Nothing but the most uncompromising religious purpose can justify certain
things in the "Leaves;" nothing but the most buoyant and pervasive
spirituality can justify its overwhelming materiality; nothing but the
most creative imagination can offset its tremendous realism; nothing but
the note of universal brotherhood can atone for its vehement Americanism;
nothing but the primal spirit of poesy itself can make amends for this
open flouting of the routine poetic, and this endless procession before us
of the common and the familiar.