roar other fleeting successes, and all alike +be forgotten in a night. + +I insisted in the first of these talks upon the principle that good art +is "human and wholesome and sane." We need to keep these characteristics +constantly in mind; and to make them practical tests of the literature +upon which we feed our minds and our imaginations. We are greatly in +need of some sort of an artistic quarantine. Literature should not be +the carrier of mental or emotional contagion. A work which swarms with +mental and moral microbes should be as ruthlessly disinfected by fire as +if it were a garment contaminated with the germs of fever or cholera. It +is manifestly impossible that this shall be done, however, in the +present state of society; and it follows that each reader must be his +own health-board in the choice of books. + +The practical question which instantly arises is how one is to know good +books from bad until one has read them. How to distinguish between what +is worthy of attention and what is ephemeral trash has perplexed many a +sincere and earnest student. This is a duty which should devolve largely +upon trained critics, but unhappily criticism is not to-day in a +condition which makes it reliable or practically of very great +assistance where recent publications are concerned. The reader is left +to his own judgment in choosing among writings hot from the press. +Fortunately the task of discriminating is not impossible. It is even far +less difficult than it at first appears. The reader is seldom without a +pretty clear idea of the character of notorious books before he touches +them. Where the multitude of publications is so great, the very means of +advertising which are necessary to bring them into notice show what they +are. Even should a man make it a rule to read nothing until he has a +definite estimate of its merit, he will find in the end that he has lost +little. For any purposes of the cultivation of the mind or the +imagination the book which is good to read to-day is good to read +to-morrow, so that there is not the haste about reading a real book that +there is in getting through the morning paper, which becomes obsolete by +noon. When one considers, too, how small a portion of the volumes +published it is possible to have time for, and how important it is to +make the most of life by having these of the best, one realizes that it +is worth while to take a good deal of trouble, and if need be to +sacrifice the superficial enjoyment of keeping in the front rank of the +mad mob of sensation seekers whose only idea of literary merit is noise +and novelty. It is a trivial and silly vanity which is unhappy because +somebody--or because everybody--has read new books first. + +There is, moreover, nothing more stupid than the attempt to deceive +ourselves,--especially if the attempt succeeds. Of all forms of lying +this is at once the most demoralizing and the most utterly useless. If +we read poor books from puerile or unworthy motives, let us at least be +frank about it in our own minds. If we have taken up with unwholesome +writers from idle curiosity, or, worse, from prurient hankering after +uncleanness, what do we gain by assuring ourselves that we did not know +what we were doing, or by pretending that we have unwillingly been +following out a line of scientific investigation? Fine theories make but +flimsy coverings for unhealthy desires. + +Of course this whole matter lies within the domain of individual liberty +and individual responsibility. The use or the abuse of reading is +determined by each man for himself. To gloat over scorbutic prose and +lubricious poetry, to fritter the attention upon the endless repetition +of numberless insignificant details, to fix the mind upon phonographic +reports of the meaningless conversations of meaningless characters, to +lose rational consciousness in the confusion of verbal eccentricities +which dazzle by the cunning with which words are prevented from +conveying intelligence,--and the writings of to-day afford ample +opportunity for doing all of these things!--is within the choice of +every reader. It is to be remembered, however, that no excuse evades the +consequence. He who wastes life finds himself bankrupt, and there is no +redress. + +Always it is to be remembered that the classics afford us the means of +measuring the worth of what we read. He who pauses to consider a little +will see at once something of what is meant by this. He will realize the +wide difference there is between familiarity with the permanent +literature of the world and acquaintance with the most sensational and +widely discussed books of to-day. A man may be a virtuous citizen and a +good husband and father, with intelligence in his business and common +sense in the affairs of life, and yet be utterly ignorant of how +Achilles put the golden tress into the hand of dead Patroclus, or of the +stratagem by which Iphigenia saved the life of Orestes at Tauris, or of +the love of Palamon and Arcite for Emilie the fair, or of whom Gudrun +married and whom she loved, or of how Sancho Panza governed his island, +or of the ill-fated loves of Romeo and Juliet, or of the agony of +Othello, or of Hamlet, or Lear, or Perdita, or Portia. The knowledge of +none of these is necessary to material existence, and it is possible to +make a creditable figure in the world without it. Yet we are all +conscious that the man who is not aware of these creations which are so +much more real than the majority of the personages that stalk +puppet-like across the pages of history, has missed something of which +the loss makes his life definitely poorer. We cannot but feel the +enrichment of mind and feeling which results from our having in classic +pages made the acquaintance with these gracious beings and shared their +adventures and their emotions. Suppose that the books most noisily +lauded to-day were to be tried by the same test. Is a man better for +knowing with Zola all the diseased genealogy of the Rougon-Macquart +family, morbid, criminal, and foul? Is not the mind cleaner and saner if +it has never been opened to the entertainment of Poznyscheff, Hedda +Gabler, Dr. Rank, Mademoiselle de Maupin, Oswald Alving, or any of this +unclean tribe? It is not that a strong or well-developed man will +ignore the crime or the criminals of the world; but it is not necessary +to gloat over either. It is not difficult to learn all that it is +necessary to know about yellow fever, cholera, or leprosy, without +passing days and nights in the pest hospitals. + +These unwholesome books, however, are part of the intellectual history +of our time. He who would keep abreast of modern thought and of life as +it is to-day, we are constantly reminded, must take account of the +writers who are most loudly lauded. Goethe has said: "It is in her +monstrosities that nature reveals herself;" and the same is measurably +true in the intellectual world. The madness, the eccentricity, the +indecencies of these books, are so many indications by which certain +tendencies of the period betray themselves. It seems to me, however, +that this is a consideration to which it is extremely easy to give too +much weight. To mistake this noisy and morbid class of books, these +self-parading and sensational authors, for the most significant signs of +the intellectual condition of the time is like mistaking a drum-major +for the general, because the drum-major is most conspicuous and always +to the fore,--except in action. The mind is nourished and broadened, +moreover, by the study of sanity. It is the place of the physician to +concern himself with disease; but as medical treatises are dangerous in +the hands of laymen, so are works of morbid psychology in the hands of +the ordinary reader. + +Fortunately contemporary literature is not confined to books of the +unwholesome sort, greatly as these are in evidence. We have a real +literature as well as a false one. Time moves so swiftly that we have +begun to regard the works of Thackeray and Dickens and Hawthorne, and +almost of Browning and Tennyson, as among the classics. They are so, +however, by evident merit rather than by age, and have not been in +existence long enough to receive the suffrages of generations. The names +of these authors remind us how many books have been written in our time +which endure triumphantly all tests that have been proposed; books to +miss the knowledge of which is to lose the opportunity of making life +richer. Certainly we should be emotionally and spiritually poorer +without the story of Hester Prynne and Arthur Dimmesdale, between whom +the Scarlet Letter glowed balefully; without Hilda in her tower and poor +Miriam bereft of her Faun below. To have failed to share the Fezziwigs' +ball, or the trial of Mr. Pickwick for breach of promise; to have lived +without knowing the inimitable Sam Weller and the juicy Micawbers, the +amiable Quilp and the elegant Mrs. Skewton, philanthropic Mrs. Jellyby +and airy Harold Skimpole, is to have failed of acquaintances that would +have brightened existence; to be ignorant of Becky Sharp and Colonel +Newcome, of Arthur Pendennis and George Warrington, of Beatrix and +Colonel Esmond, is to have neglected one of the blessings, and not of +the lesser blessings either. No man is without a permanent and tangible +gain who has comprehendingly read Emerson's "Rhodora," or the +"Threnody," or "Days," or "The Problem." Whoever has been +sympathetically through the "Idylls of the King" not only experienced a +long delight but has gained a fresh ideal; while to have gone to the +heart of "The Ring and the Book,"--that most colossal _tour-de-force_ in +all literature,--to have heard the tender confidences of dying Pompilia, +the anguished confession of Caponsacchi, the noble soliloquy of the +Pope, is to have lived through a spiritual and an emotional experience +of worth incalculable. In the age of Thackeray and Dickens, of Hawthorne +and Emerson and Tennyson and Browning, we cannot complain that there is +any lack of genuine literature. + +Nor are we obliged to keep to what seems to some a high and breathless +altitude of reading. There are many readers who are of so little natural +imagination, or who have cultivated it so little, that it is a conscious +and often a fatiguing effort to keep to the mood of these greater +authors. Beside these works to the keen enjoyment of which imagination +is necessary, there are others which are genuine without being of so +high rank. It is certainly on the whole a misfortune that one should be +deprived of a knowledge of Mrs. Proudie and the whole clerical circle in +which she moved, and especially of Mr. Harding, the delightful "Warden;" +he is surely to be pitied who has not read the story of "Silas Marner," +who does not feel friendly and intimate with shrewd and epigrammatic +Mrs. Poyser, with spiritual Dinah Morris, and with Maggie Tulliver and +her family. No intelligent reader can afford to have passed by in +neglect the pleasant sweetness of Longfellow or the wholesome soundness +of Whittier, the mystic sensuousness of Rossetti or the voluptuous +melodiousness of Swinburne. + +It is manifestly impossible to enumerate all the authors who illustrate +the richness of the latter half of the nineteenth century; but there are +those of the living who cannot be passed in silence. To deal with those +who are writing to-day is manifestly difficult, but as I merely claim to +cite illustrations no fault can justly be found with omissions. +Naturally Meredith and Hardy come first to mind. He who has read that +exquisite chapter in "The Ordeal of Richard Feverel" which tells of the +meeting of Richard and Lucy in the meadows by the river has in memory a +gracious possession for the rest of his days. Who can recall from "The +Return of the Native" the noonday visit of Mrs. Yeobright to the house +of her son and her journey to death back over Egdon Heath, without a +heart-deep thrill? What sympathetic reader fails to recognize that he is +mentally and imaginatively richer for the honest little reddle-man, +Diggory Venn, for sturdy Gabriel Oak, for the delightful clowns of +"Under the Greenwood Tree" and "Far from the Madding Crowd," or for +ill-starred Tess when on that dewy morning she had the misfortune to +touch the caddish heart of Angel Clare? To have failed to read and to +reread Stevenson,--for one thinks of Stevenson as still of the +living,--to have passed Kipling by, is to have neglected one of the +blessings of the time. + +It may be that I have seemed to imply by the examples I have chosen that +the literature of continental Europe is to be shunned. Naturally in +addressing English-speaking folk one selects examples when possible from +literature in that tongue; and I have alluded to books in other +languages only when they brought out more strikingly than do English +books a particular point. It is needless to say that in these +cosmopolitan days no one can afford to neglect the riches of other +nations in contemporary literature. It is difficult to resist the +temptation to make lists, to speak of the men who in France with Guy de +Maupassant at their head have developed so great a mastery of style; one +would gladly dwell on the genius of Turgenieff, perhaps the one writer +who excuses the modern craze for Russian books; or of Sienkiewicz, who +has only Dumas _père_ to dispute his place as first romancer of the +world; and so on for other writers of other lands and tongues. It is +unnecessary, however, to multiply examples, and here there is no attempt +to speak exhaustively even of English literature. + +The thing to be kept in mind is that it is our good fortune to live in +the century which in the whole course of English literature is outranked +by the brilliant Elizabethan period only. It is surely worth while to +attempt to prove ourselves worthy of that which the gods have graciously +given us. Men sigh for the good day that is gone, and imagine that had +they lived then they would have made their lives correspondingly rich to +match the splendors of an age now famous. We live in a time destined to +go down to the centuries not unrenowned for literary achievement; it is +for us to prove ourselves appreciative and worthy of this time. + + + + +XIV + +FICTION + + +Probably the oldest passion of the race which can lay any claim to +connection with the intellect is the love of stories. The most ancient +examples of literature which have been preserved are largely in the form +of narratives. As soon as man has so far conquered the art of speech as +to get beyond the simplest statements, he may be supposed to begin +instinctively to relate incidents, to tell rudimentary tales, and to put +into words the story of events which have happened, or which might have +happened. + +The interest which every human being takes in the things which may +befall his fellows underlies this universal fondness; and the man who +does not love a story must be devoid of normal human sympathy with his +kind. It is hardly necessary, at this late day, to point out the strong +hold upon the sympathies of his fellows which the story-teller has had +from the dawn of civilization. The mind easily pictures the gaunt +reciters who, in savage tribes, repeat from generation to generation the +stories and myths handed orally from father to son; or the professional +narrators of the Orient who repeat gorgeously colored legends and +fantastic adventures in the gate or the market. Perhaps, too, the +mention of the subject of this talk brings from the past the homely, +kindly figure of the nurse who made our childish eyes grow large, and +our little hearts go trippingly in the days of pinafores and +fairy-lore--the blessed days when "once upon a time" was the open sesame +to all delights. The responsiveness of human beings to story-telling the +world over unites all mankind as in a bond of common sympathy. + +What old-fashioned theologians seemed to find an inexhaustible pleasure +in calling "the natural man" has always been strongly inclined to turn +in his reading to narratives in preference to what our grandparents +primly designated as "improving works." In any library the bindings of +the novels are sure to be worn, while the sober backs of treatises upon +manners, or morals, or philosophy, or even science, remain almost as +fresh as when they left the bindery. Each reader in his own grade +selects the sort of tale which most appeals to him; and while the range +is wide, the principle of selection is not so greatly varied. The +shop-girl gloats over "The Earl's Bride; or, The Heiress of Plantagenet +Park." The school-miss in the street-car smiles contemptuously as she +sees this title, and complacently opens the volume of the "Duchess" or +of Rhoda Broughton which is the delight of her own soul. The advanced +young woman of society has only contempt for such trash, and accompanies +her chocolate caramels with the perusal of "The Yellow Aster," or the +"Green Carnation," while her mother, very likely, reads the felicitous +foulness of some Frenchman. Those readers who have a sane and wholesome +taste, properly cultivated, take their pleasure in really good novels or +stories; but the fondness for narrative of some sort is universal. + +It would be manifestly unfair to imply that there is never a natural +inclination for what is known as "solid reading," but such a taste is +exceptional rather than general. Certainly a person who cared only for +stories could not be looked upon as having advanced far in intellectual +development; but appreciation for other forms of literature is rather +the effect of cultivation than the result of natural tendencies. Most of +us have had periods in which we have endeavored to persuade ourselves +that we were of the intellectual elect, and that however circumstances +had been against us, we did in our inmost souls pant for philosophy and +yearn for abstract wisdom. We are all apt to assure ourselves that if we +might, we should devote our days to the study of science and our nights +to mastering the deepest secrets of metaphysics. We declare to ourselves +that we have not time; that just now we are wofully overworked, but that +in some golden, although unfortunately indeterminate future, for which +we assure ourselves most solemnly that we long passionately, we shall +pore over tremendous tomes of philosophical thought as the bee grapples +itself to a honey-full clover-blossom. It is all humbug; and, what is +more, we know that it is humbug. We do not, as a rule, relish the +effort of comprehending and assimilating profoundly thoughtful +literature, and it is generally more easy to read fiction in a slipshod +way than it is to glide with any amusement over intellectual work. The +intense strain of the age of course increases this tendency to light +reading; but in any age the only books of which practically everybody +who reads at all is fond are the story-books. + + * * * * * + +It has been from time to time the habit of busy idlers to fall into +excited and often acrimonious discussion in regard to this general love +for stories. Many have held that it is an instinct of a fallen and +unregenerate nature, and that it is to be checked at any cost. It is not +so long since certain most respectable and influential religious sects +set the face steadfastly against novels; and you may remember as an +instance that when George Eliot was a young woman she regarded +novel-reading as a wicked amusement. There is to-day a more rational +state of feeling. It is seen that it is better to accept the instincts +of human nature, and endeavor to work through them than to engage in the +well-nigh hopeless task of attempting to eradicate them. To-day we are +coming to recognize the cunning of the East in inculcating wisdom in +fables and the profound lesson of the statement in the Gospels: "Without +a parable spake He not unto them." + +Much of the distrust which has been in the past felt in regard to +fiction has arisen from a narrow and uncomprehending idea of its nature. +Formalists have conceived that the relating of things which never +occurred--which indeed it was often impossible should occur,--is a +violation of truth. The fundamental ground of most of the objections +which moralists have made to fiction has been the assumption that +fiction is false. Of certain kinds of fiction this is of course true +enough, but of fiction which comes within the range of literature it is +conspicuously incorrect. + +Fiction is literature which is false to the letter that it may be true +to the spirit. It is unfettered by narrow actualities of form, because +it has to express the higher actualities of emotion. It uses incident +and character as mere language. It is as unfair to object to the +incidents of a great novel that they are untrue, as it would be to say +that the letters of a word are untrue. There is no question of truth or +untruth beyond the question whether the symbols express that which they +are intended to convey. The letters are set down to impart to the +intelligence of the reader the idea of a given word; the incidents of a +novel are used to embody a truth of human nature and life. Truth is here +the verity of the thing conveyed. In a narrow and literal sense Hamlet +and Othello and Colonel Newcome and Becky Sharp are untrue. They never +existed in the flesh. They have lived, however, in the higher and more +vital sense that they have been part of the imagination of a master. +They are true in that they express the truth. It is a dull +misunderstanding of the value of things to call that book untrue which +deals with fictitious characters wisely, yet to hold as verity that +which records actual events stolidly and unappreciatively. The history +may be false from beginning to end and the fiction true. Fiction which +is worthy of consideration under the name of literature is the truest +prose in the world; and I believe that it is not without an instinctive +recognition of this fact that mankind has so generally taken it to its +heart. + +The value of at least certain works of fiction has come to be generally +recognized by the intellectual world. There are some novels which it is +taken for granted that every person of education has read. Whoever makes +the smallest pretense of culture must, for instance, be at least +tolerably familiar with Scott, Thackeray, Dickens, and Hawthorne; while +he will find it difficult to hold the respect of cultivated men unless +he is also acquainted with Miss Austen, George Eliot, and Charlotte +Brontë, with Dumas _père_, Balzac, and Victor Hugo, and with the works +of leading living writers of romance. "Don Quixote" is as truly a +necessary part of a liberal education as is the multiplication table; +and it would not be difficult to extend the list of novels which it is +assumed as a matter of course that persons of cultivation know +familiarly. + +Nor is it only the works of the greater writers of imaginative narration +which have secured a general recognition. If it is not held that it is +essential for an educated man to have read Trollope, Charles Reade, +Kingsley, or Miss Mulock, for example, it is at least recognized that +one had better have gained an acquaintance with these and similar +writers. Traill, the English critic, speaks warmly of the books which +while falling below the first rank are yet richly worth attention. He +says with justice:-- + + The world can never estimate the debt that it owes to second-class + literature. Yet it is basely afraid to acknowledge the debt, + hypocritically desiring to convey the impression that such literature + comes to it in spite of protest, calling off its attention from the + great productions. + +It is true enough that there is a good deal of foolish pretense in +regard to our genuine taste in reading, but in actual practice most +persons do in the long run read chiefly what they really enjoy. It is +also true that there are more readers who are capable of appreciating +the novels of the second grade than there are those who are in sympathy +with fiction of the first. The thing for each individual reader is to +see to it that he is honest in this matter with himself, and that he +gives attention to the best that he can like rather than to the poorest. + +Even those who accept the fact that cultivated persons will read novels, +and those who go so far as to appreciate that it is a distinct gain to +the intellectual life, are, however, very apt to be troubled by the +dangers of over-indulgence in this sort of literature. It has been said +and repeated innumerable times that the excessive reading of novels is +mentally debilitating and even debauching. This is certainly true. So is +it true that there is great mental danger in the excessive reading of +philosophy or theology, or the excessive eating of bread, or the +excessive doing of any other thing. The favorite figure in connection +with fiction has been to compare it to opium-eating or to dram-drinking; +and the moral usually drawn is that the novel-reader is in imminent +danger of intellectual dissoluteness or even of what might be called the +delirium tremens of the imagination. I should not be honest if I +pretended to have a great deal of patience with most that is said in +this line. The exclusive use of fiction as mental food is of course +unwise, and the fact is so patent that it is hardly worth while to waste +words in repeating it. When I said a moment ago that there is danger in +the eating of bread if it is carried to excess I indicated what seems to +me to be the truth in this matter. If one reads good and wholesome +fiction, I believe that the natural instincts of the healthy mind may be +trusted to settle the question of how much shall be read. If the fiction +is unhealthy, morbid, or false, any of it is bad. If it is good, if it +calls into play a healthy imagination, there is very little danger that +too much of it will be taken. When there is complaint that a girl or a +boy is injuring the mind by too exclusive a devotion to novels, I +believe that it generally means, if the facts of the case were +understood, that the mind of the reader is in an unwholesome condition, +and that this excessive devotion to fiction is a symptom rather than a +disease. When the girl coughs, it is not the cough that is the trouble; +this is only a symptom of the irritation of membranes; and I believe +that much the same is the case with extravagant novel-readers. + +Of course this view of the matter will not commend itself to everybody. +It is hard for us to shake off the impression of all the countless +homilies which have been composed against novel-reading; and we are by +no means free from the poison of the ascetic idea that anything to which +mankind takes naturally and with pleasure cannot really be good in +itself. I hope, however, that it will not appear to you unreasonable +when I say that it seems to me far better to insist upon proper methods +of reading and upon the selection of books which are genuine literature +than to wage unavailing war against the natural love of stories which is +to be found in every normal and wholesome human being. If I could be +assured that a boy or a girl read only good novels and read them +appreciatively and sympathetically, I should never trouble myself to +inquire how many he or she read. I should be hopefully patient even if +there was apparently a neglect of history and philosophy. I should be +confident that it is impossible that the proper reading of good fiction +should not in the end both prove beneficial in itself and lead the mind +to whatever is good in other departments of literature. I am not +pleading for the indiscriminating indulgence in doubtful stories. I do +not believe that girls are brought to fine and well-developed womanhood +by an exclusive devotion to the chocolate-caramel-and-pickled-lime sort +of novels. I do not hold that boys come to nobility and manliness +through the influence of sensational tales wherein blood-boultered +bandits reduce to infinitesimal powder every commandment of the +decalogue. I do, however, thoroughly believe that sound and imaginative +fiction is as natural and as wholesome for growing minds as is the air +of the seashore or the mountains for growing bodies. + +The fact is of especial importance as applied to the education of +children. A healthy child is instinctively in the position of a learner. +He is unconsciously full of deep wonderment concerning this world in +which he finds himself, and concerning this mysterious thing called life +in which he has a share. His mind is eager to receive, but it is +entirely free from any affectation. A child accepts what appeals to him +directly, and he is without scruple in neglecting what does not interest +him. He learns only by slow degrees that knowledge may have value and +interest from its remote bearings; and in dealing with him in the +earlier stages of mental development there is no other means so sure and +effective as story-telling. It is here that a child finds the specific +and the concrete while he is still too immature to be moved by the +general and the abstract. + +It is "to cater to this universal taste," the circulars of the +publishers assure us, that so-called "juvenile literature" was invented. +I do not wish to be extravagant, but it does seem to me that modern +juvenile literature has blighted the rising generation as rust blights a +field of wheat. The holiday counters are piled high with hastily +written, superficial, often inaccurate, and, what is most important of +all, unimaginative books. The nursery of to-day is littered with +worthless volumes, and the child halfway through school has already +outlived a dozen varieties of books for the young. + +A good many of these works are as full of information as a sugar-coated +pill is of drugs. Thirst for practical information is one of the +extravagances of the age. Parents to-day make their children to pass +through tortures in the service of what they call "practical knowledge" +as the unnatural parents of old made their offspring to pass through the +fires of Moloch. We are all apt to lose sight of the fact that wisdom is +not what a man knows but what he is. The important thing is not what we +drill into our children, but what we drill them into. There are times +when it is the most profound moral duty of a parent to substitute +Grimm's fairy stories for text-books, and to devote the whole stress of +educational effort to the developing of the child's imagination. I am +not at all sure that it is not of more importance to see to it that a +child--and especially a boy--is familiar with "the land east of the sun +and west of the moon" than to stuff his brain with the geographical +details of the wilds of Asia, Africa, or the isles of the far seas. I am +sure that he is better off from knowing about Sindbad and Ali Baba than +for being able to extract a cube root. I do not wish to be understood as +speaking against the imparting of practical information, although I must +say that I think that the distinction between what is really practical +and what is not seems to me to be somewhat confused in these days. I +simply mean that just now there is need of enforcing the value of the +imaginative side of education. No accumulation of facts can compensate +for the narrowing of the growing mind; and indeed facts are not to be +really grasped and assimilated without the development of the +realizing--the imaginative--faculty. + +It is even more important for children than for adults that their +reading shall be imaginative. The only way to protect them against +worthless books is to give them a decided taste for what is good. It is +only after children have been debauched by vapid or sensational books +that they come to delight in rubbish. It is easier in the first place to +interest them in real literature than in shams. The thing is to take the +trouble to see to it that what they read is fine. The most common error +in this connection is to suppose that children need an especial sort of +literature different from that suited to adults. As far, certainly, as +serious education is concerned, there is neither adult literature nor +juvenile literature; there is simply literature. Speaking broadly, the +literature best for grown persons is the literature best for children. +The limitations of youth have, and should have, the same effects in +literature as in life. They restrict the comprehension and appreciation +of the facts of life; and equally they set a bound to the comprehension +and appreciation of what is read. The impressions which a child gets +from either are not those of his elders. The important thing is that +what the growing mind receives shall be vital and wholesome. It is less +unfortunate for the child to mistake what is genuine than to receive as +true what is really false. We all commit errors in the conclusions which +we draw from life; and so will it be with children and books. Books +which are wise and sane, however, will in time correct the +misconceptions they beget, as life in time makes clear the mistakes +which life has produced. + +The whole philosophy of reading for children is pretty well summed up by +implication in the often quoted passage in which Charles Lamb describes +under the disguise of Bridget Elia, the youthful experience of his +sister Mary:-- + + She was tumbled early, by accident or design, into a spacious closet + of good old English reading, without much selection or prohibition, + and browsed at will upon that fair and wholesome pasturage. Had I + twenty girls, they should be brought up exactly in this + fashion.--_Mackery End._ + +Fiction--to return to the immediate subject of this talk--is only a part +of a child's education, but it is a most essential part; and it is of +the greatest importance that the fiction given to a young reader be +noble; that it be true to the essentials of life, as it can be true only +if it is informed by a keen and sane imagination. Children should be fed +on the genuine and sound folk-tales like those collected by the brothers +Grimm; the tales of Hans Christian Andersen, of Asbjörnsen, of +Laboulaye, and of that delightful old lady, the Countess d'Aulnoy; the +fine and robust "Morte d'Arthur" of Malory; the more modern classics, +"Robinson Crusoe" and "Gulliver." Then there are Hawthorne's "Tanglewood +Tales" and the "Wonder-Book," "Treasure Island" and "Kidnapped," "Uncle +Remus," and the "Jungle Books." It may be claimed that these are +"juvenile" literature; but I have named nothing of which I, at least, am +not as fond now as in my youth, and I have yet to discover that adults +find lack of interest in good books even of fairy stories. What has been +said against juvenile literature has been intended against the +innumerable works mustered under that name which are not literature at +all. Wonder lore is as normal food for old as for young, and there is no +more propriety in confining it to children than there is in limiting the +use of bread and butter to the inhabitants of the nursery. + +It is neither possible nor wise to attempt here a catalogue of books +especially adapted to children. I should myself put Spenser high in the +list, and very likely include others which common custom does not regard +as well adapted to the young. These, of course, are books to be read to +the child, not that he at first can be expected to go pleasurably +through alone. Prominent among them I would insist first, last, and +always upon Shakespeare. If it were practically possible to confine the +reading of a child to Shakespeare and the Bible, the whole question +would be well and wisely settled. Since this cannot be, it is at least +essential that a child be given both as soon as he can be interested in +them,--and it is equally important that he be given neither until they +do attract him. He is to be guided and aided, but there cannot be a more +rich and noble introduction to fiction than through the inspired pages +of Shakespeare, and the child who has been well grounded in the greatest +of poets is not likely ever to go very widely astray in his reading. + + + + +XV + +FICTION AND LIFE + + +The reading of fiction has come to have an important and well recognized +place in modern life. However strong may be the expression of +disapprobation against certain individual books, no one in these days +attempts to deny the value of imaginative literature in the development +of mind and the formation of character; yet so strong is the Puritan +strain in the blood of the English race that there is still a good deal +of lingering ascetic disapproval of novels. + +It must be remembered in this connection that there are novels and +novels. The objections which have from time to time been heaped upon +fiction in general are more than deserved by fiction in particular; and +that, too, by the fiction most in evidence. The books least worthy are +for the most part precisely those which in their brief day are most +likely to excite comment. That the flaming scarlet toadstools which +irresistibly attract the eye in the forest are viciously poisonous does +not, however, alter the fact that mushrooms are at once delicious and +nutritious. It is no more logical to condemn all fiction on account of +the worthlessness or hurtfulness of bad books than it would be to +denounce all food because things have often been eaten which are +dangerously unwholesome. + +The great value of fiction as a means of intellectual and of moral +training lies in the fact that man is actually and vitally taught +nothing of importance save by that which really touches his feelings. +Advice appeals to the intellect, and experience to the emotions. What +has been didactically told to us is at best a surface treatment, while +what we have felt is an inward modification of what we are. We approve +of advice, and we act according to experience. Often when we have +decided upon one course of life or action, the inner self which is the +concrete result of our temperament and our experiences goes quietly +forward in a path entirely different. What we have resolved seldom comes +to pass unless it is sustained by what we have felt. For centuries has +man been defining himself as a being that reasons while he has been +living as a being that feels. + +The sure hold of fiction upon mankind depends upon the fact that it +enables the reader to gain experience vicariously. Seriously and +sympathetically to read a story which is true to life is to live through +an emotional experience. How vivid this emotion is will manifestly +depend upon the imaginative sympathy with which one reads. The young man +who has appreciatively entered into the life of Arthur Pendennis will +hardly find that he is able to go through the world in a spirit of +dandified self-complaisance without a restraining consciousness that +such an attitude toward life is most absurd folly. A man of confirmed +worldliness is perhaps not to be turned from his selfish and ignoble +living by studying the history of Major Pendennis, to read about whom is +not unlike drinking dry and rare old Madeira; yet it is scarcely to be +doubted that an appreciation of the figure cut by the old beau, +fluttering over the flowers of youth like a preserved butterfly poised +on a wire, must tend to lead a man to a different career. No reader can +have felt imaginatively the passionate spiritual struggles of Arthur +Dimmesdale without being thereafter more sensitive to good influences +and less tolerant of self-deception and concealed sin. These are the +more obvious examples. The experiences which one gains from good fiction +go much farther and deeper. They extend into those most intangible yet +most real regions where even the metaphysician, the psychologist, and +the maker of definitions have not yet been able to penetrate; those dim, +mysterious tracts of the mind which are still to us hardly better known +than the unexplored mid-countries of Asia or Africa. + +As a means of accomplishing a desired end didactic literature is +probably the most futile of all the unavailing attempts of mankind. In +the days when ringlets and pantalets were in fashion, when small boys +wore frilled collars and asked only improving questions, when the most +delirious literary dissipation of which the youthful fancy could +conceive was a Rollo book or a prim tale by Maria Edgeworth, it was +generally believed that moral precepts and wise maxims had a prodigious +influence upon the young. It was held possible to mould the rising +generation by putting one of the sentences of Solomon at the head of a +copy-book page, and to make a permanent impression upon the spirit by +saws and sermons. If this were ever true, it is certainly not true now. +If sermon or saw has touched the imagination of the hearer, it has had +some effect which will be lasting; and this the saw does oftener than +the sermon, the proverb than the precept. If it has won only an +intellectual assent, there is small ground for supposing that it will +bring about any alteration which will be permanent and effective. + +Taking into account these considerations, one might sum up the whole +matter somewhat in this way: To read fiction is certainly a pleasure; it +is to be looked upon as no less important a means of intellectual +development; while in the cultivation of the moral and spiritual sense +the proper use of fiction is one of the most effectual and essential +agencies to-day within the reach of men. In other words the proper +reading of fiction is, from the standpoint of pleasure, of intellectual +development, or of moral growth, neither more nor less than a distinct +and imperative duty. + +I have been careful to say, "the proper reading of fiction." Whatever +strictures may be laid upon careless readers in general may perhaps be +quadrupled when applied to bad reading of novels. It is the duty of +nobody to read worthless fiction; and it is a species of moral iniquity +to read good novels carelessly, flippantly, or superficially. There is +small literary or intellectual hope for those whom Henry James describes +as "people who read novels as an exercise in skipping." There are two +tests by which the novel-reader is to be tried: What sort of fiction +does he read, and how does he read it? If the answers to these questions +are satisfactory, the whole matter is settled. + +Of course it is of the first importance that the reader think for +himself; that he form his own opinions, and have his own appreciations. +Small minds are like weak galvanic cells; one alone is not strong enough +to generate a sensible current; they must be grouped to produce an +appreciable result. One has no opinion; while to accomplish anything +approaching a sensation a whole circle is required. It takes an entire +community of such intellects to get up a feeling, and of course the +feeling when aroused is shared in common. There are plenty of +pretentious readers of all the latest notorious novels who have as small +an individual share in whatever emotion the book excites as a Turkish +wife has in the multifariously directed affections of her husband. It is +impossible not to see the shallowness, the pretense, and the +intellectual demoralization of these readers; and it is equally idle to +deny the worthlessness of the books in which they delight. + +What, then, is to be learned from fiction, that so much stress is to be +laid upon the necessity of making it a part of our intellectual and +moral education? The answer has in part at least been so often given +that it seems almost superfluous to repeat it. The more direct lessons +of the novel are so evident as scarcely to call for enumeration. Nobody +needs at this late day to be told how much may be learned from fiction +of the customs of different grades of society, of the ways and habits of +all sorts and conditions of men, and of the even more fascinating if not +actually more vitally important manners and morals of all sorts and +conditions of women. Every reader knows how much may be learned from +stories of the facts of human relations and of social existence,--facts +which one accumulates but slowly by actual experience, while yet a +knowledge of them is of so great importance for the full appreciation +and the proper employment and enjoyment of life. + +Civilization is essentially an agreement upon conventions. It is the +tacit acceptance of conditions and concessions. It is conceded that if +human beings are to live together it is necessary that there must be +mutual agreement, and as civilization progresses this is extended to all +departments and details of life. What is called etiquette, for instance, +is one variety of social agreement into which men have entered for +convenience and comfort in living together. What is called good breeding +is but the manifestation of a generous desire to observe all those human +regulations by which the lives of others may be rendered more happy. +These concessions and conventions are not natural. A man may be born +with the spirit of good breeding, but he must learn its methods. Nature +may bestow the inclination to do what is wisest and best in human +relations, but the forms and processes of social life and of all human +intercourse must be acquired. It is one of the functions of fiction to +instruct in all this knowledge; and only he who is unacquainted with +life will account such an office trivial. + +Intimate familiarity with the inner characteristics of humanity, and +knowledge of the experiences and the nature of mankind, are a still more +important gain from fiction. Almost unconsciously the intelligent +novel-reader grows in the comprehension of what men are and of what they +may be. This art makes the reader a sharer in those moments when +sensation is at its highest, emotion at its keenest. It brings into the +life which is outwardly quiet and uneventful, into the mind which has +few actual experiences to stir it to its deeps, the splendid +exhilaration of existence at its best. The pulse left dull by a +colorless life throbs and tingles over the pages of a vivid romance; the +heart denied contact with actualities which would awaken it beats hotly +with the fictitious passion made real by the imagination; so that life +becomes forever richer and more full of meaning. + +In one way it is possible to gain from these imaginative experiences a +knowledge of life more accurate than that which comes from life itself. +It is possible to judge, to examine, to weigh, to estimate the emotions +which are enjoyed æsthetically; whereas emotions arising from real +events benumb all critical faculties by their stinging personal quality. +He who has never shared actual emotional experiences has never lived, +it is true; but he who has not shared æsthetic emotions has never +understood. + +What should be the character of fiction is pretty accurately indicated +by what has been said of the part which fiction should play in human +development. Here, as in all literature, men are less influenced by the +appeal to the reason than by the appeal to the feelings. The novelist +who has a strong and lasting influence is not he who instructs men +directly, but he who moves men. This is instruction in its higher sense. +The guidance of life must come from the reason; equally, however, must +the impulse of life come from the emotions. The man who is ruled by +reason alone is but a curious mechanical toy which mimics the movements +of life without being really alive. + +This prime necessity of touching and moving the reader determines one of +the most important points of difference between literature and science. +It forces the story-teller to modify, to select, and to change if need +be the facts of life, in order to produce an impression of truth. Out of +the multifarious details of existence the author must select the +significant; out of the real deduce the possibility which shall commend +itself to the reader as verity. + +Above everything else is an artist who is worthy of the name truthful in +his art. He never permits himself to set down anything which is not a +verity to his imagination, or which fails to be consistent with the +conditions of human existence. He realizes that fiction in which a +knowledge of the outward shell and the accidents of life is made the +chief object cannot be permanent and cannot be vitally effective. The +novelist is not called upon to paint life, but to interpret life. It is +his privilege to be an artist; and an artist is one who sees through +apparent truth to actual verity. It is his first and most essential duty +to arouse the inner being, and to this necessity he must be ready to +sacrifice literal fact. Until the imagination is awake, art cannot even +begin to do its work. It is true that there may be a good deal of +pleasant story-telling which but lightly touches the fancy and does not +reach deeper. It is often harmless enough; but it is as idle to expect +from this any keen or lasting pleasure, and still more any mental +experience of enduring significance, as it would be to expect to warm +Nova Zembla with a bonfire. What for the moment tickles the fancy goes +with the moment, and leaves little trace; what touches the imagination +becomes a fact of life. + +Macaulay, in his extraordinarily wrong-headed essay on Milton, has +explicitly stated a very wide-spread heresy when he says:-- + + We cannot unite the incompatible advantages of reality and deception, + the clear discernment of truth and the exquisite enjoyment of fiction. + +This is the ground generally held by unimaginative men. Macaulay had +many good gifts and graces, but his warmest admirers would hardly +include among them a greatly endowed or vigorously developed +imagination. If one cannot unite the advantages of reality and +deception, if he cannot join clear discernment of truth to the +exquisite enjoyment of fiction, it is because he fails of all just and +adequate comprehension of literature. To call fiction deception is +simply to fail to understand that real truth may be independent of +apparent truth. It would from the point of view of this sentence of +Macaulay's be competent to open the Gospels and call the parable of the +sower a falsehood because there is no probability that it referred to +any particular incident. The stupidity of criticism of fiction which +begins with the assumption that it is not true is not unlike that of an +endeavor to swallow a chestnut burr and the consequent declaration that +the nut is uneatable. If one is not clever enough to get beneath the +husk, his opinion is surely not of great value. + +In order to enjoy a novel, it is certainly not necessary to believe it +in a literal sense. No sane man supposes that Don Quixote ever did or +ever could exist. To the intellect the book is little more than a +farrago of impossible absurdities. The imagination perceives that it is +true to the fundamental essentials of human nature, and understands that +the book is true in a sense higher than that of mere literal verity. It +is the cultivated man who has the keenest sense of reality, and yet only +to the cultivated man is possible the exquisite enjoyment of "Esmond," +of "Les Misérables," "The Scarlet Letter," "The Return of the Native," +or "The Ordeal of Richard Feverel." So far from being incompatible, the +clear discernment of truth and the exquisite enjoyment of fiction are +inseparable. + +An artist who is worthy of the name is above all else truthful in his +art. He never permits himself to set down anything which he does not +feel to be true. It is with a truth higher than a literal accuracy, +however, that he is concerned. His perception is the servant of his +imagination. He observes and he uses the outward facts of life as a +means of conveying its inner meanings. It is this that makes him an +artist. The excuse for his claiming the attention of the world is that +in virtue of his imagination he is gifted with an insight keener and +more penetrating than that of his fellows; and his enduring influence +depends upon the extent to which he justifies this claim. + +With the novel of trifles it is difficult to have any patience whatever. +The so-called Realistic story collects insignificant nothings about a +slender thread of plot as a filament of cobweb gathers dust in a barn. +The cobweb seems to me on the whole the more valuable, since at least it +has the benefit of the old wives' theory that it is good to check +bleeding. It is a more noble office to be wrapped about a cut finger +than to muffle a benumbed mind. + +One question which the great mass of novel-readers who are also students +of literature are interested to have answered is, How far is it well to +read fiction for simple amusement? With this inquiry, too, goes the +kindred one whether it is well or ill to relax the mind over light tales +of the sort sometimes spoken of as "summer reading." To this it is +impossible to give a categorical reply. It is like the question how +often and for how long it is wise to sit down to rest while climbing a +hill. It depends upon the traveler, and no one else can determine a +point which is to be decided by feelings and conditions known alone to +him. It is hardly possible and it is not wise to read always with +exalted aims. Whatever you might be advised by me or by any other, you +would be foolish not to make of fiction a means of grateful relaxation +as well as a help in mental growth. Always it is important to remember, +however, that there is a wide difference in the ultimate result, +according as a person reads for diversion the best that will entertain +him or the worst. It is a matter of the greatest moment that our +amusements shall not be allowed to debauch our taste. It is necessary to +have some standard even in the choice of the most foamy fiction, served +like a sherbet on a hot summer afternoon. One does not read vulgar and +empty books, even for simple amusement, without an effect upon his own +mind. The Chinese are said to have matches in which cockroaches are +pitted against each other to fight for the amusement of the oblique-eyed +heathen. To be thus ignoble in their very sports indicates a peculiar +degradation and poverty of spirit; and there are certain novels so much +in the same line that it is difficult to think of their being read +without seeing in fancy a group of pig-tailed Celestials hanging +breathlessly over a bowl in which struggle the disgusting little insect +combatants. To give the mind up to this sort of reading is not to be +commended in anybody. + +Fortunately we are in this day provided with a great deal of light +fiction which is sound and wholesome and genuine as far as it goes. Some +of it even goes far in the way of being imaginative and good. As +examples--not at all as a list--may be named Blackmore, Crawford, +Stanley Weyman, Anthony Hope, or the numerous writers of admirable short +stories, Cable, Miss Jewett, Miss Wilkins, J. M. Barrie, Ian Maclaren, +or Thomas Nelson Page. All these and others may be read for simple +entertainment, and all are worth reading for some more or less strongly +marked quality of permanent worth. There are plenty of writers, too, +like William Black and Clark Russell and Conan Doyle, concerning the +lasting value of whose stories there might easily be a question, yet who +do often contrive to be healthily amusing, and who furnish the means of +creating a pleasant and restful vacuity in lives otherwise too full. +Every reader must make his own choice, and determine for himself how +much picnicking he will do on his way up the hill of life. If he is wise +he will contrive to find his entertainment chiefly in books which +besides being amusing have genuine value; and he will at least see to it +that his intellectual dissipations shall be with the better of such +books as will amuse him and not with the poorer. + +The mention of the short story brings to mind the great part which this +form of fiction plays to-day. The restlessness of the age and the +fostering influence of the magazines have united to develop the short +story, and it has become one of the most marked of the literary +features of the time. It has the advantage of being easily handled and +comprehended as a whole, but it lessens the power of seizing in their +entirety works which are greater. It tends rather to increase than to +diminish mental restlessness, and the lover of short stories will do +well not to let any considerable length of time go by without reading +some long and far-reaching novel by way of corrective. Another +consequence of the wide popularity of the short story is that we have +nowadays so few additions to that delightful company of fictitious yet +most admirably real personages whose acquaintance the reader makes in +longer tales. The delight of knowing these characters is not only one of +the most attractive joys of novel-reading, but it is one which helps +greatly to brighten life and enhance friendship. Few things add more to +the sympathy of comradeship than a community of friends in the enchanted +realms of the imagination. Strangers in the flesh become instantly +conscious of an intimacy in spirit when they discover a common love for +some character in fiction. Two men may be strangers, with no common +acquaintances in the flesh, but if they discover that both admire +Elizabeth Bennet, or Lizzie Hexam, or Laura Bell, or Ethel Newcome; that +both are familiar friends with Pendennis, or Warrington, or Harry +Richmond, or Mulvaney, or Alan Breck, or Mowgli, or Zagloba; or belong +to the brave brotherhood of D'Artagnan, Athos, Porthos, and Aramis, they +have a community of sympathy which brings them very close together. + +It is seldom and indeed almost never that the short story gives to the +reader this sense of knowing familiarly its characters. If there be a +series, as in Kipling's "Jungle Book" or Maclaren's tales, where the +same actors appear again and again, of course the effect may be in this +respect the same as that of a novel; but cases of this sort are not +common. All the aged women of Miss Wilkins' stories, for instance, are +apt in the memory either to blend into one composite photograph of the +New England old woman, or to stand remotely, not as persons that we +know, but rather as types about which we know. The genuine novel-reader +will realize that this consideration is really one of no inconsiderable +weight; and it is one which becomes more and more pressing with the +increase of the influence of the short story. + +This consideration is the more important from the fact that novels in +which the reader is able to identify himself with the characters are by +far the most effective, because thus is he removed from the realities +which surround him, and for the time being freed from whatever would +hamper his imagination. That which in real life he would be, but may +not, he may in fiction blissfully and expandingly realize. The innate +sense of justice--not, perhaps, unseconded by the innate vanity; we are +all of us human!--demands that human possibilities shall be realized, +and in the story in which the reader merges his personality in that of +some actor, all this is accomplished. In actual outward experience life +justifies itself but rarely; to most men its justification is reached +only by the aid of the imagination, and it is largely by the aid of +literature that the imagination works. Even more true is this of the +other sex. Much that men learn from life women must learn from books; so +that to women fiction is the primer of life as well as the text-book of +the imagination. By the novels he reads the man gives evidence of his +imaginative development; the woman of her intellectual existence. + +Fiction should be delightful, absorbing, and above all inspiring. +Genuine art may sadden, but it cannot depress; it may bring a fresh +sense of the anguish of humanity, but it must from its very nature join +with this the consolation of an ideal. The tragedy of human life is in +art held to be the source of new courage, of nobler aspiration, because +it gives grander opportunities for human emotion to vindicate its +superiority to all disasters, all terrors, all woe. The reader does not +leave the great tragedies with a soured mind or a pessimistic disbelief +in life. "Lear," "Othello," "Romeo and Juliet," tragic as they are, +leave him quivering with sympathy but not with bitterness. The +inspiration of the thought of love triumphant over death, of moral +grandeur unsubdued by the worst that fate can do, lifts the mind above +the disaster. One puts down "The Kreutzer Sonata" with the very flesh +creeping with disgust at human existence; the same sin is treated no +less tragically in "The Scarlet Letter," yet the reader is left with an +inspiration and a nobler feeling toward life. The attitude of art is in +its essence hopeful, and the work of the pessimist must therefore fail, +even though it be informed with all the cleverness and the witchery of +genius. + +It is, I believe, from something akin to a remote and perhaps +half-conscious perception of this principle that readers in general +desire that a novel shall end pleasantly. The popular sentiment in favor +of a "happy ending" is by no means so entirely wrong or so utterly +Philistine as it is the fashion in these super-æsthetical days to +assume. The trick of a doleful conclusion has masqued and paraded as a +sure proof of artistic inspiration when it is nothing of the kind. +Unhappy endings may be more common than happy ones in life, although +even that proposition is by no means proved; they seem so from the human +habit of marking the disagreeables and letting pleasant things go +unnoted. Writers of a certain school have assumed from this that they +were keeping more close to life if they left the reader at the close of +a story in a state of darkest melancholy; and they have made much parade +of the claim that this is not only more true to fact, but more artistic. +There is no reason for such an assumption. The artistic climax of a tale +is that which grows out of the story by compelling necessity. There are +many narrations, of course, which would become essentially false if made +to end gladly. When the ingenious Frenchman rewrote the last act of +"Hamlet," marrying off the Prince and dismissing him with Ophelia to +live happily ever after, the thing was monstrously absurd. The general +public is not wholly blind to these things. No audience educated up to +the point of enjoying "Hamlet" or "Othello" at all would be satisfied +with a sugar-candy conclusion to these. The public does ask, however, +and asks justly, that there shall be no meaningless agony; and if it +prefers tales which inevitably come to a cheerful last chapter, this +taste is in the line with the great principle that it is the function of +art to uplift and inspire. + +It has already been said over and over that it is the office of +literature to show the meaning of life, and the meaning of life is not +only what it is but what it may be. To paint the actualities of life is +only to state a problem, and it is the mission of art to offer a +solution. The novel which can go no further than the presentation of the +apparent fact is from the higher standpoint futile because it fails to +indicate the meaning of that fact; it falls short as art in so far as it +fails to justify existence. + +Lowell complains:-- + + Modern imaginative literature has become so self-conscious, and + therefore so melancholy, that Art, which should be "the world's sweet + inn," whither we repair for refreshment and repose, has become rather + a watering-place, where one's private touch of liver-complaint is + exasperated by the affluence of other sufferers whose talk is a + narrative of morbid symptoms.--_Chaucer._ + +We have introduced into fiction that popular and delusive fallacy of +emotional socialism which insists not so much that all shall share the +best of life, as that none shall escape its worst. The claim that all +shall be acquainted with every phase of life is enforced not by an +endeavor to make each reader a sharer in the joys and blessings of +existence, but by a determined thrusting forward of the pains and shames +of humanity. Modern literature has too generally made the profession of +treating all facts of life impartially a mere excuse for dealing +exclusively with whatever is ugly and degraded, and for dragging to +light whatever has been concealed. This is at best as if one used rare +cups of Venetian glass for the measuring out of commercial kerosene and +vinegar, or precious Grecian urns for the gathering up of the refuse of +the streets. + +The wise student of literature will never lose sight of the fact that +fiction which has not in it an inspiration is to be looked upon as +ineffectual, if it is not to be avoided as morbid and unwholesome. +Fiction may be sad, it may deal with the darker side of existence; but +it should leave the reader with the uplift which comes from the +perception that there is in humanity the power to rise by elevation of +spirit above the bitterest blight, to triumph over the most cruel +circumstances which can befall. + +One word must be added in conclusion, and that is the warning that +fiction can never take the place of actual life. There is danger in all +art that it may win men from interest in real existence. Literature is +after all but the interpreter of life, and living is more than all +imaginative experience. We need both the book and the deed to round out +a full and rich being. It is possible to abuse literature as it is +possible to abuse any other gift of the gods. It is not impossible to +stultify and benumb the mind by too much novel-reading; but of this +there is no need. Fiction properly used and enjoyed is one of the +greatest blessings of civilization; and how poor and thin and meagre +would life be without it! + + + + +XVI + +POETRY + + +The lover of literature must approach any discussion of poetry with +feelings of mingled delight and dread. The subject is one which can +hardly fail to excite him to enthusiasm, but it is one with which it is +difficult to deal without a declaration of sentiments so strong that +they are not likely to be spoken; and it is one, too, upon which so much +has been said crudely and carelessly, or wisely and warmly, that any +writer must hesitate to add anything to the abundance of words already +spoken. + +For there have been few things so voluminously discussed as poetry. It +is a theme so high that sages could not leave it unpraised; while there +is never a penny-a-liner so poor or so mean that he hesitates to write +his essay upon the sublime and beautiful art. It is one of the +consequences of human vanity that the more subtile and difficult a +matter, the more feeble minds feel called upon to cover it with the dust +of their empty phrases. The most crowded places are those where angels +fear to tread; and it is with reverence not unmixed with fear that any +true admirer ventures to speak even his love for the noble art of +poetry. No discussion of the study of literature, however, can leave +out of the account that which is literature's crown and glory; and of +the much that might be said and must be felt, an effort must be made +here to set something down. + + * * * * * + +There are few characteristics more general in the race of man than that +responsiveness to rhythm which is the foundation of the love of verse. +The sense of symmetry exists in the rudest savage that tattoos the two +sides of his face in the same pattern, or strings his necklace of shells +in alternating colors. The same feeling is shown by the unæsthetic +country matron, the mantel of whose sacredly dark and cold best room is +not to her eye properly adorned unless the ugly vase at one end is +balanced by another exactly similar ugly vase upon the other. In sound +the instinct is yet more strongly marked. The barbaric drum-beat which +tells in the quivering sunlight of an African noon that the +cannibalistic feast is preparing appeals crudely to the same quality of +the human mind which in its refinement responds to the swelling cadences +of Mendelssohn's Wedding March or the majestic measures of the Ninth +Symphony. The rhythm of the voice in symmetrically arranged words is +equally potent in its ability to give pleasure. Savage tribes make the +beginnings of literature in inchoate verse. Indeed, so strongly does +poetry appeal to men even in the earlier states of civilization that +Macaulay seems to have conceived the idea that poetry belongs to an +immature stage of growth,--a deduction not unlike supposing the sun to +be of no consequence to civilization because it has been worshiped by +savages. In the earlier phases of human development, whether of the +individual or of the race, the universal instincts are more apparent; +and the hold which song takes upon half-barbaric man is simply a proof +of how primal and universal is the taste to which it appeals. The sense +and enjoyment of rhythm show themselves in a hundred ways in the life +and pleasures of primitive races, the vigorous shoots from which is to +spring a splendid growth. + +Not to go so far back as the dawn of civilization, however, it is +sufficient here to recall our own days in the nursery, when Mother +Goose, the only universal Alma Mater, with rhymes foolish but +rhythmical, meaningless but musical, delighted ears yet too untrained to +distinguish sense from folly, but not too young to enjoy the delight of +the beating of the voice in metrically arranged accents. + +This pleasure in rhythm is persistent, and it is strongly marked even in +untrained minds. In natures unspoiled and healthy, natures not +bewildered and sophisticated by a false idea of cultivation, or deceived +into unsound notions of the real value of poetry, the taste remains +sound and good. In the youth of a race this natural enjoyment of verse +is gratified by folk-songs. These early forms are naturally undeveloped +and simple, but the lays are genuine and wholesome; they possess lasting +quality. Different peoples have in differing degrees the power of +appreciating verse, but I do not know that any race has been found to +lack it entirely. There is abundant evidence that the Anglo-Saxon and +Norman ancestors from whom sprang the English-speaking peoples were in +this respect richly endowed, and that they early went far in the +development of this power. The old ballads of our language are so rich +and so enduringly beautiful that we are proved to come from a stock +endowed with a rich susceptibility to poetry. If this taste has not been +generally developed it is from some reason other than racial incapacity. +Nothing need be looked for in early literatures sweeter and sounder than +the fine old ballads of "Chevy Chace," "Tamlane," "Sir Patrick Spens," +or "Clerk Saunders." Many a later poet of no mean reputation has failed +to strike so deep and true a note as rings through these songs made by +forgotten minstrels for a ballad-loving people. There are not too many +English-speaking poets to-day who could match the cry of the wraith of +Clerk Saunders at the window of his love:-- + + Oh, cocks are crowing a merry midnight, + The wild fowls are boding day; + Give me my faith and troth again, + Let me fare on my way.... + + Cauld mould it is my covering now, + But and my winding sheet; + The dew it falls nae sooner down + Than my resting-place is weet! + +How far popular taste has departed from an appreciation of verse that is +simple and genuine is shown by those favorite rhymes which are +unwearyingly yearned for in the columns of Notes and Queries, and which +reappear with periodic persistence in Answers to Correspondents. In +educated persons, it is true, there is still a love of what is really +good in verse, but it is far too rare. The general ear and the general +taste have become vitiated. There is a melancholy and an amazing number +of readers who are pleased only with rhymes of the sort of Will +Carleton's "Farm Ballads," the sentimentally inane jingles published in +the feminine domestic periodicals, and the rest of what might be called, +were not the phrase perilously near to the vulgar, the chewing-gum +school of verse. + +One of the most serious defects in modern systems of education seems to +me to be, as has been said in an earlier talk, an insufficient provision +for the development of the imagination. This is nowhere more marked than +in the failure to recognize the place and importance of poetry in the +training of the mind of youth. It might be supposed that an age which +prides itself upon being scientific in its methods would be clever +enough to perceive that from the early stages of civilization may well +be taken hints for the development of the intellect of the young. +Primitive peoples have invariably nourished their growing intelligence +and enlarged their imagination by fairy-lore and poetry. The childhood +of the individual is in its essentials not widely dissimilar from the +childhood of the race; and what was the instinctive and wholesome food +for one is good for the other. If our common schools could but omit a +good deal of the instruction which is falsely called "practical," +because it deals with material issues, and devote the time thus gained +to training children to enjoy poetry and to use their imagination, the +results would be incalculably better.[2] + +[Footnote 2: I say to enjoy poetry. There is much well-meant instruction +which is unconsciously conducive to nothing but its detestation. +Students who by nature have a fondness for verse are laboriously trained +by conscientiously mistaken instructors to regard anything in poetical +form as a bore and a torment. The business of a teacher in a preparatory +school should be to incite the pupil to love poetry. It is better to +make a boy thrill and kindle over a single line than it is to get into +his head all the comments made on literature from the beginning of +time.] + +The strain and stress of modern life are opposed to the appreciation of +any art; and in the case of poetry this difficulty has been increased by +a wide-spread feeling that poetry is after all of little real +consequence. It has been held to be an excrescence upon life rather than +an essential part of it. It is the tendency of the time to seek for +tangible and present results; and men have too generally ceased to +appreciate the fact that much which is best is to be reached more surely +indirectly than directly. Since of the effects which spring from poetry +those most of worth are its remote and intangible results, careless and +superficial thinkers have come to look upon song as an unmanly +affectation, a thing artificial if not effeminate. This is one of the +most absolute and vicious of all intellectual errors. In high and noble +truth, poetry is as natural as air; poetry is as virile as war! + +It is not easy to discover whence arose the popular feeling of the +insignificance of poetry. It is allied to the materialistic undervaluing +of all art, and it is probably not unconnected with the ascetic idea +that whatever ministers to earthly delight is a hindrance to progress +toward the unseen life of another world. Something is to be attributed, +no doubt, to the contempt bred by worthless imitations with which facile +poetasters have afflicted a long-suffering world; but most of all is the +want of an appreciation of the value of poetry to be attributed to the +fact that men engrossed in literal and material concerns have not been +able to appreciate remote consequences, or to comprehend the utterances +of the masters who speak the language of the imagination. + +While the world in general, however, has been increasingly unsympathetic +toward poetry, the sages have universally concurred in giving to it the +highest place in the list of literary achievements. "Poetry," Emerson +said, "is the only verity." The same thought is expanded in a passage +from Mrs. Browning, in which she speaks of poets as + + --the only truth-tellers now left to God,-- + The only speakers of essential truth, + Opposed to relative, comparative, + And temporal truths; the only holders by + His sun-skirts, through conventual gray glooms; + The only teachers who instruct mankind + From just a shadow on a charnel wall + To find man's veritable stature out, + Erect, sublime,--the measure of a man. + + --_Aurora Leigh_ + +So Wordsworth:-- + + Poetry is the breath and finer spirit of all knowledge, it is the + impassioned expression which is on the face of all science. + +It is needless, however, to multiply quotations. The world has never +doubted the high respect which those who appreciate poetry have for the +art. + +It is true also that however general at any time may have been the +seeming or real neglect of poetry, the race has not failed to preserve +its great poems. The prose of the past, no matter how great its wisdom, +has never been able to take with succeeding generations the rank held by +the masterpieces of the poets. Mankind has seemed not unlike one who +affects to hold his jewels in little esteem, it may be, yet like the +jewel owner it has guarded them with constant jealousy. The honor-roll +of literature is the world's list of great poets. The student of +literature is not long in discovering that his concern is far more +largely with verse than with anything else that the wit of mankind has +devised to write. However present neglect may at any time appear to show +the contrary, the long-abiding regard of the race declares beyond +peradventure that it counts poetry as most precious among all its +intellectual treasures. + + + + +XVII + +THE TEXTURE OF POETRY + + +In discussing poetry it is once more necessary to begin with something +which will serve us as a definition. No man can imprison the essence of +an art in words; and it is not to be understood that a formal definition +can be framed which shall express all that poetry is and means. Its more +obvious characteristics, however, may be phrased, and even an incomplete +formula is often useful. There have been almost as many definitions of +poetry made already as there have been writers on literature, some +of them intelligible and some of them open to the charge of +incomprehensibility. Schopenhauer, for instance, defined poetry as the +art of exciting by words the power of the imagination; a phrase so broad +that it is easily made to cover all genuine literature. It will perhaps +be sufficient for our purpose here if we say that poetry is the +embodiment in metrical, imaginative language of passionate emotion. + +By metrical language is meant that which is systematically rhythmical. +Much prose is rhythmical. Indeed it is difficult to conceive of fine or +delicate prose which has not rhythm to some degree, and oratorical prose +is usually distinguished by this. The Bible abounds in excellent +examples; as, for instance, this passage from Job:-- + + Hell is naked before Him, and destruction hath no covering; He + stretcheth out the north over the empty place, and hangeth the earth + upon nothing. He bindeth up the waters in his thick clouds; and the + cloud is not rent under them. He holdeth back the face of His throne, + and spreadeth His cloud upon it. He hath compassed the waters with + bounds until the day and night come to an end. The pillars of heaven + tremble, and are astonished at His reproof. He divideth the sea with + His power, and by His understanding He smiteth through the + proud.--_Job_, xxvi. 6-12. + +Here, as in all fine prose, there is a rhythm which is marked, and at +times almost regular; but it is not ordered by a system, as it must be +in the simplest verse of poetry. Take, by way of contrast, a stanza from +the superb chorus to Artemis in "Atalanta in Calydon:"-- + + Come with bows bent and with emptying of quivers, + Maiden most perfect, lady of light, + With a noise of winds and many rivers, + With a clamor of waters and with might; + Bind on thy sandals, O thou most fleet, + Over the splendor and speed of thy feet; + For the faint east quickens, the wan west shivers, + Round the feet of the day and the feet of the night. + +Here the rhythm is systematized according to regular laws, and so +becomes metrical. The effect upon the ear in prose is largely due to +rhythm, but metrical effects are entirely within the province of poetry. + +This difference between rhythmical and metrical language would seem to +be sufficiently obvious, but the difficulty which many students have in +appreciating it may make it worth while to give another illustration. +The following passage from Edmund Burke, that great master of sonorous +English, is strongly and finely rhythmical:-- + + Because we are so made as to be affected at such spectacles with + melancholy sentiments upon the unstable condition of mortal + prosperity, and the tremendous uncertainty of human greatness; because + in those natural feelings we learn great lessons; because in events + like these our passions instruct our reason; because when kings are + hurled from their thrones by the Supreme Director of this great drama, + and become objects of insult to the base, and of pity to the good, we + behold such disasters in the moral, as we should behold a miracle in + the physical order of things.--_Reflections on the Revolution in + France._ + +So markedly rhythmical is this, indeed, that it would take but little to +change it into metre:-- + + Because we are so made as to be moved by spectacles like these with + melancholy sentiments of the unstable case of mortal things, and the + uncertainty of human greatness here; because in those our natural + feelings we may learn great lessons too; because in such events our + passions teach our reason well; because when kings are hurled down + from their thrones, etc. + +There is no longer any dignity in this. It has become a sort of +sing-song, neither prose nor yet poetry. The sentiments are not unlike +those of a familiar passage in Shakespeare:-- + + This is the state of man; to-day he puts forth + The tender leaves of hopes; to-morrow blossoms, + And bears his blushing honors thick upon him: + The third day comes a frost, a killing frost; + And,--when he thinks, good easy man, full surely + His greatness is a ripening,--nips his root, + And then he falls, as I do. + + _Henry VIII._, iii. 2. + +In the extract from Burke a sense of weakness and even of flatness is +produced by the rearrangement of the accents so that they are made +regular; while in the verse of Shakespeare the sensitive ear is very +likely troubled by the single misplaced accent in the first line. In any +mood save the poetic metre seems an artificiality and an affectation, +but in that mood it is as natural and as necessary as air to the lungs. + +Besides being metrical the language of poetry must be imaginative. By +imaginative language is meant that which not only conveys imaginative +conceptions, but which is itself full of force and suggestion; language +which not only expresses ideas and emotions, but which by its own power +evokes them. Imaginative language is marked by the most vivid perception +on the part of the writer of the connotive effect of words; it conveys +even more by implication than by direct denotation. It may of course be +used in poetry or prose. In the passage from Job just quoted, the use of +such phrases as "empty place," "hangeth the earth upon nothing," convey +more by what they suggest to the mind than by their literal assertion. +The writer has evidently used them with a vital and vivid understanding +of their suggestiveness. He realizes to the full their office to convey +impressions so subtle that they cannot be given by direct and literal +diction. + +Poetry is made up of words and phrases which glow with this richness of +intention. When Shakespeare speaks of skin "smooth as monumental +alabaster," how much is added to the idea by the epithet "monumental," +the suggestion of the polished and protected stone, enshrined on a tomb; +how much is due to association and implication in such phrases as the +"reverberate hills," "parting is such sweet sorrow," "the white wonder +of dear Juliet's hand," "and sleep in dull, cold marble,"--phrases all +of which have a literal significance plain enough, yet of which this +literal meaning is of small account beside that which they evoke. Poetic +diction naturally and inevitably melts into figures, as when we read of +"the shade of melancholy boughs," "the spendthrift sun," "the bubble +reputation," "the inaudible and noiseless foot of time;" but the point +here is that even in its literal words there is constantly the sense and +the employment of implied meanings. It is by no means necessarily +figures to which language owes the quality of being imaginative. Broadly +speaking, a style may be said to be imaginative in proportion as the +writer has realized and intended its suggestions. + +The language of prose is often imaginative to a high degree, but seldom +if ever to that extent or with that deliberate purpose which in verse is +nothing less than essential. Genuine poetry differs from prose in the +entire texture of its web. From the same threads the loom may weave +plain stuff or richest brocade; and thus of much the same words are made +prose and poetry. The difference lies chiefly in the fashion of working. + +The essentials of the manner of poetry being language metrical and +imaginative, the essential of the matter is that it be the expression of +passionate emotion. By passionate emotion is meant any feeling, powerful +or delicate, which is capable of filling the whole soul; of taking +possession for the time being of the entire man. It may be fierce hate, +enthralling love, ambition, lust, rage, jealousy, joy, sorrow, any +over-mastering mood, or it may be one of those intangible inclinations, +those moods of mist, ethereal as hazes in October, those caprices of +pleasure or sadness which Tennyson had the art so marvelously to +reproduce. Passionate emotion is by no means necessarily intense, but it +is engrossing. For the time being, at least, it seems to absorb the +whole inner consciousness. + +It is the completeness with which such a mood takes possession of the +mind, so that for the moment it is to all intents and purposes the man +himself, that gives it so great an importance in human life and makes it +the fitting and the sole essential theme of the highest art. Behind all +serious human effort lies the instinctive sense of the fitness of +things. The artist must always convince that his end is worthy of the +means which he employs to reach it; and it follows naturally that the +writer who uses imaginative diction and the elaborateness of metre must +justify this by what he embodies in them. Metrical forms are as much +out of place in treating of the material concerns of life as would be +court robes or religious rites in the reaping of a field or the selling +of a cargo of wool. The poet is justified in his use of all the +resources of form and of poetic diction by the fact that the message +which he is endeavoring to convey is high and noble; that the meaning +which he attempts to impart is so profoundly subtle as to be +inexpressible unless the words which he employs are assisted by the +language of rhythm and metre. + +That the reader unconsciously recognizes the fact that the essential +difference in the office of prose and poetry makes inevitable a +difference also of method, is shown by his dissatisfaction when the +writer of prose invades the province of poetry. The arrangement of the +words of prose into systematic rhythm produces at once an effect of +weakness and of insincerity. Dickens in some of his attempts to reach +deep pathos has made his prose metrical with results most disastrous. +The mood of poetry is so elevated that metrical conventions seem +appropriate and natural; whereas in the mood of even the most emotional +prose they appear fantastical and affected. The difference is not unlike +that between the speaking and the singing voice. A man who sang in +conversation, or even in a highly excited oration, would simply make +himself ridiculous. In song this manner of using the voice is not only +natural but inevitable and delightful. What would be uncalled for in the +most exalted moods of the prose writer is natural and fitting in the +case of the poet, because the poet is endeavoring to embody, in language +the most deep, the most high, the most delicate experiences of which +humanity is capable. The form is with him a part of his normal language. +To say in prose: "My love is like a red rose newly sprung in June, or +like a melody beautifully played," means not much. Yet the words +themselves are not widely varied from those in which Burns conveys the +same ideas with so great an added beauty, and so much more emotional +force:-- + + Oh, my luve's like a red, red rose + That's newly sprung in June; + Oh, my luve's like a melodie + That's sweetly played in tune. + +The metrical cadences woo the ear like those of a melody sweetly played, +and to that which the words may say or suggest they add an effect yet +more potent and delightful. + +A moment's consideration of these facts enables one to estimate rightly +the stricture made by Plato:-- + + You have often seen what a poor appearance the tales of poets make + when stripped of the colors which music puts upon them, and recited in + prose. They are like faces which were never really beautiful, but only + blooming, and now the bloom of youth has passed away from them. + +It would be more just and more exact to say that they are like the +framework of a palace from which have been stripped the slabs of +precious marble which covered it. It is neither more nor less +reasonable to object to poetry that its theme told in prose is slight or +dull than it would be to scorn St. Peter's because its rafters and +ridgepole might not be attractive if they stood out bare against the +sky. The form is in poetry as much an integral part as walls and roof +and dome, statues and jewel-like marbles, are part of the temple. + +Leaving out of consideration those peculiarities such as rhyme and +special diction, which although often of much effect are not essential +since poetry may be great without them, it is sufficiently exact for a +general examination to say that the effects of poetry are produced by +the threefold union of ideas, suggestion, and melody. In the use of +ideas poetry is on much the same footing as prose, except in so far as +it deals with exalted moods which have no connection with thoughts which +are mean or commonplace. In the use of suggestion poetry but carries +farther the means employed in imaginative prose. Melody may be said +practically to be its own prerogative. The smoothest flow of rhythmical +prose falls far below the melodious cadences of metrical language; and +in this manner of appeal to the senses and the soul of man verse has no +rival save music itself. + +These three qualities may be examined separately. Verse may be found in +which there is almost nothing but melody, divorced from suggestion or +ideas. There are good examples in Edward Lear's "Nonsense Songs," in +which there is an intentional lack of sense; or in the "Alice" books, +as, for instance:-- + + And as in uffish thought he stood, + The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame, + Came whiffling through the tulgy wood, + And burbled as it came!... + + "And hast thou slain the Jabberwock? + Come to my arms, my beamish boy! + O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!" + He chortled in his joy. + +Or one may take something which will convey no idea and no suggestion +beyond that which comes with sound and rhythm. Here is a verse once made +in sport to pass as a folk-song in an unknown tongue:-- + + Apaulthee kong lay laylarthay; + Ameeta tinta prown, + Lay lista, lay larba, lay moona long, + Toolay échola doundoolay koko elph zong, + Im lay melplartha bountaina brown. + +This is a collection of unmeaning syllables, and yet to the ear it is a +pleasure. The examples may seem trivial, but they serve to illustrate +the fact that there is magic in the mere sound of words, meaning though +they have none. + +The possibility of pleasing solely by the arrangement and choice of +words in verse has been a snare to more than one poet; as a neglect of +melody has been the fault of others. In much of the later work of +Swinburne it is evident that the poet became intoxicated with the mere +beauty of sound, and forgot that poetry demands thought as well as +melody; while the reader is reluctantly forced to acknowledge that in +some of the verse of Browning there is a failure to recognize that +melody is an element as essential as thought. + +As verse may be found which has little but melody, so is it possible to +find verse in which there is practically nothing save melody and +suggestion. In "Ulalume" Poe has given an instance of the effect +possible from the combining of these with but the thinnest thread of +idea:-- + + The skies they were ashen and sober; + The leaves they were crispèd and sere,-- + The leaves they were withering and sere; + It was night in the lonesome October, + Of my most immemorial year; + It was hard by the dim lake of Auber, + In the misty mid-region of Weir-- + It was down by the dark tarn of Auber, + In the ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir. + +There is here no definite train of thought. It is an attempt to convey a +certain mood by combining mysterious and weird suggestion with melody +enticing and sweet. + +A finer example is the closing passage in "Kubla Khan." The suggestions +are more vivid, and the imagination far more powerful. + + A damsel with a dulcimer + In a vision once I saw; + It was an Abyssinian maid, + And on her dulcimer she played, + Singing of Mount Abora. + Could I revive within me + Her symphony and song, + To such deep delight 'twould win me, + That with music loud and long, + I would build that dome in air, + That sunny dome; those caves of ice; + And all who heard should see them there, + And all should cry: "Beware! Beware! + His flashing eyes, his floating hair; + Weave a circle round him thrice, + And close your eyes with holy dread, + For he on honey-dew hath fed, + And drunk the milk of Paradise." + +Here there is a more evident succession of ideas than in "Ulalume;" but +in both the effect is almost entirely produced by the music and the +suggestion, with very little aid from ideas. + +How essential to poetry are melody and suggestion is at once evident +when one examines verse which contains ideas without these fundamental +qualities. Wordsworth, great as he is at his best, affords ready +examples here. The following is by no means the least poetical passage +in "The Prelude," but it is sufficiently far from being poetry in any +high sense to serve as an illustration:-- + + I was a better judge of thoughts than words, + Misled in estimating words, not only + By common inexperience of youth, + But by the trade of classic niceties, + The dangerous craft of culling term and phrase + From languages that want the living voice + To carry meaning to the natural heart. + +Here are ideas, but there is no emotion, and the thing could be said +better in prose. It is as fatal to try to express in poetry what is not +elevated enough for poetic treatment as it is to endeavor to say in +prose those high things which can be embodied by poetry only. Melody +alone, or suggestiveness alone, is better than ideas alone if there is +to be an attempt to produce the effect of poetry. + +Poetry which is complete and adequate adds melody and suggestion to +that framework of ideas which is to them as the skeleton to flesh and +blood. Any of the great lyrics of the language might be given as +examples. The reader has but to open his Shakespeare's "Sonnets" at +random, as for instance, at this:-- + + From you have I been absent in the spring, + When proud-pied April, dressed in all his trim, + Hath put a spirit of youth in every thing, + That heavy Saturn laugh'd and leap'd with him. + Yet nor the lays of birds, nor the sweet smell + Of different flowers in odor and in hue, + Could make me any summer's story tell, + Or from their proud lap pluck them where they grew: + Nor did I wonder at the lily's white, + Nor praise the deep vermilion in the rose; + They were but sweet, but figures of delight, + Drawn after you, you pattern of all those. + Yet seem'd it winter still, and, you away, + As with your shadow I with these did play. + +It is not necessary to carry this analysis farther. The object of +undertaking it is to impress upon the reader the fact that in poetry +form is an essential element in the language of the art. The student +must realize that the poet means his rhythm as truly as and in the same +measure that he means the thought; and that to attempt to appreciate +poetry without sensitiveness to melody is as hopeless as would be a +similar attempt to try to appreciate music. When Wordsworth said that +poetry is inevitable, he meant the metre no less than the thought; he +wished to convey the fact that the impassioned mood breaks into melody +of word as the full heart breaks into song. The true poem is the +embodiment of what can be expressed in no other way than by that +especial combination of idea, suggestion, and sound. The thought, the +hint, and the music are united in one unique and individual whole. + + + + +XVIII + +POETRY AND LIFE + + +Vitally to appreciate what poetry is, it is necessary to realize what +are its relations to life. Looked at in itself its essentials are +emotion which is capable of taking entire possession of the +consciousness, and the embodiment of this emotion by the combined +effects of imaginative language and melodious form. It is still needful, +however, to consider how this art acts upon human beings, and why there +has been claimed for it so proud a pre-eminence among the arts. + +Why, for instance, should Emerson speak of the embodiment of mere +emotion as "the only verity," Wordsworth as "the breath and finer spirit +of all knowledge," and why does Mrs. Browning call poets "the only +truth-tellers"? The answer briefly is: Because consciousness is +identical with emotion, and consciousness is life. For all practical +purposes man exists but in that he feels. The universe concerns him in +so far as it touches his feelings, and it concerns him no farther. That +is for man most essential which comes most near to the conditions of his +existence. Pure and ideal emotion is essential truth in the sense that +it approaches most nearly to the consciousness,--that is, to the actual +being of the race. + +I am aware that this sounds dangerously like an attempt to be darkly +metaphysical; but it is impossible to talk on high themes without to +some extent using high terms. It is useless to hope to put into words +all the mysteries of the relations of art to life, yet it is not +impossible to approximate somewhat to what must be the truth of the +matter, although in doing it one inevitably runs the risk of seeming to +attempt to say what cannot be said. What I have been endeavoring to +convey will perhaps be plainer if I say that for purposes of our +discussion man is practically alive only in so far as he realizes life. +This realization of life, this supreme triumph of inner consciousness, +comes to him through his feelings,--indeed, is perhaps to be considered +as identical with his feelings. His sensations affect him only by the +emotions which they excite. His emotion, in a word, is the measure of +his existence. Now the emotion of man always responds, in a degree +marked by appreciation, to certain presentations of the relation of +things, to certain considerations of the nature of human life, and above +all to certain demonstrations of the possibilities of human existence. +If these are made actual and clear to the mind, they cannot fail to +arouse that engrossing realization which is the height of consciousness. +To enable a man to seize with his imagination the ideal of love or hate, +of fear or courage, of shame or honor, is to make him kindle and thrill. +It is to make him for the time being thoroughly and richly alive, and it +is to increase greatly his power of essential life. These are the +things which most deeply touch human creatures; they are the universal +in that they appeal to all sane hearts and minds; they are the eternal +as measured by mortal existence because they have power to touch the men +of all time; hence they are the real truths; they are, for beings under +the conditions of earthly existence, the only verities. + +The ordinary life of man is not unlike the feeble flame of a miner's +lamp, half smothered in some underground gallery until a draught of +vital air kindles it into sudden glow and sparkle. Most human beings +have but a dull flicker of half-alive consciousness until some outward +breath causes it to flash into quick and quivering splendor. Poetry is +that divine air, that breeze from unscaled heights of being, the +kindling breath by which the spark becomes a flame. + +It is but as a means of conveying the essential truth which is the +message of poetry, that the poet employs obvious truth. The facts which +impress themselves upon the outer senses are to him merely a language by +means of which he seeks to impart the higher facts that are apprehended +only by the inner self; those facts of emotion which it is his office as +a seer to divine and to interpret. The swineherd and the wandering +minstrel saw the same wood and sky and lake; but to one they were earth +and air and water; while to the other they were the outward and visible +embodiment of the spirit of beauty which is eternal though earth and sea +and sky vanish. To Peter Bell the primrose by the river's brim was but +a primrose and nothing more; to the poet it was the symbol and the +embodiment of loveliness, the sign of an eternal truth. To the laborer +going afield in the early light the dewdrops are but so much water, +wetting unpleasantly his shoes; to Browning it was a symbol of the +embodiment in woman of all that is pure and holy when he sang:-- + + There's a woman like a dew-drop, she's so purer than the purest. + +It is evident from what has been said that in reading poetry it is +necessary to penetrate through the letter to the spirit. I have already +spoken at length in a former lecture upon the need of knowing the +language of literature, and of being in sympathy with the mood of the +writer. This is especially true in regard to poetry, since poetry +becomes great in proportion as it deals with the spirit rather than with +the letter. "We are all poets when we read a poem well," Carlyle has +said. It is only by entering into the mood and by sharing the exaltation +of the poet that we are able to appreciate his message. A poem is like a +window of stained glass. From without one may be able to gain some +general idea of its design and to guess crudely at its hues; but really +to perceive its beauty, its richness of design, its sumptuousness of +color, one must stand within the very sanctuary itself. + +It is partly from the lack of sensitiveness of the imagination of the +reading public, I believe, that in the latter half of this century the +novel has grown into a prominence so marked. The great mass of readers +no longer respond readily to poetry, and fiction is in a sense a +simplification of the language of imagination so that it may be +comprehended by those who cannot rise to the heights of verse. In this +sense novels might almost be called the kindergarten of the imagination. +In fiction, emotional experiences are translated into the language of +ordinary intellectual life; whereas in poetry they are phrased in terms +of the imagination, pure and simple. There can be no question of the +superiority of the means employed by the poet. Much which is embodied in +verse cannot be expressed by prose of any sort, no matter how exalted +that prose may be; but for the ordinary intelligence the language of +prose is far more easily comprehensible. + + * * * * * + +What I have been saying, however, may seem to be so general and +theoretical that I may be held not yet fairly to have faced that issue +at which I hinted in the beginning, the issue which Philistine minds +raise bluntly: What is the use of poetry? Philistines are willing to +concede that there is a sensuous pleasure to be gained from verse. They +are able to perceive how those who care for such things may find an +enervating enjoyment in the linked sweetness of cadence melting into +cadence, in musical line and honeyed phrase. What they are utterly +unable to understand is how thoughtful men, men alive to the practical +needs and the real interests of the race, can speak of poetry as if it +were a thing of genuine importance in the history and development of +mankind. It would not be worth while to attempt an answer to this for +the benefit of the Philistines. They are a folk who are so completely +ignorant of the higher good of life that it is impossible to make them +understand. Their conception of value does not reach beyond pecuniary +and physical standards; they comprehend nothing which is not expressed +in material terms. One who attempted to describe a symphony to a deaf +man would not be more at a loss for terms than must be he who attempts +to set forth the worth of art to those ignorant of real values. The +question may be answered, but to those who most need to be instructed in +regard to æsthetic values any answer must forever remain unintelligible. + +There are, however, many sincere and earnest seekers after truth who are +unable to clear up their ideas when they come in contact, as they must +every day, with the assumption that poetry is but the plaything of idle +men and women, a thing not only unessential but even frivolous. For them +it is worth while to formulate some sort of a statement; although to do +this is like making the attempt to declare why the fragrance of the rose +is sweet or why the hue of its petals gives delight. + +In the first place, then, the use of poetry is to nourish the +imagination. I have spoken earlier of the impossibility of fulfilling +the higher functions of life without this faculty. A common error +regards imagination as a quality which has to do with rare and +exceptional experiences; as a power of inventing whimsical and +impossible thoughts; as a sort of jester to beguile idle moments of the +mind. In reality imagination is to the mental being what blood is to the +physical man. Upon it the intellect and the emotional consciousness +alike depend for nourishment. Without it the mind is powerless to seize +or to make really its own anything which lies outside of actual +experience. Without it the broker could not so fully realize his cunning +schemes as to manipulate the market and control the price of stocks; +without it the inventor could devise no new machine, the scientist grasp +no fresh secret of laws which govern the universe. It is the divine +power in virtue of which man subdues the world to his uses. In a word, +imagination is that faculty which distinguishes man from brute. + +It is the beginning of wisdom to know; it is the culmination of wisdom +to feel. The intellect accumulates; the emotion assimilates. What we +learn, we possess; but what we feel, we are. The perception acquires, +and the imagination realizes; and thus it is that only through the +imagination can man build up and nourish that inner being which is the +true and vital self. To cultivate the imagination, therefore, is an +essential--nay, more; it is the one essential means of insuring the +progression of the race. This is the great office of all art, but +perhaps most obviously is it the noble prerogative and province of +poetry. "In the imagination," wrote Coleridge, "is the distinguishing +characteristic of man as a progressive being." To kindle into flame the +dull embers of this god-like attribute is the first office of poetry; +and were this all, it would lift the art forever above every cumbering +material care and engrossing intellectual interest. + +In the second place, the use of poetry is to give man knowledge of his +unrecognized experiences or his unrealized capacities of feeling. The +poet speaks what many have felt, but what none save he can say. He +accomplishes the hitherto impossible. He makes tangible and subject the +vague emotions which disquiet us as if they were elusive ghosts haunting +the dwelling of the soul, unsubdued and oppressive in their mystery. The +joy of a moment he has fixed for all time; the throb gone almost before +it is felt he has made captive; to the evasive emotion he has given +immortality. In a word, it is his office to confer upon men dominion +over themselves. + +Third, it is poetry which nourishes and preserves the optimism of the +race. Poetry is essentially optimistic. It raises and encourages by +fixing the mind upon the possibilities of life. Even when it bewails +what is gone, when it weeps lost perfection, vanished joy, and crushed +love, the reader receives from the poetic form, from the uplift of +metrical inspiration, a sense that the possibilities of existence +overwhelm individual pain. The fact that such blessings could and may +exist is not only consolation when fate has wrenched them away, but the +vividness with which they are recalled may almost make them seem to be +relived. That + + A sorrow's crown of sorrow is remembering happier things, + +is not the whole story. In times of deepest woe it is this very +remembrance which makes it possible to live on at all. The unconscious +and the inevitable lesson of all true art, moreover, is that the +possibility of beauty in life is compensation for the anguish which its +existence entails. The poet who weeps for the lost may have no word of +comfort to offer, but the fact that life itself is of supreme +possibilities is shown inevitably and persuasively by the fact that he +is so deeply moved. He could not be thus stricken had he not known very +ecstasies of joy; and his message to the race is that such bliss has +been and thus may be again. More than this, the fact that he in his +anguish instinctively turns to art is the most eloquent proof that +however great may be the sorrows of life there is for them an +alleviating balm in æsthetic enjoyment. He may speak of + + Beauty that must die, + And Joy whose hand is ever at his lips, + Bidding adieu; + +but with the very thought of the brevity is coupled an exquisite sense +of both beauty and joy in ever fresh renewal, so that the reader knows a +subtle thrill of pleasure even at the mention of pain. Poe's proposition +that poetry should be restricted to sorrowful themes probably arose from +a more or less conscious feeling that the expression of despair is the +surest means of conveying vividly a sense of the value of what is gone; +and whether Poe went so far as to realize it or not the fact is that +the passion of loss most surely expresses the possible bliss of +possession. Even when it would, art cannot deny the worth and the glory +of existence. The word of denial is chanted to a strain which inspires +and affirms. Even when he would be most pessimistic the genuine poet +must perforce preach in deathless tones the gospel of optimism. + +Fourth, poetry is the original utterance of the ideas of the world. It +is easy and not uncommon to regard the art of the poet as having little +to do with the practical conduct of life; yet there is no man in +civilization who does not hold opinions and theories, thoughts and +beliefs, which he owes to the poets. Thought is not devised in the +marketplace. What thinkers have divined in secret is there shown openly +by its results. Every poet of genius remakes the world. He leaves the +stamp of his imagination upon the whole race, and philosophers reason, +scientists explore, money-changers scheme, tradesmen haggle, and farmers +plough or sow, all under conditions modified by what has been divulged +in song. The poet is the great thinker, whose thought, translated, +scattered, diluted, spilled upon the ground and gathered up again, is +the inspiration and the guide of mankind. + +If this seem extravagant, think for a little. Reflect in what +civilization differs from savagery; consider not the accidental and +outward circumstance, but the fundamental causes upon which these +depend. If you endeavor to find adequately expressed the ideals of +honor, of truth, of love, and of aspiration which are behind all the +development of mankind, it is to the poets that you turn instinctively. +It is possible to go farther than this. Knowledge is but a perception of +relations. The conception of the universe is too vast to be assimilated +all at once, but every perception of the way in which one part is +related to another, one fact to another, one thing to the rest, helps +toward a realization of the ultimate truth. It is the poet who first +discerns and proclaims the relations of those facts which the experience +of the race accumulates. From the particular he deduces the general, +from the facts he perceives the principles which underlie them. The +general, that is, in its relation to that emotional consciousness which +is the real life of man; the principles which take hold not upon +material things only, but upon the very conditions of human existence. +All abstract truth has sprung from poetry as rain comes from the sea. +Changed, diffused, carried afar and often altered almost beyond +recognition, the thought of the world is but the manifestation of the +imagination of the world; and it has found its first tangible expression +in poetry. + +Fifth, poetry is the instructor in beauty. No small thing is human +happiness, and human happiness is nourished on beauty. Poetry opens the +eyes of men to loveliness in earth and sky and sea, in flower and weed, +in tree and rock and stream, in things common and things afar alike. It +is by the interpretation of the poet that mankind in general is aware of +natural beauty; and it is hardly less true that the beauty of moral and +emotional worlds would be practically unknown were it not for these +high interpreters. The race has first become aware of all ethereal and +elusive loveliness through the song of the poet, sensitive to see and +skillful to tell. For its beauty in and of itself, and for its +revelation of the beauty of the universe, both material and intangible, +poetry is to the world a boon priceless and peerless. + +Sixth, poetry is the creator and preserver of ideals. The ideal is the +conception of the existence beyond what is of that which may and should +be. It is the measure of the capability of desire. "Man's desires are +limited by his perceptions," says William Blake; "none can desire what +he has not perceived." What man can receive, what it is possible for him +to enjoy, is limited to what he is able to wish for. The ideal is the +highest point to which his wish has been able to attain, and upon the +advancement of this point must depend the increasing of the +possibilities of individual experience. With the growth of ideals, +moreover, comes the constant, however slow, realization of them. So true +is this that it almost affords a justification of the belief that +whatever mankind really desires must in the end be realized from the +very fact that it is desired. Be that as it may, an ideal is the +perception of a higher reality. It is the recognition of essential as +distinguished from accidental truth; the comprehension of the eternal +principle which must underlie every fact. It is a realization of the +meaning of existence; a piercing through the transient appearance to the +fundamental and the enduring. The reader who finds himself caught away +like St. Paul to the third heaven--"whether in the body I cannot tell; +or whether out of the body I cannot tell"--has no need to ask whether +life is merely eating and drinking, getting and spending, marrying and +giving in marriage. He has for that transcendent moment lived the real +life; he has tasted the possibilities of existence; he has for one +glorious instant realized the ideal. When a poem has carried him out of +himself and the material present which we call the real, then the verse +has been for him as a chariot of fire in which he has been swirled +upward to the very heart of the divine. + +When not actually under the influence of this high exalting power of +poetry most men have a strange reluctance to admit that it is possible +for them to be so moved; and thus it may easily happen that what has +just been said may seem to the reader extravagant and florid. There are +happily few, however, to whom there have not come moments of inner +illumination, few who cannot if they will call up times when the +imagination has carried them away, and the delight of being so borne +above the actual was a revelation and a joy not easily to be put into +word. Recalling such an experience, you will not find it difficult to +understand what is meant by the claim that poetry creates in the mind of +man an ideal which in turn it justifies also. + +Lastly and above all, the use of poetry is--poetry. + + 'Tis the deep music of the rolling world + Kindling within the strings of the waved air + Æolian modulations. + +It is vain to endeavor to put into word the worth and office of poetry. +At the last we are brought face to face with the fact that anything +short of itself is inadequate to do it justice. To read a single page of +a great singer is more potent than to pore over volumes in his praise. A +single lyric puts to shame the most elaborate analysis or the most +glowing eulogy; in the end there is no resource but to appeal to the +inner self which is the true man; since in virtue of what is most deep +and noble in the soul, each may perceive for himself that poetry is its +own supreme justification; that there is no need to discuss the relation +of poetry to life, since poetry is the expression of life in its best +and highest possibilities. + + + + +INDEX + + + Abbot, J. S. C., "Rollo," 201. + + Addison, 66. + + Advertising, 168-170. + + Æschylus, 149. + + Aldrich, T. B., "Story of a Bad Boy," 11, 15. + + Allusions, Biblical, 98-101; + to folk-lore, 106; + historical, 103-106; + literary, 107-108; + mythological, 101-103. + + Amiel, "Journal Intime," 7. + + Amiot, 90. + + Andersen, Hans Christian, 196. + + Apprehension, 74. + + Ariosto, 143. + + Art, conventions in, 89; + deals with the typical, 6; + end of, 87; + good, 22; + origin of, 3-5; + sanity of, 174; + truth in, 206; + truth of, 209; + _vs._ science, 32. + + Artist, office of, 207. + + Asbjörnsen, 196. + + Augustine, St., "Confessions," 7. + + Austen, Jane, 189. + + + Ballads, 222. + + Balzac, 189. + + Barrie, J. M., 211. + + Bible, 101, 140, 142, 145, 197; + allusions to, 98-101; + as a classic, 143-147; + books of, characterized, 146; + quoted, 100, 228; + Revised Version _vs._ King James, 146. + + Black, William, 13, 211. + + Blackmore, R. D., 211. + + Blake, William, 54, 66; + quoted, 58, 121, 252. + + Boccaccio, 143. + + Breeding, good, 204. + + Brontë, Charlotte, 189. + + Broughton, Rhoda, 185. + + Browning, Mrs. E. B., quoted, 8, 132, 225, 241; + "Sonnets from the Portuguese," 7-9. + + Browning Robert, 92, 155, 179, 180; + "Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came," 48; + lack of melody, 236; + obscure in allusions, 106; + "Prospice," 13; + quoted, 244; + "The Ring and the Book," 180. + + Bunyan, John, "Pilgrim's Progress," 129. + + Burke, Edmund, quoted, 229. + + Burns, quoted, 234. + + Byron, Lord, 11, 12; + quoted, 104. + + + Cable, G. W., 211. + + Carleton, Will, "Farm Ballads," 223. + + Carlyle, Thomas, 42; + quoted, 244. + + Carroll, Lewis, quoted, 236. + + Cervantes, 133, 140, 143; + "Don Quixote," 129, 189. + + Character, 56. + + Chaucer, Geoffrey, 78, 116, 123, 124, 140, 142, 146; + as a classic, 151-152; + Lowell on, 114; + quoted, 114. + + Children, education of, 193-196, 223; + reading of, 195-198. + + Civilization, 204. + + Classic, defined, 127. + + Classics, 176, 177; + cause of the neglect of, 132-134; + test of, 130. + + "Clerk Saunders," 222. + + Coleridge, S. T., 54, 66; + "Hymn Before Sunrise," etc., 75; + quoted, 145, 237, 247. + + Collins, William, 66. + + Comprehension, 74. + + Conventions, 88-92. + + Cowper, William, quoted, 79. + + Crawford, F. M., 211. + + Critics, use of, 70. + + + Dante, 58, 78, 140, 142, 146; + as a classic, 150-151. + + Darwin, Charles, 55. + + D'Aulnoy, Countess, 196. + + D'Aurevilly, Barbey, 169. + + Defoe, 66; + "Robinson Crusoe," 197. + + De Gasparin, Madame, "The Near and the Heavenly Horizons," 48. + + De Maupassant, Guy, 182. + + Dekker, Thomas, quoted, 115. + + Dickens, Charles, 179, 180, 189; + his metrical prose, 233. + + Doyle, A. Conan, 211; + quoted, 134. + + Dryden, John, 66, 146; + quoted, 152. + + "Duchess," The, 13, 185. + + Dumas, A., _père_, 182, 189; + "D'Artagnan Romances," 27, 92. + + + Edgeworth, Maria, 201. + + Education, use of poetry in, 223. + + Eliot, George, 180, 187, 189. + + Emerson, R. W., 179, 180; + on translations, 148; + quoted, 43, 47, 103, 225, 241. + + Emotion, 241-245; + fashion in, 15; + genuine, 68; + tests of genuineness of, 10-20. + + Etiquette, 204. + + Euripides, 149. + + Experience the test of art, 10. + + + Fairy stories, 196-197. + + Fiction, truth in, 188. + + Fielding, Henry, 66. + + Folk-lore, 223. + + Folk-songs, 137-139, 221-222. + + French authors, 170. + + Fuller, Margaret, 86. + + + Genius, 20, 250. + + Gibbon, Edward, quoted, 74. + + Gladstone, W. E., 168. + + Goethe, quoted, 36, 178. + + Goldsmith, Oliver, 66. + + Gower, John, 116. + + Gray, Thomas, quoted, 103. + + Greek literature, 149, 150. + + Greek sculpture, 150. + + Greek tragedians, 143, 148. + + Greeks, sanity of the, 148. + + Grimm, The Brothers, 194, 196. + + + Haggard, Rider, "She," 26. + + Hannay, James, quoted, 57. + + Hardy, Thomas, "Far from the Madding Crowd," 181; + "The Return of the Native," 181, 208; + "Tess of the D'Urbervilles," 181; + "Under the Greenwood Tree," 181. + + Harris, J. C., "Uncle Remus," 197. + + Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 179, 180, 189; + Arthur Dimmesdale, 201; + "The Marble Faun," 92; + quoted, 83; + "The Scarlet Letter," 2, 13, 201, 208, 214; + "Tanglewood Tales," 197; + "The Wonder-Book," 197. + + Hazlitt, William, quoted, 113. + + "Helen of Kirconnell," 13, 138. + + Homer, 58, 78, 123, 131, 140, 142, 146, 151; + as a classic, 147-150. + + Hope, Anthony, 211. + + Hugo, Victor, 189; + "Les Misérables," 92, 208. + + Hunt, Leigh, quoted, 84. + + Hunt, W. M., quoted, 62. + + + Ibsen, 172, 173, 177; + "The Doll's House," 18; + "Ghosts," 173. + + Imagination, 93, 246-248, 253; + and thought, 251; + creative, 111; + the realizing faculty, 19; + reality of, 54. + + Imaginative language, defined, 230-231. + + Imaginative quality, test of, 93. + + Impressionism, 69. + + Interest, temporary and permanent, 127-129. + + Irreverence, 87. + + Isaiah, 146, 150. + + + James, Henry, quoted, 203. + + Jewett, Sarah O., Miss, 211. + + Job, 146, 230. + + Johnson, Samuel, quoted, 84. + + Jonson, Ben, quoted, 83. + + Judd, Sylvester, "Margaret," 30. + + + Keats, John, 54, 92, 112; + letters to Miss Brawne, 62; + "Ode on a Grecian Urn," 17; + quoted, 94, 102, 249. + + Kingsley, Charles, 189. + + Kipling, Rudyard, 182; + "Jungle Books," 197, 213. + + + Laboulaye, Édouard, 196. + + Lamb, Charles, 133; + quoted, 196. + + Language, imaginative, defined, 230-231. + + Lear, Edward, 235. + + Lessing, "Nathan the Wise," 48. + + Lincoln, Abraham, "Gettysburg Address," 112. + + Literature, books about, 65-68; + convincing, 14; + defined, 1-32; + didactic, 201; + early, 136; + eighteenth century, 65, 66; + gossip about, 62-65; + history of, 65; + juvenile, 193-195; + morbid, 20, 177, 178; + office of, 46-59; + relative rank, 31; + study of, defined, 33-44, 60-68; + study of, difficult, 72; + talk about, 40-43; + a unit, 154; + _vs._ science, 55. + + "Littell's Living Age," 39. + + Longfellow, H. W., 181. + + Lowell, J. R., 67; + quoted, 78, 102, 114, 173, 216. + + + Macaulay, T. B., 220; + quoted, 207. + + Maclaren, Ian, 211, 213. + + Maeterlinck, 172. + + Magazines, 163-166. + + Malory, Thomas, "Morte d'Arthur," 196. + + Marcus Aurelius, "Reflections," 7. + + Marlowe, Christopher, "The Jew of Malta," 76. + + Melody, 235-240. + + Meredith, George, "The Ordeal of Richard Feverel," 92, 181, 208. + + Metre, 227-230. + + Milton, John, 108, 140, 143; + "L'Allegro," 106; + "Il Penseroso," 107; + "Lycidas," 77; + "On the Morning of Christ's Nativity," 100; + quoted, 63, 113, 163. + + Modernity, 169. + + Molière, 140, 143. + + Montaigne, 133, 140, 143. + + Morbidity, 140. + + Morley, John, 67. + + "Mother Goose," 96, 221. + + Mulock, D. M., 189. + + Music, barbaric, 90; + Chinese, 90. + + Musset, A. de, "Mlle. de Maupin," 177. + + + Newspapers, 162, 163. + + Nordau, Max, "Degeneration," 170; + quoted, 171. + + Notes, use of, 84, 109. + + Notoriety, 128, 172. + + Novels, realistic, 209; + _vs._ poetry, 245; + with a theory, 167. + + Novelty, 134. + + + "Old Oaken Bucket," The, 17. + + Originality, 170. + + Ouida, 17, 41. + + + Page, T. N., 211. + + Pater, Walter, "Marius the Epicurean," 25. + + Periodicals, 162-166. + + Petrarch, 143. + + Philology not the study of literature, 79. + + Plato, quoted, 234. + + Plutarch, letter to his wife, 50. + + Poe, E. A., "Lygeia," 22; + quoted, 104, 105, 237, 249; + Tales, 21. + + Poetry, defined, 227; + form is essential, 236, 239; + how different from prose, 231, 232; + office in education, 223; + office of, 245-252; + optimism of, 248-250; + origin, 5; + reading of, 244; + _vs._ novels, 245. + + Pope, Alexander, 66. + + Prose, how different from poetry, 231-232; + language of, 231. + + Public guided by the few, 10. + + + Quincy, Josiah, 50. + + + Rabelais, 133, 140. + + Reade, Charles, 189. + + Reading, first, 85; + for amusement, 210; + measure of character, 159; + serious matter, 87; + should be a pleasure, 71-73; + test of, 86; + works as units, 81. + + Realism, 69, 209. + + Reverence, 87. + + Rhythm, 220, 221, 227-229. + + Richardson, Samuel, 66. + + Rossetti, D. G., 181; + "Sister Helen," 119, 120. + + Rousseau, "Confessions," 7. + + Ruskin, John, quoted, 95. + + Russell, W. Clark, 13, 211. + + + Sanity, 140, 174. + + Schopenhauer, quoted, 63, 227. + + Science _vs._ art, 32. + + Science _vs._ literature, case of Darwin, 55. + + Scott, Sir Walter, 189. + + Sculpture, Aztec, 89; + Greek, 89. + + Sensationalism, 26. + + Sentiment, 16, 157; + defined, 15. + + Sentimentality, 16, 139, 157; + defined, 15. + + Shakespeare, William, 3, 35, 41, 53, 58, 65, 77, 86, + 92, 93, 107, 118, 124, 133, 140, 143, 145, 147, + 173, 214, 216; + as a classic, 152-153; + condensation of, 93; + "Cymbeline," 75; + epithets of, 112, 231; + for children, 197; + "Hamlet," 81, 215; + "King Lear," 81; + "The Merchant of Venice," 115-118; + "Othello," 81; + quoted, 102, 104, 113, 114, 115, 229, 231, 239; + "Sonnets," 8, 239. + + Shelley, P. B., 92, 131; + quoted, 254; + "Stanzas Written in Dejection," etc., 17. + + Shorthouse, J. H., "John Inglesant," 29. + + Sienkiewicz, 182; + "The Deluge," 92. + + Sincerity, 12-15. + + Smile, sardonic, 95. + + Sophocles, 149. + + Spenser, Edmund, 123, 124, 143, 197. + + Standards, 141; + of criticism, 161. + + Steele, Sir Richard, 66. + + Stephen, Leslie, 67. + + Stevenson, R. L., 181; + "Kidnapped," 197; + quoted, 57; + "Treasure Island," 27, 197. + + Stockton, Frank, "The Adventures of Captain Horn," 27. + + Story, happy ending of a, 215; + the short, 211-214. + + Stowe, Mrs. H. B., on Byron, 62. + + Suckling, Sir John, quoted, 106. + + Suggestion, 111-114, 118-120, 230, 235. + + Suttner, Baroness von, 161. + + Swift, Jonathan, 66; + "Gulliver's Travels," 197. + + Swinburne, A. C., 181; + "Atalanta in Calydon," 228; + excess of melody, 236. + + Symbolism, 69. + + Sympathy between reader and author, 82. + + + Talleyrand, quoted, 38. + + Tasso, 143. + + Taste a measure of character, 3. + + Technical excellence, 25. + + Tennyson, Alfred, 92, 155, 179, 180, 232; + "Idylls of the King," 180; + "In Memoriam," 7, 50; + quoted, 101, 249. + + Thackeray, W. M., 42, 179, 180, 189; + Beatrix Esmond, 92; + Colonel Newcome, 13; + "Henry Esmond," 208; + Major Pendennis, 201; + "Pendennis," 200. + + Titian, 42-43. + + Tolstoi, 172, 177; + "The Kreutzer Sonata," 20, 214; + "War and Peace," 29. + + Traill, H. D., quoted, 190. + + Translations, use of, 147, 148. + + Trollope, Anthony, 180, 189. + + Tupper, M. F., 3. + + Turgenieff, 182. + + + "Uncle Tom's Cabin," 160. + + + Vedas, The, 145. + + Verlaine, 22. + + + "Waly, waly," 138. + + Wendell, Barrett, quoted, 42. + + Weyman, S. J., 211. + + Whittier, J. G., 181. + + Wilkins, Miss M. E., 211, 213. + + Wordsworth, William, 54, 66; + "The Daffodils," 17; + quoted, 108, 225, 238, 239, 241, 243; + "To Lucy," 13. + + + Zend-Avesta, The, 145. + + Zola, 172, 173, 177; + "L'Assommoir," 173. + + + + +Books by Arlo Bates. + + + THE INTOXICATED GHOST AND OTHER STORIES. Crown 8vo, $1.50. + THE DIARY OF A SAINT. Crown 8vo, $1.50. + LOVE IN A CLOUD. A Novel. Crown 8vo, $1.50. + THE PURITANS. A Novel. Crown 8vo, $1.50. + THE PHILISTINES. A Novel. 12mo, $1.50. + THE PAGANS. A Novel. 16mo, $1.00. + PATTY'S PERVERSITIES. A Novel. 16mo, $1.00. + PRINCE VANCE. The Story of a Prince with a Court in his Box. By + Arlo Bates and Eleanor Putnam. Crown 8vo, $1.50. + A LAD'S LOVE. 16mo, $1.00. + UNDER THE BEECH-TREE. Poems. Crown 8vo, $1.50. + TALKS ON WRITING ENGLISH. First Series. Crown 8vo, $1.50. + TALKS ON WRITING ENGLISH. Second Series. Crown 8vo, $1.30, _net_. + Postpaid, $1.42. + TALKS ON TEACHING LITERATURE. Crown 8vo, $1.30, _net_. 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