Page:The nature and elements of poetry, Stedman, 1892.djvu/105

 III.

CREATION AND SELF-EXPRESSION.

difficulty that confronts one who enters upon a general discussion of poetry is its universal The radiant dome. range. The portals of his observatory tower before him, flashing yet frowning, and inscribed with great names of all the ages. Mount its stairway, and a chart of the field disclosed is indeed like that of the firmament. In what direction shall we first turn? To the infinite dome at large, or toward some particular star or group? We think of inspiration, and a Hebrew seer glows in the prophetic East; of gnomic wisdom and thought, and many fixed white stars shine tranquilly along the equinox, from Lucretius to Emerson; of tragedy and comedy, the dramatic coil and mystery of life, and group after group invites the lens,—for us, most of all, that English constellation blazing since "the spacious times of great Elizabeth"; of beauty, and the long train of poetic artists, with Keats like his own new planet among them, swims into our ken. Asia is somewhere beyond the horizon, and in view are countless minor lights,—the folk-singers and minstrels of many lands and generations.

The future lecturer will have the satisfaction of