The morning star and Catholic messenger., 1875-09-19
BY'H. w. wILBERFoRcE.

mnsnTesson immediately on it's publication, not
nnIy among Catholics but among English
readers in general, which conld hardy oily nave
r otber writer of the day, with the exception
UsIhaps, of the Laureate. The explanation Is
~ he found in the initials j. ii. N. at the end
" " .ha nreface-a signature long ago of world
r. VIII mSra NAV he those who feel surprised to
find that q man chiefly known az having been,
nnSer mud Gods providence and grace, the main
antbor of the Oxford movement of 1888, should
4 he found to have possessed and exercised e4-
g traordinary poetical gifts. 1t may perhaps oe
II nartly lurking feeling of envy, partly just
perception how rarely any one man combines
numerous uncoDnected powers, wnlcn makes
= the world at large reluctant to ADMIT tnaI any
man has greatly distlngnlshe9 n',nse, is on ~ Rnt
: that feeling, be its origin what IL may, ooes
not in reason apply to the'caSe oeiete et u.s. 10
cause it would seem that the gus Will 1
specially qualify man to Proouce eeeP
eject upon the hearts and consciences OF MS
fellows, to be the founder and leader OF any
great school of thought, social moral polltical
1 or ralipious are very much the same as tnose
&reonired for the making of great poet.
The weighty and touching
thoughts of these poems bear the stamp of the
same mint from which issued those volumes of
sermons which, far more than any other work,
have impressed permanent stamp upon the
generation of English readers which is now
ward the decline of life" l. is impossible to
read them without feeling that, if his life had
been one of mere literary leisure, his chosen
employ ment would probably have been poetry.
As it is, he has evidently resorted to it, not
when he was thinking of others, but when he
sourht to relieve the fulness of his own soul.
In this world he has written IN prose his
poetry has been the record of his inner
struggles and emotions, and has been written
! for himself and bis God.
AS long as any memory of the English nation
and the English language remains among men,
Dr. Newman, doubt not, will be remem-
bered and reverenced ; not indeed as one of the
few whom poetry has made great but as one
of the great men who have written poetry.
And so far from deeming it strange that such
should be the case with the great author of the
movement of 1888, we, for our part, should
highest literary culture, the intense feelings in
which that movement orig ma ed had not
relieved themselves by poetical expression:
We believe, indeed, that few if any great moral
movements have taken place in which come
thing more OF less of the same kind has not
been found. Perhaps the most remarkable ex-
ception was the change of religion IN England
in the sixteenth century the leaders in which
not only prod ced no great poetical " orB, but
did not leave behind them SO much as by mn.
This was striking contrast not only to the
contem porary movement in Germany. and to
that of the Methodists in the eiCh "fnth GEN.
tury, but also to that of the earlier l. ,llhrds.
The explanation, howeDer; is not far to seek.
only person who had any important share in
the En- glish Reformation, who did not consider
it as a mere political job" Now. attractive as
qualified to inspire any political atii atus
Cranmer was too busy getting what he could
for himself, to be musing over Poetical images.
Besides the Reformation in England appealed
not so much to mems deeper feelings to
their natural and reasonable dislike to have
their property con6scated and themselves i'm
prisoned, hanged, and cut up alive; and this
last kind of appeal neither needed nor en-
couraged poetical powers.
To return to the volume before US, the
poems were evidently written only for the
fhnr ia q on r.
time that they have ever been published. The
greater part of them first appeared in a series
called the Lyrd Apostolica in many successiv We
numbers of the British Magazine, edited by the
late Hugh James Rose, in which several of DR..
Gewmsns earliest prose writings were origi-
nally published. 1t was afterward issued in
which appeared in 1886. By far the greater
part of it was supplied by DR.. Newman; the
other poems, by five of his intimate friends.
To these are added, in the present volume, a
few of earlier aud a good many of later date.
All of them seem equs ally to have been COM
posed without any view to publication, and
considering that their illustrious author has
always been remarkable for q dislike to pat
himself forward, and for an almost extreme
susceptibility of feeling, some persons may
wonder that he has ever been able to persuade
himself to give them to the world. We do not
share their wonder, for we long ago came to
the conclusion that it is by men of the greatest
natural reserve that the fullest condolences of
their inner feelings are not unfrequently made.
In the common Intercourse of society such men
display least of their real feeling. But being
distinguished from others by the depth and
strength of their thoughts and affections, more
lasting convictions and emotions, and greater
selfknowledge, they can, upon any call of
duty, speak out most unreservedly and SIN
cerely aud the pain it gives them to make
any revelation of their inner selves is such that,
to do it compile tely, costs them little If any
thing, more than to speak of themselves at all.
This, all the world sees, has been exemp!ified
in the ApologiG, aud in its measure it has been
the same with the Lyrd ApOstOlicd, and with
the present volume. The poems in the Lyrd
were, nearly all of them, the expression of the
SMnongets which crowded into the minds OF DR..
newman during tonr in the Mediterranean,
between December, lc}2, and July, 1888.
~ is impossible to read these poems without
ieellng how much a man takes with him from
nome OF the thou ghts which are called ont
even BY the most striking and memorable
' scene. ihe events going on in England-the
evident decay of what he still believed to be
the " reformed church Informed the coloring g
medium through which he looked at ell he saw.
mus, at sea, the day ne left Gibralter, he wrote
The lines headed "Englaud:"