Believing only a portion of my former volume to be worthy a second
edition—that small portion I thought it as well to include in the
present book as to republish by itself. I have therefore herein
combined “Al Aaraaf” and “Tamerlane” with other poems hitherto
unprinted. Nor have I hesitated to insert from the “Minor Poems,” now
omitted, whole lines, and even passages, to the end that being placed
in a fairer light, and the trash shaken from them in which they were
embedded, they may have some chance of being seen by posterity.
It has been said that a good critique on a poem may be written by
one who is no poet himself. This, according to _your_ idea and _mine_
of poetry, I feel to be false—the less poetical the critic, the less
just the critique, and the converse. On this account, and because
there are but few B——s in the world, I would be as much ashamed of
the world’s good opinion as proud of your own. Another than yourself
might here observe, “Shakespeare is in possession of the world’s good
opinion, and yet Shakespeare is the greatest of poets. It appears then
that the world judge correctly; why should you be ashamed of their
favourable judgment?” The difficulty lies in the interpretation of the
word “judgment” or “opinion.” The opinion is the world’s, truly, but
it may be called theirs as a man would call a book his, having bought
it; he did not write the book, but it is his; they did not originate
the opinion, but it is theirs. A fool, for example, thinks Shakespeare
a great poet—yet the fool has never read Shakespeare. But the fool’s
neighbour, who is a step higher on the Andes of the mind, whose head
(that is to say, his more exalted thought) is too far above the fool to
be seen or understood, but whose feet (by which I mean his every-day
actions) are sufficiently near to be discerned, and by means of which
that superiority is ascertained, which _but_ for them would never have
been discovered—this neighbour asserts that Shakespeare is a great
poet—the fool believes him, and it is henceforward his _opinion_.
This neighbour’s own opinion has, in like manner, been adopted from
one above _him_, and so, ascendingly, to a few gifted individuals who
kneel around the summit, beholding, face to face, the master spirit who
stands upon the pinnacle.
You are aware of the great barrier in the path of an American writer.
He is read, if at all, in preference to the combined and established
wit of the world. I say established; for it is with literature as
with law or empire—an established name is an estate in tenure, or a
throne in possession. Besides, one might suppose that books, like their
authors, improve by travel—their having crossed the sea is, with us,
so great a distinction. Our antiquaries abandon time for distance; our
very fops glance from the binding to the bottom of the title-page,
where the mystic characters which spell London, Paris, or Genoa, are
precisely so many letters of recommendation.
I mentioned just now a vulgar error as regards criticism. I think the
notion that no poet can form a correct estimate of his own writings
is another. I remarked before that in proportion to the poetical
talent would be the justice of a critique upon poetry. Therefore a bad
poet would, I grant, make a false critique, and his self-love would
infallibly bias his little judgment in his favour; but a poet, who is
indeed a poet, could not, I think, fail of making a just critique.
Whatever should be deducted on the score of self-love might be replaced
on account of his intimate acquaintance with the subject; in short,
we have more instances of false criticism than of just where one’s
own writings are the test, simply because we have more bad poets than
good. There are, of course, many objections to what I say: Milton is
a great example of the contrary; but his opinion with respect to the
“Paradise Regained” is by no means fairly ascertained. By what trivial
circumstances men are often led to assert what they do not really
believe! Perhaps an inadvertent word has descended to posterity. But,
in fact, the “Paradise Regained” is little, if at all, inferior to the
“Paradise Lost,” and is only supposed so to be because men do not like
epics, whatever they may say to the contrary, and reading those of
Milton in their natural order, are too much wearied with the first to
derive any pleasure from the second.