Daily national Democrat., 1859-12-01
Comparative Purity of Modern Litera-
Especially POetical.

|
with the conseryators of the public morals
that there is so much impurity of sentiment
in the standard literary works Of modern
times 1t is contended that the vicious idens
contained in these works are sown broadcast
through society, and corrupt the very foun-
tains of public thought and feeling. Vice is
clothed, they say, in so fascinating a garb
that it wins the admiration of the uniformed
minds of youth, as well of one sex as the
other, and thus our young men and young
women grow up with the notion that 1t Is a
fine thing to be romantieally wrong aud
poetically criminal mere ordinary, un-
refined wrong.doer is despised, but gay,
dashing brilliant witty intellectual scoun-
drel is almost worshpped as n hero; while a
Young and beautiful female. dazzlingly sinful
and swaying with loveliness Utmost fend
like in its magic power the hearts Of men. is
the pattern of the closeted damsel who dreams
of a like glory. And go through the whole
grade Of characters limned out by the light
ming pen of genius in the novels and the
poems OF the present dny.
This is all true to a certain extent, but We
are 10y no means prepared to admit that the
current literature OF modern times-and We
speak now of the works of genius-is any
grosser than that of former periods. The
most lieentious poem that Lord Byron ever
wrote cannot compare in grossness ofalIu
sion and pruriency of idea to the "V Venus and
Adonis" of Shakespeare; and many of the
standard productions of the ago of Charles
Second, which then adorned the tables of the
| first families of the kingdom. are scarcely ad-
missable in any private English library OF
the present day.
As Macauley says, "of that generation,
from Dryden down to Durfey, the common
characteristic was hard hearted, shameless,
staggering licentiousness, at once inelegant
and inhuman" However gross the literature,
and especially the poetical literature of the
Elizabethan age, lcentious writing only
reached its pitch in the times of Charles Sec.
ond, for then it became strongly imbued with
the spirit Of the French authors,-the most
corrupt, at that time and now. upon the face
of the earih--and we think it may be safely
said that for gross and appalling licentious-
ness no writers of any celebrity in any sub
sequent period of English literary history
have ever equaled those same devilish and
ribald authors. 1t was bad enough before,
for if we even go back to the days of old Dan
Chaucer. when English poetry may be said
to have been in its rudimental state, we shall
find that the moral tone of much of it was
anything but exalted.
But the root of the evil was in far re-
moter period. The literature of ancient
Greece, and subsequently Of ancient Rome,
was far from moral. In fact, it was grossly,
we may even shy diabolically sensual True
there were moral writers who spoke well of
virtue, but the prevailing tone of the poets
was brilliantly lcentious. Sappho wrote
things which could scarcely be read at this
day in the most abandoned circles, and
Horace described, with an amazing pros,itu-
ton of power, scenes which it would be
penal offense, under the laws regarding OBJ
scene publications, for any man to translate
literally into English. When We speak of
the immortality of the writings of the ancients,
be it understood that we have reference only
to the erotic literature of the period, for it is
very well known that even the grossest wr |
ters in this respect paid high tributes to
patriotism, honesty and other manly virtues
Well, We may be asked, what does all this
amount to? 1t amounts to simply this, tIat
the taste of the present age for prurient and
licentious productions is no greater than that
which prevailed in the civilized portion of
the earth long ago. Indeed we are Of the
opinion that it is not as great 1t is there
fore idle to be mourning over the supposed
degeneracy Of the passing times, and lugu-
briously prOpheeying the moral destructi
of civilized society. There is always lcaven
OF virtue in every community nAd in every
age of the world there will lie the good and
the Tad The contest between good and evil
must be kept up us long as the world lasts
The literature of a country declares the mo a
character of the people. for supply and d.,
mand go together. lfthc reading public de.
sire an elevated species Of writing they will
get it; if the contrary, they will c certain
to get that. And so the thing goes. 1t is
somewhat pleasing. in this connection, to
know that the higher order of poetica as
well as other writing in the United States is
of an eminently moral tone Our leading
literary geniuses are Bryant and Longfellpw
and Irving and Emerson and many others
whom we might name, whose pens have
written but few words which, on the score of
an evil tendency, they could wish dying to
blot out.