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 sublimity and supremacy of his genius in its own climate and proper atmosphere—one which forbids access to all others and escape to him, since only there can he breathe and range, and he alone can breathe and range there; part to the frequent vapour that wraps his head and the frequent dust that soils his feet, filling the simpler sort with admiration of one so lofty at once and so familiar; and part, I fear, to the quality which no other great poet ever shared or can share with him, to his inveterate and invincible Philistinism, his full community of spirit and faith, in certain things of import, with the vulgarest English mind—or that which with the Philistine does duty for a mind. To those who like Shelley and Landor could see and mark this indomitable dullness and thickness of sense which made him mix with magnificent and flawless verse the "enormous folly" of "those stupid staves," his pupils could always point out again the peculiar and unsurpassable grandeur and splendour of his higher mood; and it was vain to reply that these could be seen and enjoyed without condonation or excuse of his violent and wearisome perversities. This is what makes his poetry such unwholesome and immoral reading for Philistines; they can turn round upon their rebukers, and say, "Here is one of us who by'your own admission is also one of the great poets;" and no man can give them the lie; and the miserable men are confirmed in their faith and practice by the shameful triumph.

It will be a curious problem for the critics of another age to work at, and if they can to work out, this influence of men more or less imbued with the savour and spirit of Philistia upon the moral Samson who has played