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reader from his choice of subject, so arbitrarily, in his treatment of his themes, does he compel his audience to place themselves at his own point of view, that the life of his art depends entirely on his individuality. Should future generations be less inclined than our own to surrender their imaginations to his guidance, he will not be able to appeal to them through that element of life which lies in the Universal.

If it is an error to look for the life of poetry exclusively in the mind of the poet, it is no less an error to derive its sources from the current tastes of the people. What is universal is always popular in the true sense of the word; but what is popular is not necessarily universal. Yet the modern poet is under a strong temptation to adapt his conceptions to the fashion of the moment. Modern invention and science occupy the imagination with a dissolving panorama of passing interests; and to embody these in a striking form is the proper end of the art of journalism. The ability and success with which the journalist discharges his functions naturally excite emulation among those who practise the fine arts. They imitate his methods. Hence they are led to Realism in the choice of subject, Impressionism, Literary Paradox, and all those other short cuts in art through which seekers after novelty attempt to discover nine-days wonders for the imagination. By the very hypothesis of fine art such methods must necessarily be fallacious; because, when the temporary conditions to which they owe their being pass away, the pleasure they excite perishes with them.

The abiding life of poetry must be looked for far beneath the surface of society: it should be the aim of the poet first to divine the true character of his age, as distinct from the shows and illusions of things, and then to discover which of the great moulds of poetry corresponds most closely with the nature of his thought. This is a truth written on every page of classic English poetry. In the reign of Elizabeth the life of the nation had its centre in the Crown, and poetical energy found its natural expression in the drama. The eighteenth century was an age of aristocracy and philosophic thought; accordingly the characteristic poetry of that era was ethical or elegiac. With the French Revolution began the great democratic movement which has prevailed for a hundred years, and from that time to this the dominant note in poetry has been lyrical.

I think that one difficulty in the way of forming a poetic conception of Nature and Society in our own day arises from our adhering too tenaciously to a poetical tradition which no longer corresponds with the life and reality of things. Poetry, like politics, is an outward mode of expressing the active principle of social life, and for three generations the master-spirit in social action has been Liberty. In politics we have seen Liberty embodying itself in all that we understand by the word Democracy; sweeping away privilege, test, restriction; widening the basis of government; wakening the energies of free thought; shaking the foundations of faith and authority. In poetry the same principle has found utterance in the

varied emotions we comprehend under the name of
Romance. Romance was heard in the voice of Words-
worth sending out his thought into the heart of Nature;
in the voice of Byron rebellious against the laws of
Society; in the voice of Shelley dreaming of the desti-
nies of humanity; in the voice of Tennyson penetrating
the depths and intricacies of private sorrow.
For uni-
versal conceptions such as these Romance has been the
fitting vehicle of expression. But alike in politics and
in poetry, the productive power of Liberty seems to
have reached its natural limits. Can Democracy, apart
from hereditary Monarchy, solve the problems it has
itself created? civilise the swarming populations of
the city? bind the young and vigorous colony more
closely to the venerable Mother Country? charm
away the demon of social envy? curb the fury of
political faction? Or is Romance the poetical form
that can most fitly reflect those scientific ideas of
Nature and Society which press so powerfully on the
modern imagination? It is just because Romance is
unable to do this that the school of poetry which has
adhered most faithfully to the romantic tradition now
sounds in its art the note of lyric pessimism.

There is surely an analogy in the tasks that lie respectively before the modern statesman and the modern poet. It is the part of the one, rising above the pettinesses of party, to lead, to construct, to consolidate in an imperial spirit. Not very different should be the aim of poetry. The romantic poet regards himself as "the idle singer of an empty day": is it, however, just to charge the age with emptiness

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merely because it affords no materials fitted for expression in a particular poetical mould? The art of poetry has many mansions; and it does not follow that, if one mode of conceiving Nature has become trite and mechanical, the resources of Nature herself are exhausted. Sound reasoning would seem rather to point to the conclusion that, since the subjective and lyrical forms of poetry languish, the sources of life are rather to be sought on the objective side, and in the dramatic, ethical, and satiric forms of the art.

But perhaps to speculate precisely on this point is to fall into the very error of academic criticism which we started with condemning. It will be best to conclude with reiterating the truth that, while the force of individual liberty and genius is absolutely necessary to inspire poetic conception with the breath of life, obedience to the law of the Universal in Nature is no less needful, if the life thus generated is to be enduring.

II

POETICAL EXPRESSION

EXPERIENCE shows me that, in England, it is unsafe to suppose that the most elementary truths of criticism will be accepted as self-evident, or that the most familiar terms can be left without explanation. In opening this series of lectures on "Life in Poetry," I began, as I was bound to do, with a definition. I said that "Poetry was the art which produces pleasure for the imagination by imitating human actions, thoughts, and passions in metrical language." Since poetry had been regarded as an imitative art by a hundred well-known critics from Aristotle downwards, and since not only Aristotle, but such modern and Christian critics as Wordsworth and Coleridge, had agreed that the end of poetry was to produce pleasure for the imagination, I fondly hoped that what I called a "working" definition might pass without argument. But what happened? A critic in a weekly paper of high standing supposed that by using the word "imitation" in relation to poetry I must necessarily mean the photographic reproduction of external objects, and that the word " "pleasure"

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