Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books Part 21

APPENDIX TO LYRICAL BALLADS

(1802)

Perhaps, as I have no right to expect that attentive perusal, without which, confined, as I have been, to the narrow limits of a preface, my meaning cannot be thoroughly understood, I am anxious to give an exact notion of the sense in which the phrase poetic diction has been used; and for this purpose, a few words shall here be added, concerning the origin and characteristics of the phraseology, which I have condemned under that name.

The earliest poets of all nations generally wrote from pa.s.sion excited by real events; they wrote naturally, and as men: feeling powerfully as they did, their language was daring, and figurative. In succeeding times, Poets, and Men ambitious of the fame of Poets, perceiving the influence of such language, and desirous of producing the same effect without being animated by the same pa.s.sion, set themselves to a mechanical adoption of these figures of speech, and made use of them, sometimes with propriety, but much more frequently applied them to feelings and thoughts with which they had no natural connexion whatsoever. A language was thus insensibly produced, differing materially from the real language of men in _any situation_. The Reader or Hearer of this distorted language found himself in a perturbed and unusual state of mind: when affected by the genuine language of pa.s.sion he had been in a perturbed and unusual state of mind also: in both cases he was willing that his common judgement and understanding should be laid asleep, and he had no instinctive and infallible perception of the true to make him reject the false; the one served as a pa.s.sport for the other. The emotion was in both cases delightful, and no wonder if he confounded the one with the other, and believed them both to be produced by the same, or similar causes.

Besides, the Poet spake to him in the character of a man to be looked up to, a man of genius and authority. Thus, and from a variety of other causes, this distorted language was received with admiration; and Poets, it is probable, who had before contented themselves for the most part with misapplying only expressions which at first had been dictated by real pa.s.sion, carried the abuse still further, and introduced phrases composed apparently in the spirit of the original figurative language of pa.s.sion, yet altogether of their own invention, and characterized by various degrees of wanton deviation from good sense and nature.

It is indeed true, that the language of the earliest Poets was felt to differ materially from ordinary language, because it was the language of extraordinary occasions; but it was really spoken by men, language which the Poet himself had uttered when he had been affected by the events which he described, or which he had heard uttered by those around him. To this language it is probable that metre of some sort or other was early superadded. This separated the genuine language of Poetry still further from common life, so that whoever read or heard the poems of these earliest Poets felt himself moved in a way in which he had not been accustomed to be moved in real life, and by causes manifestly different from those which acted upon him in real life.

This was the great temptation to all the corruptions which have followed: under the protection of this feeling succeeding Poets constructed a phraseology which had one thing, it is true, in common with the genuine language of poetry, namely, that it was not heard in ordinary conversation; that it was unusual. But the first Poets, as I have said, spake a language which, though unusual, was still the language of men. This circ.u.mstance, however, was disregarded by their successors; they found that they could please by easier means: they became proud of modes of expression which they themselves had invented, and which were uttered only by themselves. In process of time metre became a symbol or promise of this unusual language, and whoever took upon him to write in metre, according as he possessed more or less of true poetic genius, introduced less or more of this adulterated phraseology into his compositions, and the true and the false were inseparately interwoven until, the taste of men becoming gradually perverted, this language was received as a natural language: and at length, by the influence of books upon men, did to a certain degree really become so. Abuses of this kind were imported from one nation to another, and with the progress of refinement this diction became daily more and more corrupt, thrusting out of sight the plain humanities of nature by a motley masquerade of tricks, quaintnesses, hieroglyphics, and enigmas.

It would not be uninteresting to point out the causes of the pleasure given by this extravagant and absurd diction. It depends upon a great variety of causes, but upon none, perhaps, more than its influence in impressing a notion of the peculiarity and exaltation of the Poet's character, and in flattering the Reader's self-love by bringing him nearer to a sympathy with that character; an effect which is accomplished by unsettling ordinary habits of thinking, and thus a.s.sisting the Reader to approach to that perturbed and dizzy state of mind in which if he does not find himself, he imagines that he is _balked_ of a peculiar enjoyment which poetry can and ought to bestow.

The sonnet quoted from Gray, in the Preface, except the lines printed in italics, consists of little else but this diction, though not of the worst kind; and indeed, if one may be permitted to say so, it is far too common in the best writers both ancient and modern. Perhaps in no way, by positive example could more easily be given a notion of what I mean by the phrase _poetic diction_ than by referring to a comparison between the metrical paraphrase which we have of pa.s.sages in the Old and New Testament, and those pa.s.sages as they exist in our common Translation. See Pope's _Messiah_ throughout; Prior's 'Did sweeter sounds adorn my flowing tongue,' &c. &c. 'Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels,' &c. &c, 1st Corinthians, ch. xiii.

By way of immediate example take the following of Dr. Johnson:

Turn on the prudent Ant thy heedless eyes, Observe her labours, Sluggard, and be wise; No stern command, no monitory voice, Prescribes her duties, or directs her choice; Yet, timely provident, she hastes away To s.n.a.t.c.h the blessings of a plenteous day; When fruitful Summer loads the teeming plain, She crops the harvest, and she stores the grain.

How long shall sloth usurp thy useless hours, Unnerve thy vigour, and enchain thy powers?

While artful shades thy downy couch enclose, And soft solicitation courts repose, Amidst the drowsy charms of dull delight, Year chases year with unremitted flight, Till Want now following, fraudulent and slow, Shall spring to seize thee, like an ambush'd foe.

From this hubbub of words pa.s.s to the original 'Go to the Ant, thou Sluggard, consider her ways, and be wise: which having no guide, overseer, or ruler, provideth her meat in the summer, and gathereth her food in the harvest. How long wilt thou sleep, O Sluggard?

when wilt thou arise out of thy sleep? Yet a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep. So shall thy poverty come as one that travelleth, and thy want as an armed man' Proverbs, ch. vi.

One more quotation, and I have done. It is from Cowper's Verses supposed to be written by Alexander Selkirk:

Religion! what treasure untold Resides in that heavenly word!

More precious than silver and gold, Or all that this earth can afford But the sound of the church-going bell These valleys and rocks never heard, Ne'er sighed at the sound of a knell, Or smiled when a sabbath appeared Ye winds, that have made me your sport Convey to this desolate sh.o.r.e Some cordial endearing report Of a land I must visit no more My friends, do they now and then send A wish or a thought after me?

O tell me I yet have a friend, Though a friend I am never to see

This pa.s.sage is quoted as an instance of three different styles of composition. The first four lines are poorly expressed, some Critics would call the language prosaic; the fact is, it would be bad prose, so bad, that it is scarcely worse in metre. The epithet 'church-going'

applied to a bell, and that by so chaste a writer as Cowper, is an instance of the strange abuses which Poets have introduced into their language, till they and their Readers take them as matters of course, if they do not single them out expressly as objects of admiration.

The two lines 'Ne'er sighed at the sound,' &c., are, in my opinion, an instance of the language of pa.s.sion wrested from its proper use, and, from the mere circ.u.mstance of the composition being in metre, applied upon an occasion that does not justify such violent expressions; and I should condemn the pa.s.sage, though perhaps few Readers will agree with me, as vicious poetic diction. The last stanza is throughout admirably expressed: it would be equally good whether in prose or verse, except that the Reader has an exquisite pleasure in seeing such natural language so naturally connected with metre. The beauty of this stanza tempts me to conclude with a principle which ought never to be lost sight of, and which has been my chief guide in all I have said,--namely, that in works of _imagination and sentiment_, for of these only have I been treating, in proportion as ideas and feelings are valuable, whether the composition be in prose or in verse, they require and exact one and the same language. Metre is but advent.i.tious to composition, and the phraseology for which that pa.s.sport is necessary, even where it may be graceful at all will be little valued by the judicious.

PREFACE TO POEMS

(1815)

The powers requisite for the production of poetry are: first, those of Observation and Description,--i.e. the ability to observe with accuracy things as they are in themselves, and with fidelity to describe them, unmodified by any pa.s.sion or feeling existing in the mind of the describer; whether the things depicted be actually present to the senses, or have a place only in the memory. This power, though indispensable to a Poet, is one which he employs only in submission to necessity, and never for a continuance of time: as its exercise supposes all the higher qualities of the mind to be pa.s.sive, and in a state of subjection to external objects, much in the same way as a translator or engraver ought to be to his original. 2ndly, Sensibility,--which, the more exquisite it is, the wider will be the range of a poet's perceptions; and the more will he be incited to observe objects, both as they exist in themselves and as re-acted upon by his own mind. (The distinction between poetic and human sensibility has been marked in the character of the Poet delineated in the original preface.) 3rdly, Reflection,--which makes the Poet acquainted with the value of actions, images, thoughts, and feelings; and a.s.sists the sensibility in perceiving their connexion with each other. 4thly, Imagination and Fancy,--to modify, to create, and to a.s.sociate. 5thly, Invention,--by which characters are composed out of materials supplied by observation; whether of the Poet's own heart and mind, or of external life and nature; and such incidents and situations produced as are most impressive to the imagination, and most fitted to do justice to the characters, sentiments, and pa.s.sions, which the Poet undertakes to ill.u.s.trate. And, lastly, Judgement, to decide how and where, and in what degree, each of these faculties ought to be exerted; so that the less shall not be sacrificed to the greater; nor the greater, slighting the less, arrogate, to its own injury, more than its due. By judgement, also, is determined what are the laws and appropriate graces of every species of composition.[3]

The materials of Poetry, by these powers collected and produced, are cast, by means of various moulds, into divers forms. The moulds may be enumerated, and the forms specified, in the following order. 1st, The Narrative,--including the Epopoeia, the Historic Poem, the Tale, the Romance, the Mock-heroic, and, if the spirit of Homer will tolerate such neighbourhood, that dear production of our days, the metrical Novel. Of this Cla.s.s, the distinguishing mark is, that the Narrator, however liberally his speaking agents be introduced, is himself the source from which everything primarily flows. Epic Poets, in order that their mode of composition may accord with the elevation of their subject, represent themselves as _singing_ from the inspiration of the Muse, 'Anna virumque _cano_;' but this is a fiction, in modern times, of slight value: the _Iliad_ or the _Paradise Lost_ would gain little in our estimation by being chanted. The other poets who belong to this cla.s.s are commonly content to _tell_ their tale;--so that of the whole it may be affirmed that they neither require nor reject the accompaniment of music.

2ndly, The Dramatic,--consisting of Tragedy, Historic Drama, Comedy, and Masque, in which the Poet does not appear at all in his own person, and where the whole action is carried on by speech and dialogue of the agents; music being admitted only incidentally and rarely. The Opera may be placed here, inasmuch as it proceeds by dialogue; though depending, to the degree that it does, upon music, it has a strong claim to be ranked with the lyrical. The characteristic and Impa.s.sioned Epistle, of which Ovid and Pope have given examples, considered as a species of monodrama, may, without impropriety, be placed in this cla.s.s.

3rdly, The Lyrical,--containing the Hymn, the Ode, the Elegy, the Song, and the Ballad; in all which, for the production of their _full_ effect, an accompaniment of music is indispensable.

4thly, The Idyllium,--descriptive chiefly either of the processes and appearances of external nature, as the _Seasons_ of Thomson; or of characters, manners, and sentiments, as are Shenstone's _Schoolmistress, The Cotter's Sat.u.r.day Night_ of Burns, _The Twa Dogs_ of the same Author; or of these in conjunction with the appearances of Nature, as most of the pieces of Theocritus, the _Allegro_ and _Penseroso_ of Milton, Beattie's _Minstrel_, Goldsmith's _Deserted Village_. The Epitaph, the Inscription, the Sonnet, most of the epistles of poets writing in their own persons, and all loco-descriptive poetry, belonging to this cla.s.s.

5thly, Didactic,--the princ.i.p.al object of which is direct instruction; as the Poem of Lucretius, the _Georgics_ of Virgil, _The Fleece_ of Dyer, Mason's _English Garden_, &c.

And, lastly, philosophical Satire, like that of Horace and Juvenal; personal and occasional Satire rarely comprehending sufficient of the general in the individual to be dignified with the name of poetry.

Out of the three last has been constructed a composite order, of which Young's _Night Thoughts_, and Cowper's _Task_, are excellent examples.

It is deducible from the above, that poems apparently miscellaneous, may with propriety be arranged either with reference to the powers of mind _predominant_ in the production of them; or to the mould in which they are cast; or, lastly, to the subjects to which they relate. From each of these considerations, the following Poems have been divided into cla.s.ses; which, that the work may more obviously correspond with the course of human life, and for the sake of exhibiting in it the three requisites of a legitimate whole, a beginning, a middle, and an end, have been also arranged, as far as it was possible, according to an order of time, commencing with Childhood, and terminating with Old Age, Death, and Immortality. My guiding wish was, that the small pieces of which these volumes consist, thus discriminated, might be regarded under a two-fold view; as composing an entire work within themselves, and as adjuncts to the philosophical Poem, _The Recluse_.

This arrangement has long presented itself habitually to my own mind.

Nevertheless, I should have preferred to scatter the contents of these volumes at random, if I had been persuaded that, by the plan adopted, anything material would be taken from the natural effect of the pieces, individually, on the mind of the unreflecting Reader. I trust there is a sufficient variety in each cla.s.s to prevent this; while, for him who reads with reflection, the arrangement will serve as a commentary unostentatiously directing his attention to my purposes, both particular and general. But, as I wish to guard against the possibility of misleading by this cla.s.sification, it is proper first to remind the Reader, that certain poems are placed according to the powers of mind, in the Author's conception, predominant in the production of them; _predominant_, which implies the exertion of other faculties in less degree. Where there is more imagination than fancy in a poem, it is placed under the head of imagination, and _vice versa_. Both the above cla.s.ses might without impropriety have been enlarged from that consisting of 'Poems founded on the Affections;'

as might this latter from those, and from the cla.s.s 'proceeding from Sentiment and Reflection.' The most striking characteristics of each piece, mutual ill.u.s.tration, variety, and proportion, have governed me throughout.

None of the other Cla.s.ses, except those of Fancy and Imagination, require any particular notice. But a remark of general application may be made. All Poets, except the dramatic, have been in the practice of feigning that their works were composed to the music of the harp or lyre: with what degree of affectation this has done in modern times, I leave to the judicious to determine. For my own part, I have not been disposed to violate probability so far, or to make such a large demand upon the Reader's charity. Some of these pieces are essentially lyrical; and, therefore, cannot have their due force without a supposed musical accompaniment; but, in much the greatest part, as a subst.i.tute for the cla.s.sic lyre or romantic harp, I require nothing more than an animated or impa.s.sioned recitation, adapted to the subject. Poems, however humble in their kind, if they be good in that kind, cannot read themselves; the law of long syllable and short must not be so inflexible,--the letter of metre must not be so impa.s.sive to the spirit of versification,--as to deprive the Reader of all voluntary power to modulate, in subordination to the sense, the music of the poem;--in the same manner as his mind is left at liberty, and even summoned, to act upon its thoughts and images. But, though the accompaniment of a musical instrument be frequently dispensed with, the true Poet does not therefore abandon his privilege distinct from that of the mere Proseman;

He murmurs near the running brooks A music sweeter than their own.

Let us come now to the consideration of the words Fancy and Imagination, as employed in the cla.s.sification of the following Poems.

'A man,' says an intelligent author, 'has imagination in proportion as he can distinctly copy in idea the impressions of sense: it is the faculty which _images_ within the mind the phenomena of sensation. A man has fancy in proportion as he can call up, connect, or a.s.sociate, at pleasure, those internal images ([Greek: phantazein] is to cause to appear) so as to complete ideal representations of absent objects.

Imagination is the power of depicting, and fancy of evoking and combining. The imagination is formed by patient observation; the fancy by a voluntary activity in shifting the scenery of the mind. The more accurate the imagination, the more safely may a painter, or a poet, undertake a delineation, or a description, without the presence of the objects to be characterized. The more versatile the fancy, the more original and striking will be the decorations produced.'--_British Synonyms discriminated, by W. Taylor_.

Is not this as if a man should undertake to supply an account of a building, and be so intent upon what he had discovered of the foundation, as to conclude his task without once looking up at the superstructure? Here, as in other instances throughout the volume, the judicious Author's mind is enthralled by Etymology; he takes up the original word as his guide and escort, and too often does not perceive how soon he becomes its prisoner, without liberty to tread in any path but that to which it confines him. It is not easy to find out how imagination, thus explained, differs from distinct remembrance of images; or fancy from quick and vivid recollection of them: each is nothing more than a mode of memory. If the two words bear the above meaning, and no other, what term is left to designate that faculty of which the Poet is 'all compact;' he whose eyes glances from earth to heaven, whose spiritual attributes body forth what his pen is prompt in turning to shape; or what is left to characterize Fancy, as insinuating herself into the heart of objects with creative activity?--Imagination, in the sense of the word as giving t.i.tle to a cla.s.s of the following Poems, has no reference to images that are merely a faithful copy, existing in the mind, of absent external objects; but is a word of higher import, denoting operations of the mind upon those objects, and processes of creation or of composition, governed by certain fixed laws. I proceed to ill.u.s.trate my meaning by instances. A parrot _hangs_ from the wires of his cage by his beak or by his claws; or a monkey from the bough of a tree by his paws or his tail. Each creature does so literally and actually. In the first Eclogue of Virgil, the shepherd, thinking of the time when he is to take leave of his farm, thus addresses his goats:--

Non ego vos posthac viridi projectus in antro Dumosa _pendere_ procul de rupe videbo.

----half way down _Hangs_ one who gathers samphire,

is the well-known expression of Shakespeare, delineating an ordinary image upon the cliffs of Dover. In these two instances is a slight exertion of the faculty which I denominate imagination, in the use of one word: neither the goats nor the samphire-gatherer do literally hang, as does the parrot or the monkey; but, presenting to the senses something of such an appearance, the mind in its activity, for its own gratification, contemplates them as hanging.

As when far off at sea a fleet descried _Hangs_ in the clouds, by equinoctial winds Close sailing from Bengala, or the isles Of Ternate or Tidore, whence merchants bring Their spicy drugs; they on the trading flood Through the wide Ethiopian to the Cape Ply, stemming nightly toward the Pole; so seemed Far off the flying Fiend.

Here is the full strength of the imagination involved in the word _hangs_, and exerted upon the whole image: First, the fleet, an aggregate of many ships, is represented as one mighty person, whose track, we know and feel, is upon the waters; but, taking advantage of its appearance to the senses, the Poet dares to represent it as _hanging in the clouds_, both for the gratification of the mind in contemplating the image itself, and in reference to the motion and appearance of the sublime objects to which it is compared.

From impressions of sight we will pa.s.s to those of sound; which, as they must necessarily be of a less definite character, shall be selected from these volumes:

Over his own sweet voice the Stock-dove _broods_;

of the same bird,

His voice was _buried_ among trees, Yet to be come at by the breeze;

O, Cuckoo I shall I call thee _Bird_, Or but a wandering _Voice_?

The stock-dove is said to _coo_, a sound well imitating the note of the bird; but, by the intervention of the metaphor _broods_, the affections are called in by the imagination to a.s.sist in marking the manner in which the bird reiterates and prolongs her soft note, as if herself delighting to listen to it, and partic.i.p.ating of a still and quiet satisfaction, like that which may be supposed inseparable from the continuous process of incubation. 'His voice was buried among trees,' a metaphor expressing the love of _seclusion_ by which this Bird is marked; and characterizing its note as not partaking of the shrill and the piercing, and therefore more easily deadened by the intervening shade; yet a note so peculiar and withal so pleasing, that the breeze, gifted with that love of the sound which the Poet feels, penetrates the shades in which it is entombed, and conveys it to the ear of the listener.

Shall I call thee Bird, Or but a wandering _Voice_?