ABSTRACT
Poetry is scarce. Our age, famous as it is in many ways-abounding in great deeds, and far from being destitute of great men-seems unfavourable to the growth of the ever welcome flower. Many volumes of verses are published annually, evincing taste, feeling, and sometimes an artistic carefulness and finish. There is no indifference on the part of the public; on the contrary, we feel convinced that the ‘Vates Sacer,’1 were he to come among us, could easily command an audience. The encouragement so freely afforded to anything which looks like promise, and the indulgence displayed to the poets of America, are the best proofs we could advance in favour of the existence of a genuine love of poetry. It would be ungenerous to omit mention of an improvement which has taken place in the tone of many of our writers of verse. That there is often a delicacy and purity of feeling, a desire after noble objects of ambition, and what is better than either, an earnest and sometimes pathetic expression of sympathy for the
wants of the poor, few of those who are in the habit of bestowing attention on the literature of the day will feel inclined to deny. For the higher attributes and mysterious qualities of song, we look in vain. But at least let us be grateful for the absence of misanthropical monodies, and voluptuous love songs. There is another peculiarity in many of the recently published volumes of verses, which can hardly fail to force itself on the notice of every reader. We mean the unmistakeable traces which they bear of the influence exercised on his age and contemporaries by Mr. Tennyson. When the earlier poems of Tennyson first made their appearance, the admirers and disciples of the sensational school claimed their author for themselves. In his more recent productions, however, the poet has shown himself in an entirely new light. The debateable land that lies between the regions of sensation and the regions of thought, Mr. Tennyson has fairly claimed to hold. Where a great genius walks securely, how few there be that can follow! In the efforts of the pupils there is a want of proportion, and an absence of harmony which render the varied ease and facile gracefulness of the master only more apparent. It is far from unnatural that the younger portion of the community should fix their admiration on the poet who is nearest them. Grave seniors may hint at the propriety of rigid adherence to classic models, and point to ‘the pure well of English undefiled,’—but in spite of all that has been, or that can be said, the poet whose verse comes bounding over the soul, who is continually in the thoughts and language of youth, must be he who has felt the difficulties, and perhaps solved the problems of the present time. There is one, it is true, who is for all ages and for all times, but it is rare to discover that the first affections of male or female students of poetry centre in Shakspeare. ‘Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers.’
