Page:Genius, and other essays.djvu/272

GENIUS AND OTHER ESSAYS Message" is very striking, having much of the solemn quality which so impresses one in the "Up-Hill" of Christina Rossetti; but the latter artist would never have ruined her effect by toning up the closing stanza with commonplace light. To us, however, it seems that the most emotional and sweetest passages of the book are to be found in the poems on an infant's life and death—"The Babe's Lesson," "Spring Blossoms," "Remembrance," and especially the verses entitled "Little One." Whoever reads the latter will see what Mrs. Howe can do when feeling carries away the obscure vapors which often becloud her art.

Having thus exempted ourselves from reproach, under the rule made in "Lines to the Critic," we now proceed, lawyer-like—but in no pettifogging spirit—to take exception to the sentiment which those lines avow.

We hold that only a poor and unworthy purpose is content to throw off verse after verse, in the hope that one out of many will have poetic value. As well might a sculptor make rude, distorted figures, content with now and then conforming an image to the beauty of nature and finishing it to the fingers' ends. Is not a poem as truly a work of art as a statue or a painting, and are not all arts one in completeness? The safe, the noble rule is never to write a bad poem. We do not hold that this standard can be maintained; yet, in our day, several have come very near it. There are living poets (and poets who will live), each of whose pieces has such merit that we know not how [258]