"Ah, why," said Ellen, sighing to herself,
"Why do not words, and kiss, and solemn pledge,
And nature, that is kind in woman's breast,
And reason, that in man is wise and good,
And fear of Him who is a righteous Judge,--
Why do not these prevail for human life,
To keep two hearts together, that began
Their springtime with one love, and that have need
Of mutual pity and forgiveness sweet
To grant, or be received; while that poor bird--
O, come and hear him! Thou who hast to me
Been faithless, hear him;--though a lowly creature,
One of God's simple children that yet know not
The Universal Parent, _how_ he sings!
As if he wished the firmament of heaven
Should listen, and give back to him the voice
Of his triumphant constancy and love;
The proclamation that he makes, how far
His darkness doth transcend our fickle light."[72]
The perfection of both these passages, as far as regards truth and
tenderness of imagination in the two poets, is quite insuperable. But
of the two characters imagined, Jessy is weaker than Ellen, exactly in
so far as something appears to her to be in nature which is not. The
flowers do not really reproach her. God meant them to comfort her, not
to taunt her; they would do so if she saw them rightly.
Ellen, on the other hand, is quite above the slightest erring emotion.
There is not the barest film of fallacy in all her thoughts. She
reasons as calmly as if she did not feel. And, although the singing of
the bird suggests to her the idea of its desiring to be heard in
heaven, she does not for an instant admit any veracity in the thought.
"As if," she says,--"I know he means nothing of the kind; but it does
verily seem as if." The reader will find, by examining the rest of the
poem, that Ellen's character is throughout consistent in this clear
though passionate strength.[73]
It then being, I hope, now made clear to the reader in all respects
that the pathetic fallacy is powerful only so far as it is pathetic,
feeble so far as it is fallacious, and, therefore, that the dominion
of Truth is entire, over this, as over every other natural and just
state of the human mind, we may go on to the subject for the dealing
with which this prefatory inquiry became necessary; and why necessary,
we shall see forthwith.
[52] Three short sections discussing the use of the terms "Objective"
and "Subjective" have been omitted from the beginning of this chapter.
[53] Holmes (Oliver Wendell), quoted by Miss Mitford in her
_Recollections of a Literary Life_. [Ruskin.] From _Astræa, a Poem
delivered before the Phi Beta Kappa Society of Yale College_. The
passage in which these lines are found was later published as
_Spring_.
[54] Kingsley's _Alton Locke_, chap. 26.
[55] I admit two orders of poets, but no third; and by these two
orders I mean the creative (Shakspere, Homer, Dante), and
Reflective or Perceptive (Wordsworth, Keats, Tennyson). But both of
these must be _first_-rate in their range, though their range is
different; and with poetry second-rate in _quality_ no one ought to
be allowed to trouble mankind. There is quite enough of the
best,--much more than we can ever read or enjoy in the length of a
life; and it is a literal wrong or sin in any person to encumber us
with inferior work. I have no patience with apologies made by young
pseudo-poets, "that they believe there is _some_ good in what they
have written: that they hope to do better in time," etc. _Some_
good! If there is not _all_ good, there is no good. If they ever
hope to do better, why do they trouble us now? Let them rather
courageously burn all they have done, and wait for the better days.
There are few men, ordinarily educated, who in moments of strong
feeling could not strike out a poetical thought, and afterwards
polish it so as to be presentable. But men of sense know better
than so to waste their time; and those who sincerely love poetry,
know the touch of the master's hand on the chords too well to
fumble among them after him. Nay, more than this, all inferior
poetry is an injury to the good, inasmuch as it takes away the
freshness of rhymes, blunders upon and gives a wretched commonalty
to good thoughts; and, in general, adds to the weight of human
weariness in a most woful and culpable manner. There are few
thoughts likely to come across ordinary men, which have not already
been expressed by greater men in the best possible way; and it is a
wiser, more generous, more noble thing to remember and point out
the perfect words, than to invent poorer ones, wherewith to
encumber temporarily the world. [Ruskin.]
[56] _Inferno_, 3. 112.
[57] _Christabel_, 1. 49-50.
[58] "Well said, old mole! can'st work i' the ground so
fast?"--[Ruskin.]
[59] _Odyssey_, 11. 57-58.
[60] It is worth while comparing the way a similar question is put
by the exquisite sincerity of Keats:--
He wept, and his bright tears
Went trickling down the golden bow he held.
Thus, with half-shut, suffused eyes, he stood;
While from beneath some cumbrous boughs hard by
With solemn step an awful goddess came,
And there was purport in her looks for him,
Which he with eager guess began to read
Perplex'd, the while melodiously he said,
_"How cam'st thou over the unfooted sea?"_
_Hyperion_, 3. 42.--[Ruskin.]
[61] See Wordsworth's _Peter Bell_, Part I:--
A primrose by a river's brim
A yellow primrose was to him,
And it was nothing more.
[62] _Jude_ 13.
[63] _Kings_ xxiii, 18, and _Hosea_ x, 7.
[64] _Iliad_, 3. 243. In the MS. Ruskin notes, "The insurpassably
tender irony in the epithet--'life-giving earth'--of the grave";
and then adds another illustration:--"Compare the hammer-stroke at
the close of the [32d] chapter of _Vanity Fair_--'The darkness came
down on the field and city, and Amelia was praying for George, who
was lying on his face, dead, with a bullet through his heart. A
great deal might have been said about it. The writer is very sorry
for Amelia, neither does he want faith in prayer. He knows as well
as any of us that prayer must be answered in some sort; but those
are the facts. The man and woman sixteen miles apart---one on her
knees on the floor, the other on his face in the clay. So much love
in her heart, so much lead in his. Make what you can of it." [Cook
and Wedderburn.]
[65] The poem may be crudely paraphrased as follows:--
"Quick, Anna, quick! to the mirror! It is late,
And I'm to dance at the ambassador's ...
I'm going to the ball ...
"They're faded, see,
These ribbons--they belong to yesterday.
Heavens, how all things pass! Now gracefully hang
The blue tassels from the net that holds my hair.
"Higher!--no, lower!--you get nothing right!...
Now let this sapphire sparkle on my brow.
You're pricking me, you careless
thing! That's good!
I love you, Anna dear. How fair I am....
"I hope he'll be there, too--the one I've tried
To forget! no use! (Anna, my gown!) he too ...
(O fie, you wicked girl! my necklace, _this?_
These golden beads the Holy Father blessed?)
"He'll be there--Heavens! suppose he takes my hand
--I scarce can draw my breath for thinking of it!
And I confess to Father Anselmo
To-morrow--how can I ever tell him _all_?...
One last glance at the mirror.
O, I'm sure That they'll adore me at the ball to-night."
Before the fire she stands admiringly.
O God! a spark has leapt into her gown.
Fire, fire!--O run!--Lost thus when mad with hope?
What, die? and she so fair? The hideous flames
Rage greedily about her arms and breast,
Envelop her, and leaping ever higher,
Swallow up all her beauty, pitiless--
Her eighteen years, alas! and her sweet dream.
Adieu to ball, to pleasure, and to love!
"Poor Constance!" said the dancers at the ball,
"Poor Constance!"--and they danced till break of day.
[66] _Isaiah_ xiv, 8.
[67] _Isaiah_ lv, 12.
[68] _Night Thoughts_, 2. 345.
[69] Pastorals: _Summer, or Alexis_, 73 ff., with the omission of
two couplets after the first.
[70] From the poem beginning _'T is said that some have died for
love_, Ruskin evidently quoted from memory, for there are several
verbal slips in the passage quoted.
[71] Stanza 16, of Shenstone's twenty-sixth Elegy.
[72] _The Excursion_, 6. 869 ff.
[73] I cannot quit this subject without giving two more instances,
both exquisite, of the pathetic fallacy, which I have just come
upon, in Maud:--
For a great speculation had fail'd;
And ever he mutter'd and madden'd, and ever wann'd with despair;
And out he walk'd, when the wind like a broken worldling wail'd,
And the _flying gold of the ruin'd woodlands drove thro' the air._
There has fallen a splendid tear
From the passion-flower at the gate.
_The red rose cries, "She is near, she is near!"
And the white rose weeps, "She is late."
The larkspur listens, "I hear, I hear!"
And the lily whispers, "I wait."_ [Ruskin.]