I confess that I felt somewhat nettled at this rudeness, which,
however, I pardoned on account of his having flourished in a less
polished age. I determined, nevertheless, not to give up my
point.
"Yes," resumed I positively, "a poet; for of all writers he has
the best chance for immortality. Others may write from the head,
but he writes from the heart, and the heart will always
understand him. He is the faithful portrayer of Nature, whose
features are always the same and always interesting. Prose
writers are voluminous and unwieldy; their pages crowded with
commonplaces, and their thoughts expanded into tediousness. But
with the true poet every thing is terse, touching, or brilliant.
He gives the choicest thoughts in the choicest language. He
illustrates them by everything that he sees most striking in
nature and art. He enriches them by pictures of human life, such
as it is passing before him. His writings, therefore, contain the
spirit, the aroma, if I may use the phrase, of the age in which
he lives. They are caskets which inclose within a small compass
the wealth of the language--its family jewels, which are thus
transmitted in a portable form to posterity. The setting may
occasionally be antiquated, and require now and then to be
renewed, as in the case of Chaucer; but the brilliancy and
intrinsic value of the gems continue unaltered.
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