APDL Eductation Resources/APDL Eductation Resources.iso/text/authors/poe/marginalia/MARGINALIA

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                         1844-49
                        MARGINALIA
                     by Edgar Allan Poe

  DEMOCRATIC REVIEW, November, 1844

  In getting my books, I have been always solicitous of an ample margin;
this not so much through any love of the thing in itself, however
agreeable, as for the facility it affords me of pencilling suggested
thoughts, agreements, and differences of opinion, or brief critical
comments in general. Where what I have to note is too much to be
included within the narrow limits of a margin, I commit it to a slip of
paper, and deposit it between the leaves; taking care to secure it by an
imperceptible portion of gum tragacanth paste.

All this may be whim; it may be not only a very hackneyed, but a very
idle practice;- yet I persist in it still; and it affords me pleasure;
which is profit, in despite of Mr. Bentham, with Mr. Mill on his back.

This making of notes, however, is by no means the making of mere
memorandum- a custom which has its disadvantages, beyond doubt "Ce que
je mets sur papier," says Bernadine de St. Pierre, "je remets de ma
memoire et par consequence je l'oublie;"- and, in fact, if you wish to
forget anything upon the spot, make a note that this thing is to be
remembered.

But the purely marginal jottings, done with no eye to the Memorandum
Book, have a distinct complexion, and not only a distinct purpose, but
none at all; this it is which imparts to them a value. They have a rank
somewhat above the chance and desultory comments of literary chit-chat-
for these latter are not unfrequently "talk for talk's sake," hurried
out of the mouth; while the marginalia are deliberately pencilled,
because the mind of the reader wishes to unburthen itself of a thought;-
however flippant- however silly- however trivial- still a thought
indeed, not merely a thing that might have been a thought in time, and
under more favorable circumstances. In the marginalia, too, we talk only
to ourselves; we therefore talk freshly- boldly- originally- with
abandonnement- without conceit- much after the fashion of Jeremy Taylor,
and Sir Thomas Browne, and Sir William Temple, and the anatomical
Burton, and that most logical analogist, Butler, and some other people
of the old day, who were too full of their matter to have any room for
their manner, which, being thus left out of question, was a capital
manner, indeed,- a model of manners, with a richly marginalic air.

The circumscription of space, too, in these pencillings, has in it
something more of advantage than of inconvenience. It compels us
(whatever diffuseness of idea we may clandestinely entertain), into
Montesquieu-ism, into Tacitus-ism (here I leave out of view the
concluding portion of the "Annals")- or even into Carlyle-ism- a thing
which, I have been told, is not to be confounded with your ordinary
affectation and bad grammar. I say "bad grammar," through sheer
obstinacy, because the grammarians (who should know better) insist upon
it that I should not. But then grammar is not what these grammarians
will have it; and, being merely the analysis of language, with the
result of this analysis, must be good or bad just as the analyst is sage
or silly- just as he is Horne Tooke or a Cobbett.

But to our sheep. During a rainy afternoon, not long ago, being in a
mood too listless for continuous study, I sought relief from ennui in
dipping here and there, at random, among the volumes of my library- no
very large one, certainly, but sufficiently miscellaneous; and, I
flatter myself, not a little recherche.

Perhaps it was what the Germans call the "brain-scattering" humor of the
moment; but, while the picturesqueness of the numerous pencil-scratches
arrested my attention, their helter-skelter-iness of commentary amused
me. I found myself at length forming a wish that it had been some other
hand than my own which had so bedevilled the books, and fancying that,
in such case, I might have derived no inconsiderable pleasure from
turning them over. From this the transition- thought (as Mr. Lyell, or
Mr. Murchison, or Mr. Featherstonhaugh would have it) was natural
enough:- there might be something even in my scribblings which, for the
mere sake of scribblings would have interest for others.

The main difficulty respected the mode of transferring the notes from
the volumes- the context from the text- without detriment to that
exceedingly frail fabric of intelligibility in which the context was
imbedded. With all appliances to boot, with the printed pages at their
back, the commentaries were too often like Dodona's oracles- or those of
Lycophron Tenebrosus- or the essays of the pedant's pupils, in
Quintilian, which were "necessarily excellent, since even he (the
pedant) found it impossible to comprehend them":- what, then, would
become of it- this context- if transferred?- if translated? Would it not
rather be traduit (traduced) which is the French synonym, or overzezet
(turned topsy-turvy) which is the Dutch one?

I concluded, at length, to put extensive faith in the acumen and
imagination of the reader:- this as a general rule. But, in some
instances, where even faith would not remove mountains, there seemed no
safer plan than so to re-model the note as to convey at least the ghost
of a conception as to what it was all about. Where, for such conception,
the text itself was absolutely necessary, I could quote it, where the
title of the book commented upon was indispensable, I could name it. In
short, like a novel-hero dilemma'd, I made up my mind "to be guided by
circumstances," in default of more satisfactory rules of conduct.

As for the multitudinous opinion expressed in the subjoined farrago- as
for my present assent to all, or dissent from any portion of it- as to
the possibility of my having, in some instances, altered my mind- or as
to the impossibility of my not having altered it often- these are points
upon which I say nothing, because upon these there can be nothing
cleverly said. It may be as well to observe, however, that just as the
goodness of your true pun is in the direct ratio of its intolerability,
so is nonsense the essential sense of the Marginal Note.


I have seen many computations respecting the greatest amount of
erudition attainable by an individual in his life-time, but these
computations are falsely based, and fall infinitely beneath the truth.
It is true that, in general we retain, we remember to available purpose,
scarcely one-hundredth part of what we read; yet there are minds which
not only retain all receipts, but keep them at compound interest
forever. Again:- were every man supposed to read out, he could read, of
course, very little, even in half a century; for, in such case, each
individual word must be dwelt upon in some degree. But, in reading to
ourselves, at the ordinary rate of what is called "light reading," we
scarcely touch one word in ten. And, even physically considered,
knowledge breeds knowledge, as gold gold; for he who reads really much,
finds his capacity to read increase in geometrical ratio. The helluo
librorum will but glance at the page which detains the ordinary reader
some minutes; and the difference in the absolute reading (its uses
considered), will be in favor of the helluo, who will have winnowed the
matter of which the tyro mumbled both the seeds and the chaff. A
deep-rooted and strictly continuous habit of reading will, with certain
classes of intellect, result in an instinctive and seemingly magnetic
appreciation of a thing written; and now the student reads by pages just
as other men by words. Long years to come, with a careful analysis of
the mental process, may even render this species of appreciation a
common thing. It may be taught in the schools of our descendants of the
tenth or twentieth generation. It may become the method of the mob of
the eleventh or twenty-first. And should these matters come to pass- as
they will- there will be in them no more legitimate cause for wonder
than there is, to-day, in the marvel that, syllable by syllable, men
comprehend what, letter by letter, I now trace upon this page.

Is it not a law that need has a tendency to engender the thing needed?


Moore has been noted for the number of appositeness, as well as novelty
of his similes; and the renown thus acquired is indicial of his
deficiency in that noble merit- the noblest of all. No poet thus
distinguished was ever richly ideal. Pope and Cowper are instances.
Direct similes are of too palpably artificial a character to be
artistical. An artist will always contrive to weave his illustrations
into the metaphorical form.

Moore has a peculiar facility in prosaically telling a poetical story.
By this I mean that he preserves the tone and method of arrangement of a
prose relation, and thus obtains great advantage, in important points,
over his more stilted compeers. His is no poetical style (such as the
French have- a distinct style for a distinct purpose) but an easy and
ordinary prose manner, which rejects the licenses because it does not
require them, and is merely ornamented into poetry. By means of this
manner he is enabled to encounter, effectually, details which would
baffle any other versifier of the day; and at which Lamartine would
stand aghast. In "Alciphron" we see this exemplified. Here the minute
and perplexed incidents of the descent into the pyramid, are detailed,
in verse, with quite as much precision and intelligibility as could be
attained even by the coolest prose of Mr. Jeremy Bentham.

Moore has vivacity; verbal and constructive dexterity; a musical ear not
sufficiently cultivated; a vivid fancy; an epigrammatic spirit; and a
fine taste- as far as it goes.


Democratic Review, December, 1844

  I am not sure that Tennyson is not the greatest of poets. The
uncertainty attending the public conception of the term "poet" alone
prevents me from demonstrating that he is. Other bards produce effects
which are, now and then, otherwise produced than by what we call poems;
but Tennyson an effect which only a poem does. His alone are
idiosyncratic poems. By the enjoyment or non-enjoyment of the "Morte
D'Arthur" or of the "Oenone," I would test any one's ideal sense.

There are passages in his works which rivet a conviction I had long
entertained, that the indefinite is an element in the true poiesis. Why
do some persons fatigue themselves in attempts to unravel such
fantasy-pieces as the "Lady of Shalott"? As well unweave the "ventum
textilem." If the author did not deliberately propose to himself a
suggestive indefinitiveness of meaning with the view of bringing about a
definitiveness of vague and therefore of spiritual effect- this, at
least, arose from the silent analytical promptings of that poetic genius
which, in its supreme development, embodies all orders of intellectual
capacity.

I know that indefinitiveness is an element of the true music- I mean of
the true musical expression. Give to it any undue decision- imbue it
with any very determinate tone- and you deprive it at once of its
ethereal, its ideal, its intrinsic and essential character. You dispel
its luxury of dream. You dissolve the atmosphere of the mystic upon
which it floats. You exhaust it of its breath of fiery. It now becomes a
tangible and easily appreciable idea- a thing of the earth, earthy. It
has not, indeed, lost its power to please, but all which I consider the
distinctiveness of that power. And to the uncultivated talent, or to the
unimaginative apprehension, this deprivation of its most delicate air
will be, not unfrequently, a recommendation. A determinateness of
expression is sought- and often by composers who should know better- is
sought as a beauty rather than rejected as a blemish. Thus we have, even
from high authorities, attempts at absolute imitation in music. Who can
forget the silliness of the "Battle of Prague"? What man of taste but
must laugh at the interminable drums, trumpets, blunderbusses, and
thunder? "Vocal music," says L'Abbate Gravina, who would have said the
same thing of instrumental, "ought to imitate the natural language of
the human feelings and passions, rather than the warblings of canary
birds, which our singers, now-a-days, affect so vastly to mimic with
their quaverings and boasted cadences." This is true only so far as the
"rather" is concerned. If any music must imitate anything, it were
assuredly better to limit the imitation as Gravina suggests.

Tennyson's shorter pieces abound in minute rhythmical lapses sufficient
to asure me that- in common with all poets living or dead- he has
neglected to make precise investigation of the principles of metre; but,
on the other hand, so perfect is his rhythmical instinct in general
that, like the present Viscount Canterbury, he seems to see with his
ear.


Godey's Lady's Book, September, 1845

  The increase, within a few years, of the magazine literature, is by no
means to be regarded as indicating what some critics would suppose it to
indicate- a downward tendency in American taste or in American letters.
It is but a sign of the times, an indication of an era in which men are
forced upon the curt, the condensed, the well-digested in place of the
voluminous- in a word, upon journalism in lieu of dissertation. We need
now the light artillery rather than the peace-makers of the intellect. I
will not be sure that men at present think more profoundly than half a
century ago, but beyond question they think with more rapidity, with
more skill, with more tact, with more of method and less of excrescence
in the thought. Besides all this, they have a vast increase in the
thinking material; they have more facts, more to think about. For this
reason, they are disposed to put the greatest amount of thought in the
smallest compass and disperse it with the utmost attainable rapidity.
Hence the journalism of the age; hence, in especial, magazines. Too many
we cannot have, as a general proposition; but we demand that they have
sufficient merit to render them noticeable in the beginning, and that
they continue in existence sufficiently long to permit us a fair
estimation of their value.


Broadway Journal, Oct. 4, 1845

  Much has been said, of late, about the necessity of maintaining a
proper nationality in American Letters; but what this nationality is, or
what is to be gained by it, has never been distinctly understood. That
an American should confine himself to American themes, or even prefer
them, is rather a political than a literary idea- and at best is a
questionable point. We would do well to bear in mind that "distance
lends enchantment to the view." Ceteris paribus, a foreign theme is, in
a strictly literary sense, to be preferred. After all, the world at
large is the only legitimate stage for the autorial histrio.

But of the need of that nationality which defends our own literature,
sustains our own men of letters, upholds our own dignity, and depends
upon our own resources, there can not be the shadow of a doubt. Yet here
is the very point at which we are most supine. We complain of our want
of International Copyright on the ground that this want justifies our
publishers in inundating us with British opinion in British books; and
yet when these very publishers, at their own obvious risk, and even
obvious loss, do publish an American book, we turn up our noses at it
with supreme contempt (this is a general thing) until it (the American
book) has been dubbed "readable" by some literate Cockney critic. Is it
too much to say that, with us, the opinion of Washington Irving- of
Prescott- of Bryant- is a mere nullity in comparison with that of any
anonymous sub-sub-editor of the Spectator, the Athenaeum, or the London
Punch? It is not saying too much to say this. It is a solemn- an
absolutely awful fact. Every publisher in the country will admit it to
be a fact. There is not a more disgusting spectacle under the sun than
our subserviency to British criticism. It is disgusting, first because
it is truckling, servile, pusilanimous- secondly, because of its gross
irrationality. We know the British to bear us little but ill will- we
know that, in no case, do they utter unbiased opinions of American
books- we know that in the few instances in which our writers have been
treated with common decency in England, these writers have either openly
paid homage to English institutions, or have had lurking at the bottom
of their hearts a secret principle at war with Democracy:- we know all
this, and yet, day after day, submit our necks to the degrading yoke of
the crudest opinion that emanates from the fatherland. Now if we must
have nationality, let it be a nationality that will throw off this yoke.

The chief of the rhapsodists who have ridden us to death like the Old
Man of the Mountain, is the ignorant and egotistical Wilson. We use the
term rhapsodists with perfect deliberation; for, Macaulay, and Dilke,
and one or two others, excepted, there is not in Great Britain a critic
who can be fairly considered worthy the name. The Germans and even the
French, are infinitely superior. As regards Wilson, no man ever penned
worse criticism or better rhodomontade. That he is "egotistical" his
works show to all men, running as they read. That he is "ignorant" let
his absurd and continuous school-boy blunders about Homer bear witness.
Not long ago we ourselves pointed out a series of similar inanities in
his review of Miss Barret's [sic] poems- a series, we say, of gross
blunders, arising from sheer ignorance- and we defy him or any one to
answer a single syllable of what we then advanced.

And yet this is the man whose simple dictum (to our shame be it spoken)
has the power to make or to mar any American reputation! In the last
number of Blackwood, he has a continuation of the dull "Specimens of the
British Critics," and makes occasion wantonly to insult one of the
noblest of our poets, Mr. Lowell. The point of the whole attack consists
in the use of slang epithets and phrases of the most ineffably vulgar
description. "Squabashes" is a pet term. "Faugh!" is another. "We are
Scotsmen to the spiner" says Sawney- as if the thing were not more than
self-evident. Mr. Lowell is called a "magpie," an "ape," a "Yankee
cockney," and his name is intentionally mis-written John Russell Lowell.
Now were these indecencies perpetrated by an American critic, that
critic would be sent to Coventry by the whole press of the country, but
since it is Wilson who insults, we, as in duty bound, not only submit to
the insult, but echo it, as an excellent jest, throughout the length and
breadth of the land. "Quamdiu Catilina?" We do indeed demand the
nationality of self-respect. In Letters as in Government we require a
Declaration of Independence. A better thing still would be a Declaration
of War- and that war should be carried forthwith "into Africa."


Graham's Magazine, March, 1846

  Some Frenchman- possibly Montaigne- says: "People talk about thinking,
but for my part I never think except when I sit down to write." It is
this never thinking, unless when we sit down to write, which is the
cause of so much indifferent composition. But perhaps there is something
more involved in the Frenchman's observation than meets the eye. It is
certain that the mere act of inditing tends, in a great degree, to the
logicalisation of thought. Whenever, on account of its vagueness, I am
dissatisfied with a conception of the brain, I resort forthwith to the
pen, for the purpose of obtaining, through its aid, the necessary form,
consequence, and precision.

How very commonly we hear it remarked that such and such thoughts are
beyond the compass of words! I do not believe that any thought, properly
so called, is out of the reach of language. I fancy, rather, that where
difficulty in expression is experienced, there is, in the intellect
which experiences it, a want either of deliberateness or of method. For
my own part, I have never had a thought which I could not set down in
words, with even more distinctness than that with which I conceived it:-
as I have before observed, the thought is logicalised by the effort at
(written) expression.

There is, however, a class of fancies, of exquisite delicacy, which are
not thoughts, and to which, as yet, I have found it absolutely
impossible to adapt language. I use the word fancies at random, and
merely because I must use some word; but the idea commonly attached to
the term is not even remotely applicable to the shadows of shadows in
question. They seem to me rather psychal than intellectual. They arise
in the soul (alas, how rarely!) only at its epochs of most intense
tranquillity- when the bodily and mental health are in perfection- and
at those mere points of time where the confines of the waking world
blend with those of the world of dreams. I am aware of these "fancies"
only when I am upon the very brink of sleep, with the consciousness that
I am so. I have satisfied myself that this condition exists but for an
inappreciable point of time- yet it is crowded with these "shadows of
shadows"; and for absolute thought there is demanded time's endurance.

These "fancies" have in them a pleasurable ecstasy, as far beyond the
most pleasurable of the world of wakefulness, or of dreams, as the
Heaven of the Northman theology is beyond its Hell. I regard the
visions, even as they arise, with an awe which, in some measure
moderates or tranquillises the ecstasy- I so regard them, through a
conviction (which seems a portion of the ecstasy itself) that this
ecstasy, in itself, is of a character supernal to the Human Nature- is a
glimpse of the spirit's outer world; and I arrive at this conclusion- if
this term is at all applicable to instantaneous intuition- by a
perception that the delight experienced has, as its element, but the
absoluteness of novelty. I say the absoluteness- for in the fancies- let
me now term them psychal impressions- there is really nothing even
approximate in character to impressions ordinarily received. It is as if
the five senses were supplanted by five myriad others alien to
mortality.

Now, so entire is my faith in the power of words, that at times I have
believed it possible to embody even the evanescence of fancies such as I
have attempted to describe. In experiments with this end in view, I have
proceeded so far as, first, to control (when the bodily and mental
health are good), the existence of the condition:- that is to say, I can
now (unless when ill), be sure that the condition will supervene, if I
so wish it, at the point of time already described: of its supervention
until lately I could never be certain even under the most favorable
circumstances. I mean to say, merely, that now I can be sure, when all
circumstances are favorable, of the supervention of the condition, and
feel even the capacity of inducing or compelling it:- the favorable
circumstances, however, are not the less rare- else had I compelled
already the Heaven into the Earth.

I have proceeded so far, secondly, as to prevent the lapse from the
Point of which I speak- the point of blending between wakefulness and
sleep- as to prevent at will, I say, the lapse from this border- ground
into the dominion of sleep. Not that I can continue the condition- not
that I can render the point more than a point- but that I can startle
myself from the point into wakefulness; and thus transfer the point
itself into the realm of Memory- convey its impressions, or more
properly their recollections, to a situation where (although still for a
very brief period) I can survey them with the eye of analysis.

For these reasons- that is to say, because I have been enabled to
accomplish thus much- I do not altogether despair of embodying in words
at least enough of the fancies in question to convey to certain classes
of intellect, a shadowy conception of their character.

In saying this I am not to be understood as supposing that the fancies
or psychal impressions to which I allude are confined to my individual
self- are not, in a word, common to all mankind- for on this point it is
quite impossible that I should form an opinion- but nothing can be more
certain than that even a partial record of the impressions would startle
the universal intellect of mankind, by the supremeness of the novelty of
the material employed, and of its consequent suggestions. In a word-
should I ever write a paper on this topic, the world will be compelled
to acknowledge that, at last, I have done an original thing.


Democratic Review, April, 1846

  In general, our first impressions are true ones- the chief difficulty
is in making sure which are the first. In early youth we read a poem,
for instance, and are enraptured with it. At manhood we are assured by
our reason that we had no reason to be enraptured. But some years
elapse, and we return to our primitive admiration, just as a matured
judgment enables us precisely to see what and why we admired.

Thus, as individuals, we think in cycles, and may, from the frequency,
or infrequency of our revolutions about the various thought-centres,
form an accurate estimate of the advance of our thought toward maturity.
It is really wonderful to observe how closely, in all the essentials of
truth, the child- opinion coincides with that of the man proper- of the
man at his best.

And as with individuals so, perhaps, with mankind. When the world begins
to return, frequently, to its first impressions, we shall then be
warranted in looking for the millennium- or whatever it is:- we may
safely take it for granted that we are attaining our maximum of wit, and
of the happiness which is thence to ensue. The indications of such a
return are, at present, like the visits of angels- but we have them now
and then- in the case, for example, of credulity. The philosophic, of
late days, are distinguished by that very facility in belief which was
the characteristic of the illiterate half a century ago. Skepticism in
regard to apparent miracles, is not, as formerly, an evidence either of
superior wisdom or knowledge. In a word, the wise now believe- yesterday
they would not believe- and day before yesterday (in the time of Strabo,
for example) they believed, exclusively, anything and everything:- here,
then, is one of the indicative cycles of discretion. I mention Strabo
merely as an exception to the rule of his epoch- (just as one in a hurry
for an illustration, might describe Mr. So and So to be as witty or as
amiable as Mr. This and That is not- for so rarely did men reject in
Strabo's time, and so much more rarely did they err by rejection, that
the skepticism of this philosopher must be regarded as one of the most
remarkable anomalies on record.


I have not the slightest faith in Carlyle. In ten years- possibly in
five- he will be remembered only as a butt for sarcasm. His linguistic
Euphuisms might very well have been taken as prima facie evidence of his
philosophic ones; they were the froth which indicated, first, the
shallowness, and secondly, the confusion of the waters. I would blame no
man of sense for leaving the works of Carlyle unread merely on account
of these Euphuisms; for it might be shown a priori that no man capable
of producing a definite impression upon his age or race, could or would
commit himself to such inanities and insanities. The book about
'Hero-Worship'- is it possible that it ever excited a feeling beyond
contempt? No hero-worshipper can possess anything within himself. That
man is no man who stands in awe of his fellow-man. Genius regards genius
with respect- with even enthusiastic admiration- but there is nothing of
worship in the admiration, for it springs from a thorough cognizance of
the one admired- from a perfect sympathy, the result of the cognizance;
and it is needless to say, that sympathy and worship are antagonistic.
Your hero-worshippers, for example- what do they know about Shakespeare?
They worship him- rant about him- lecture about him- about him, him and
nothing else- for no other reason than that he is utterly beyond their
comprehension. They have arrived at an idea of his greatness from the
pertinacity with which men have called him great. As for their own
opinion about him- they really have none at all. In general the very
smallest of mankind are the class of men-worshippers. Not one out of
this class have ever accomplished anything beyond a very contemptible
mediocrity.

Carlyle, however, has rendered an important service (to posterity, at
least) in pushing rant and cant to that degree of excess which
inevitably induces reaction. Had he not appeared we might have gone on
for yet another century, Emerson-izing in prose, Wordsworth-izing in
poetry, and Fourier-izing in philosophy, Wilson-izing in criticism-
Hudson-izing and Tom O'Bedlam-izing in everything. The author of the
'Sartor Resartus,' however, has overthrown the various arguments of his
own order, by a personal reductio ad absurdum. Yet an Olympiad, perhaps,
and the whole horde will be swept bodily from the memory of man- or be
remembered only when we have occasion to talk of such fantastic tricks
as, erewhile, were performed by the Abderites.


Graham's Magazine, January, 1848

  If any ambitious man have a fancy a revolutionize, at one effort, the
universal world of human thought, human opinion, and human sentiment,
the opportunity is his own- the road to immortal renown lies straight,
open, and unencumbered before him. All that he has to do is to write and
publish a very little book. Its title should be simple- a few plain
words- "My Heart Laid Bare." But- this little book must be true to its
title.

Now, is it not very singular that, with the rabid thirst for notoriety
which distinguishes so many of mankind- so many, too, who care not a fig
what is thought of them after death, there should not be found one man
having sufficient hardihood to write this little book? To write, I say.
There are ten thousand men who, if the book were once written, would
laugh at the notion of being disturbed by its publication during their
life, and who could not even conceive why they should object to its
being published after their death. But to write it- there is the rub. No
man dare write it. No man ever will dare write it. No man could write
it, even if he dared. The paper would shrivel and blaze at every touch
of the fiery pen.


Southern Literary Messenger, April, 1849

  I blush to see, in the--, an invidious notice of Bayard Taylor's
"Rhimes of Travel." What makes the matter worse, the critique is from
the pen of one who, although undeservedly, holds, himself, some position
as a poet:- and what makes the matter worst, the attack is anonymous,
and (while ostensibly commending) most zealously endeavors to damn the
young writer "with faint praise." In his whole life, the author of the
criticism never published a poem, long or short, which could compare,
either in the higher merits, or in the minor morals of the Muse, with
the worst of Mr. Taylor's compositions.

Observe the generalizing, disingenuous, patronizing tone:-

"It is the empty charlatan, to whom all things are alike impossible, who
attempts everything. He can do one thing as well as another, for he can
really do nothing.... Mr. Taylor's volume, as we have intimated, is an
advance upon his previous publication. We could have wished, indeed,
something more of restraint in the rhetoric, but," &c., &c., &c.

The concluding sentence, here, is an excellent example of one of the
most ingeniously malignant of critical ruses- that of condemning an
author, in especial, for what the world, in general, feel to be his
principal merit. In fact, the "rhetoric" of Mr. Taylor, in the sense
intended by the critic, is Mr. Taylor's distinguishing excellence. He
is, unquestionably, the most terse, glowing, and vigorous of all our
poets, young or old- in point, I mean, of expression. His sonorous,
well-balanced rhythm puts me often in mind of Campbell (in spite of our
anonymous friend's implied sneer at "mere jingling of rhymes, brilliant
and successful for the moment,") and his rhetoric in general is of the
highest order:- By "rhetoric, I intend the mode generally in which
thought is presented. When shall we find more magnificent passages than
these?

      First queenly Asia, from the fallen thrones
        Of twice three thousand years
      Came with the woe a grieving Goddess owns
        Who longs for mortal tears.
      The dust of ruin to her mantle clung
        And dimmed her crown of gold,
      While the majestic sorrow of her tongue
        From Tyre to Indus rolled.

      Mourn with me, sisters, in my realm of woe
        Whose only glory streams
      From its lost childhood like the Arctic glow
        Which sunless winter dreams.
      In the red desert moulders Babylon
        And the wild serpent's hiss
      Echoes in Petra's palaces of stone
        And waste Persepolis.

      Then from her seat, amid the palms embowered
        That shade the Lion-land,
      Swart Africa in dusky aspect towered,
        The fetters on her hand.
      Backward she saw, from out the drear eclipse,
        The mighty Theban years,
      And the deep anguish of her mournful lips
        Interpreted, her tears.

I copy these passages first, because the critic in question has copied
them, without the slightest appreciation of their grandeur- for they are
grand; and secondly, to put the question of "rhetoric" at rest. No
artist who reads them will deny that they are the perfection of skill in
their way. But thirdly, I wish to call attention to the glowing
imagination evinced in the lines. My very soul revolts at such efforts,
(as the one I refer to,) to depreciate such poems as Mr. Taylor's. Is
there no honor- no chivalry left in the land? Are our most deserving
writers to be forever sneered down, or hooted down, or damned down with
faint praise, by a set of men who possess little other ability than that
which assures temporary success to them, in common with Swaim's Panaces
or Morrison's Pills? The fact is, some person should write, at once, a
Magazine paper exposing- ruthlessly exposing, the dessous de cartes of
our literary affairs. He should show how and why it is that ubiquitous
quack in letters can always "succeed," while genius, (which implies
self-respect with a scorn of creeping and crawling,) must inevitably
succumb. He should point out the "easy arts" by which any one, base
enough to do it, can get himself placed at the very head of American
Letters by an article in that magnanimous Journal, "The Review." He
should explain, too, how readily the same work can be induced (in the
case of Simms,) to vilify personally, any one not a Northerner, for a
trifling "consideration." In fact, our criticism needs a thorough
regeneration, and must have it.


Southern Literary Messenger, June, 1849

  I have sometimes amused myself by endeavoring to fancy what would be
the fate of any individual gifted, or rather accursed, with an intellect
very far superior to that of his race. Of course, he would be conscious
of his superiority; nor could he (if otherwise constituted as man is)
help manifesting his consciousness. Thus he would make himself enemies
at all points. And since his opinions and speculations would widely
differ from those of all mankind- that he would be considered a madman,
is evident. How horribly painful such a condition! Hell could invent no
greater torture than that of being charged with abnormal weakness on
account of being abnormally strong.

In like manner, nothing can be clearer than that a very generous spirit-
truly feeling what all merely profess- must inevitably find itself
misconceived in every direction- its motives misinterpreted. Just as
extremeness of intelligence would be thought fatuity, so excess of
chivalry could not fail of being looked upon as meanness in its last
degree- and so on with other virtues. This subject is a painful one
indeed. That individuals have so soared above the plane of their race,
is scarcely to be questioned; but, in looking back through history for
traces of their existence, we should pass over all biographies of "the
good and the great," while we search carefully the slight records of
wretches who died in prison, in Bedlam, or upon the gallows.



                        THE END