View of the World, or ‘World-view,’ defined. Distinction of
_religious_ and _philosophical_ World-views. The present essay
attempts to define and describe a _poetic_ World-view.--I.
Character of poetic experience. Types of belief about Man and
Nature to which it predisposes. Though rarely detached from
religious or philosophical presumptions, it habitually modifies
them, and the method here proposed is to study, in some salient
examples, the character and direction of these modifications (p.
150).--II. (i) Modifications of _religious_ World-views by the
poetic inspirations of Personality and Love. HOMER. ÆSCHYLUS.
DANTE (p. 156).--III. (ii) Modifications of _philosophical_
World-views: (_a_) Materialistic schools. Epicureanism and
LUCRETIUS. Poets of Pessimism: LEOPARDI (p. 169).--IV. (_b_)
‘Objective idealisms.’ Stoic pantheism and VERGIL. WORDSWORTH.
SHELLEY. Philosophic doctrine of ‘Nature’ in WORDSWORTH, and
in GOETHE. SPINOZA and GOETHE (p. 184).--V. (_c_) ‘Subjective
idealisms.’ ‘Mind’ in the philosophers and in the poets of
the age of WORDSWORTH. The poets subordinate (1) the rational
to the emotional and imaginative factors of soul: WORDSWORTH,
BLAKE, SHELLEY, and (2) moral categories to a good ‘beyond good
and evil.’ Of this poetic ethic the most vital constituent is
Love; and Love, comprehensively understood, will be an intrinsic
element of every World-view won through poetic experience (p.
198).
V