IX_On the Sublime

I have already said that of all these five conditions of the Sublime the

most important is the first, that is, a certain lofty cast of mind.

Therefore, although this is a faculty rather natural than acquired,

nevertheless it will be well for us in this instance also to train up

our souls to sublimity, and make them as it were ever big with noble

thoughts.

How, it may be asked, is this to be done? I have hinted elsewhere in my

writings that sublimity is, so to say, the image of greatness of soul.

Hence a thought in its naked simplicity, even though unuttered, is

sometimes admirable by the sheer force of its sublimity; for instance,

the silence of Ajax in the eleventh _Odyssey_[1] is great, and grander

than anything he could have said.

[Footnote 1: _Od._ xi. 543.]

It is absolutely essential, then, first of all to settle the question

whence this grandeur of conception arises; and the answer is that true

eloquence can be found only in those whose spirit is generous and

aspiring. For those whose whole lives are wasted in paltry and illiberal

thoughts and habits cannot possibly produce any work worthy of the

lasting reverence of mankind. It is only natural that their words should

be full of sublimity whose thoughts are full of majesty.

Hence sublime thoughts belong properly to the loftiest minds. Such was

the reply of Alexander to his general Parmenio, when the latter had

observed, "Were I Alexander, I should have been satisfied"; "And I, were

I Parmenio"...

The distance between heaven and earth[1]--a measure, one might say, not

less appropriate to Homer's genius than to the stature of his discord.

[Footnote 1: _Il._ iv. 442.]

How different is that touch of Hesiod's in his description of sorrow--if

the _Shield_ is really one of his works: "rheum from her nostrils

flowed"[2]--an image not terrible, but disgusting. Now consider how

Homer gives dignity to his divine persons--

"As far as lies his airy ken, who sits

On some tall crag, and scans the wine-dark sea:

So far extends the heavenly coursers' stride."[3]

He measures their speed by the extent of the whole world--a grand

comparison, which might reasonably lead us to remark that if the divine

steeds were to take two such leaps in succession, they would find no

room in the world for another.

[Footnote 2: _Scut. Herc._ 267.]

[Footnote 3: _Il._ v. 770.]

Sublime also are the images in the "Battle of the Gods"--

"A trumpet sound

Rang through the air, and shook the Olympian height;

Then terror seized the monarch of the dead,

And springing from his throne he cried aloud

With fearful voice, lest the earth, rent asunder

By Neptune's mighty arm, forthwith reveal

To mortal and immortal eyes those halls

So drear and dank, which e'en the gods abhor."[4]

Earth rent from its foundations! Tartarus itself laid bare! The whole

world torn asunder and turned upside down! Why, my dear friend, this is

a perfect hurly-burly, in which the whole universe, heaven and hell,

mortals and immortals, share the conflict and the peril.

[Footnote 4: _Il._ xxi. 388; xx. 61.]

A terrible picture, certainly, but (unless perhaps it is to be taken

allegorically) downright impious, and overstepping the bounds of

decency. It seems to me that the strange medley of wounds, quarrels,

revenges, tears, bonds, and other woes which makes up the Homeric

tradition of the gods was designed by its author to degrade his deities,

as far as possible, into men, and exalt his men into deities--or rather,

his gods are worse off than his human characters, since we, when we are

unhappy, have a haven from ills in death, while the gods, according to

him, not only live for ever, but live for ever in misery.

Far to be preferred to this description of the Battle of the Gods are

those passages which exhibit the divine nature in its true light, as

something spotless, great, and pure, as, for instance, a passage which

has often been handled by my predecessors, the lines on Poseidon:--

"Mountain and wood and solitary peak,

The ships Achaian, and the towers of Troy,

Trembled beneath the god's immortal feet.

Over the waves he rode, and round him played,

Lured from the deeps, the ocean's monstrous brood,

With uncouth gambols welcoming their lord:

The charmed billows parted: on they flew."[5]

[Footnote 5: _Il._ xiii. 18; xx. 60; xiii. 19, 27.]

And thus also the lawgiver of the Jews, no ordinary man, having formed

an adequate conception of the Supreme Being, gave it adequate expression

in the opening words of his "Laws": "God said"--what?--"let there be

light, and there was light: let there be land, and there was."

I trust you will not think me tedious if I quote yet one more passage

from our great poet (referring this time to human characters) in

illustration of the manner in which he leads us with him to heroic

heights. A sudden and baffling darkness as of night has overspread the

ranks of his warring Greeks. Then Ajax in sore perplexity cries aloud--

"Almighty Sire,

Only from darkness save Achaia's sons;

No more I ask, but give us back the day;

Grant but our sight, and slay us, if thou wilt."[6]

The feelings are just what we should look for in Ajax. He does not, you

observe, ask for his life--such a request would have been unworthy of

his heroic soul--but finding himself paralysed by darkness, and

prohibited from employing his valour in any noble action, he chafes

because his arms are idle, and prays for a speedy return of light. "At

least," he thinks, "I shall find a warrior's grave, even though Zeus

himself should fight against me."

[Footnote 6: _Il._ xvii. 645.]

In such passages the mind of the poet is swept along in the whirlwind of

the struggle, and, in his own words, he

"Like the fierce war-god, raves, or wasting fire

Through the deep thickets on a mountain-side;

His lips drop foam."[7]

[Footnote 7: _Il._ xv. 605.]

But there is another and a very interesting aspect of Homer's mind. When

we turn to the _Odyssey_ we find occasion to observe that a great

poetical genius in the decline of power which comes with old age

naturally leans towards the fabulous. For it is evident that this work

was composed after the _Iliad_, in proof of which we may mention, among

many other indications, the introduction in the _Odyssey_ of the sequel

to the story of his heroes' adventures at Troy, as so many additional

episodes in the Trojan war, and especially the tribute of sorrow and

mourning which is paid in that poem to departed heroes, as if in

fulfilment of some previous design. The _Odyssey_ is, in fact, a sort of

epilogue to the _Iliad_--

"There warrior Ajax lies, Achilles there,

And there Patroclus, godlike counsellor;

There lies my own dear son."[8]

[Footnote 8: _Od._ iii. 109.]

And for the same reason, I imagine, whereas in the _Iliad_, which was

written when his genius was in its prime, the whole structure of the

poem is founded on action and struggle, in the _Odyssey_ he generally

prefers the narrative style, which is proper to old age. Hence Homer in

his _Odyssey_ may be compared to the setting sun: he is still as great

as ever, but he has lost his fervent heat. The strain is now pitched to

a lower key than in the "Tale of Troy divine": we begin to miss that

high and equable sublimity which never flags or sinks, that continuous

current of moving incidents, those rapid transitions, that force of

eloquence, that opulence of imagery which is ever true to Nature. Like

the sea when it retires upon itself and leaves its shores waste and

bare, henceforth the tide of sublimity begins to ebb, and draws us away

into the dim region of myth and legend.

In saying this I am not forgetting the fine storm-pieces in the

_Odyssey_, the story of the Cyclops,[9] and other striking passages. It

is Homer grown old I am discussing, but still it is Homer. Yet in every

one of these passages the mythical predominates over the real.

My purpose in making this digression was, as I said, to point out into

what trifles the second childhood of genius is too apt to be betrayed;

such, I mean, as the bag in which the winds are confined,[10] the

tale of Odysseus's comrades being changed by Circe into swine[11]

("whimpering porkers" Zoilus called them), and how Zeus was fed like

a nestling by the doves,[12] and how Odysseus passed ten nights on the

shipwreck without food,[13] and the improbable incidents in the slaying

of the suitors.[14] When Homer nods like this, we must be content to say

that he dreams as Zeus might dream.

[Footnote 9: _Od._ ix. 182.]

[Footnote 10: _Od._ x. 17.]

[Footnote 11: _Od._ x. 237.]

[Footnote 12: _Od._ xii. 62.]

[Footnote 13: _Od._ xii. 447.]

[Footnote 14: _Od._ xxii. _passim_.]

Another reason for these remarks on the _Odyssey_ is that I wished to

make you understand that great poets and prose-writers, after they have

lost their power of depicting the passions, turn naturally to the

delineation of character. Such, for instance, is the lifelike and

characteristic picture of the palace of Odysseus, which may be called a

sort of comedy of manners.

Let us now consider whether there is anything further which conduces to

the Sublime in writing. It is a law of Nature that in all things there

are certain constituent parts, coexistent with their substance. It

necessarily follows, therefore, that one cause of sublimity is the

choice of the most striking circumstances involved in whatever we are

describing, and, further, the power of afterwards combining them into

one animate whole. The reader is attracted partly by the selection of

the incidents, partly by the skill which has welded them together. For

instance, Sappho, in dealing with the passionate manifestations

attending on the frenzy of lovers, always chooses her strokes from the

signs which she has observed to be actually exhibited in such cases. But

her peculiar excellence lies in the felicity with which she chooses and

unites together the most striking and powerful features.

"I deem that man divinely blest

Who sits, and, gazing on thy face,

Hears thee discourse with eloquent lips,

And marks thy lovely smile.

This, this it is that made my heart

So wildly flutter in my breast;

Whene'er I look on thee, my voice

Falters, and faints, and fails;

My tongue's benumbed; a subtle fire

Through all my body inly steals;

Mine eyes in darkness reel and swim;

Strange murmurs drown my ears;

With dewy damps my limbs are chilled;

An icy shiver shakes my frame;

Paler than ashes grows my cheek;

And Death seems nigh at hand."

Is it not wonderful how at the same moment soul, body, ears, tongue,

eyes, colour, all fail her, and are lost to her as completely as if they

were not her own? Observe too how her sensations contradict one

another--she freezes, she burns, she raves, she reasons, and all at the

same instant. And this description is designed to show that she is

assailed, not by any particular emotion, but by a tumult of different

emotions. All these tokens belong to the passion of love; but it is in

the choice, as I said, of the most striking features, and in the

combination of them into one picture, that the perfection of this Ode of

Sappho's lies. Similarly Homer in his descriptions of tempests always

picks out the most terrific circumstances.

The poet of the "Arimaspeia" intended the following lines to be grand--

"Herein I find a wonder passing strange,

That men should make their dwelling on the deep,

Who far from land essaying bold to range

With anxious heart their toilsome vigils keep;

Their eyes are fixed on heaven's starry steep;

The ravening billows hunger for their lives;

And oft each shivering wretch, constrained to weep,

With suppliant hands to move heaven's pity strives,

While many a direful qualm his very vitals rives."

All must see that there is more of ornament than of terror in the

description. Now let us turn to Homer.

One passage will suffice to show the contrast.

"On them he leaped, as leaps a raging wave,

Child of the winds, under the darkening clouds,

On a swift ship, and buries her in foam;

Then cracks the sail beneath the roaring blast,

And quakes the breathless seamen's shuddering heart

In terror dire: death lours on every wave."[1]

[Footnote 1: _Il._ xv. 624.]

Aratus has tried to give a new turn to this last thought--

"But one frail timber shields them from their doom,"[2]--

banishing by this feeble piece of subtlety all the terror from his

description; setting limits, moreover, to the peril described by saying

"shields them"; for so long as it shields them it matters not whether

the "timber" be "frail" or stout. But Homer does not set any fixed limit

to the danger, but gives us a vivid picture of men a thousand times on

the brink of destruction, every wave threatening them with instant

death. Moreover, by his bold and forcible combination of prepositions of

opposite meaning he tortures his language to imitate the agony of the

scene, the constraint which is put on the words accurately reflecting

the anxiety of the sailors' minds, and the diction being stamped, as it

were, with the peculiar terror of the situation.

[Footnote 2: _Phaenomena_, 299.]

Similarly Archilochus in his description of the shipwreck, and similarly

Demosthenes when he describes how the news came of the taking of

Elatea[3]--"It was evening," etc. Each of these authors fastidiously

rejects whatever is not essential to the subject, and in putting

together the most vivid features is careful to guard against the

interposition of anything frivolous, unbecoming, or tiresome. Such

blemishes mar the general effect, and give a patched and gaping

appearance to the edifice of sublimity, which ought to be built up in a

solid and uniform structure.

[Footnote 3: _De Cor._ 169.]