ABSTRACT
Max Müller, invited in 1895 to comment on the work of Constance Naden, Hylo-Idealist and poet, responded with condescending modesty:
I liked the poems when they first came out; but I never trust my judgment as to English poetry. I am no judge of English poetry, so far as the jingle of rhyme and the glamour of words are concerned. Tennyson once told me that the only excuse for rhyme was that it helped the memory. That may have been so in ancient times; but is it so now? My only test of poetry is: Does it stand translation into prose?1
