Page:The nature and elements of poetry, Stedman, 1892.djvu/38

8 do not speak of the science, even of the art, of verse. Yet to know the spirit of poetry we must observe, with the temper of philosophers, its preëssentials in the concrete. Even its form and its method of work must be recognized as things of dignity: the material symbols and counterparts, as in Swedenborg's cosmos, of the spirit which is reality.

And thus, I say, we must obtain at least a serviceable A working basis needed; definition of the word poetry for our present use. In beginning this course, it is well to let the mists rise, at least to have none of our own brewing. The sentimentalists invariably have befogged our topic. I ask you to divest your minds, for the moment, of sentimentalism, even of sentiment, and to assume, in Taine's phrase, that we are to begin by realizing "not an ode, but a law." Applied criticism—that which regards specific poets and poems—is a subsequent affair. Let us seek the generic elements that are to govern criticism by discovering and applying its standards. If you ask, To what end? I reply, That we may avoid dilettanteism. We are not a group of working artists, but they possess something we can share; to wit, the sincere and even ascetic mood that wishes no illusions and demands a working basis. But again, to but not for the promotion of versifying. what purpose? Surely not for the development of a breed of poets! Consider the tenuous voices of minnesingers far and near, whose music rises like the chirping of locusts by noonday and of meadow-frogs at night. Each has his