Page:Hutcheson Macaulay Posnett - Comparative Literature (1886).djvu/173



Straightway to my help had risen

Kinsmen of a heavy hand,

Smiters good when help is needed

And the feeble bend to blows;

Men, when evil bares before them

Gaping jaws of hindmost teeth,

Gay to rush upon and meet him,

Joined in bands or e'en alone.

When a brother in his trouble

Tells the story of his wrong,

They are not the men to question

And to ask for proofs of truth.

But my people, though their numbers

Be not small, are good for naught

'Gainst whatever evil cometh

Howsoever light it be;

They are men who with forgiveness

Meet the wrong their foes have done,

Men who meet the deeds of evil

Kind of heart and full of love!

Just as though the Lord created

Them among the sons of men,

Them alone, to fear before Him

And beside them no man else.

Would I had instead for clansmen

Kinsmen who, when forth they ride,

Swiftly strike their blows and hardly,

Or on horse or camel borne!"

§ 41. This peculiar objectiveness of personality in clan life will enable us to see in their true light certain characteristics of early poetry which have been constantly misinterpreted by the sentiments or philosophy of modern life. "Poetry," says Victor Hugo in his famous preface to Cromwell, has three ages, each of which corresponds to an epoch of society—the ode, the epic, the drama. Primitive ages are lyrical, ancient times are epical, modern are dramatic. The ode sings of eternity, the epic celebrates history, the drama paints life. The character of the first is naïveté, of the second simplicity, of the third truth. The rhapsodists mark the transition from lyric to epic poets just as the romancers mark that from epic to dramatic. With the second