=Introductory Note.= This instructive Essay on poetry forms one of the
series titled _Critical and Historical Essays_. Cardinal Newman's own
gifts and tastes for music and poetry render his appreciation of these
arts keen, delicate, and true.
=200= to =203=. =Nature and office of poetry.= A profound and beautiful
definition of poetry and of the poetical mind.
=203=: 1. (_a_) =Iliad.= (_c_) =Choëphoræ.= (_a_) Epic of the _Fall of
Troy_ by Homer. (_b_) A tragedy by Æschylus, so named from the chorus
that bear offerings to the tomb of Agamemnon.
=203=: 26. (_a_) =Empedocles.= (_b_) =Oppian.= (_a_) A Sicilian;
haughty, passionate; proclaimed himself a god; plunged into the crater
of Mt. Etna. (_b_) A Greek poet of Cilicia; lived in the second century.
=208=: 15. =The Divine vengeance.= Does not the same criticism apply to
Milton's Satan, a majestic spirit, punished beyond his due, and
therefore worthy our admiration and pity? Compare Dante and Milton in
their conception of Lucifer.
=210=: 17. =Eloquence mistaken for poetry.= A finely distinguished
truth, which explains why much rhetoric, even declamation, passes in our
day for poetry.
=215=: 16. =Conditions of the poetical mind.= Mark the line drawn
between the sources of true poetry and the actual practices of the poet.
Compare with the theory of Wordsworth, to find likenesses on this point.