The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1894-09-02
THE BIRTHDAY OF HOLMES.

Last Wednesday Oliver Wendell Holmes
completed his s5th year. 1t is pleasant 10
learn that the venerable poets intellect
and spirit show no more signs of being
quenched than when he was A..
This is what might be expected of so
rare, fine and genuine humorist as DR..
Holmes, who today speaks sdmiringly OF
James Whitcomb Riley as a man of super
Tor poetic quality. DIR. Holmes. to our
taste, is the most delightful of all our
American poets, because he Is the most
versatile, the sanest, and freest from
literary affectations He is a very vigor-
Gus, meIodious and. as we have said.
versatile singer. There is plenty Of breeze.
rush and beat to his verse. In verve and
spontaneity OF song Holmes Is our best
singer He is genuine humorist. singer
and keen satiriss. not reformer with the
didactic pulpit note in his song that mars
much that Whittier and Lowell have
written.
Lowell's Yankee dialect poetry and his
war poems will outlast all the rest of his
work. Holmes gave US Dorothy O."
"The Last Leaf" Under the Violets,"
''The Voiceiess," 1.-THE Chambered Nauti-
Ius," and "Brother Jonathan to Sister
Caroline" and "The Steamboat" He
gave us a deal Of noble verse beside, and
he Is our truest American poet, unless We
except Emerson.
Some two weeks ago the centennial of
the birthday of William Cullen Bryant
Al fsr Tod IN Ill -
Cummington, Mass. Among the letters
read was one from DR.. Holmes. who, while
paying high tribute to Bryant's power,
did not make the blunder so often COM
mitted Of naming Bryant as pre-eminently
"the poet of Nature" Bryant's fame rests
on ''Thanatopsis. written in 1911 before
the poet had completed his 18th year.
1t is probably the greatest poem in liter
allure that was ever produced by so young
a man. As an example OF precority of in
tellect IL Is marvellous poem, but
Bryant never fulfilled this promise of his
youth. There is nothing in his subse-
quent work that conn ares with ''Thana-
topsis," The orator of this centennial
claimed for Bryant absolute fidelity to
nature" and cortrasted him with Keats
10 the depreciation Of that great genius.
Bryant does not deserve this praise. Let
any man who ever saw the fringed
gentian read Bryant's apostrophe to this
lovely flower and ask himself whether the
poet wrote OF il with absolute fidelity to
nature"
The truth Is that Bryant was man of
very great poetic talent. while Keats was
a man Of very splendid poetic genius.
Keats knew nature as poet and loved IL
with poetic passion, while Bryant viewed
nature with the cold eye OF a eontemplative
philosopher; he had fed on Wordsworth
and he wrote of nature rather as IL looked
to Wordsworth than as IL looked
TO Keats. Keats was Greek in his pas
sionate worship of the beauty Of nature;
be was no Puritan philosopher. metaphy-
stefan or psychologist: he was very great
poet. while Bryant certainly was not
great poet. bat rather Puritan Of great
poetic talent. which, however. fell entirely
short Of genius in the sense that Byron,
Keats or Shelley stand for its immortal
IRE. SO FAR from Bryant deserving his
fame as "a poet of absolute fidelity to na-
sure" he is entirely inferior in this respect
20 Emerson. 20 Lowell and to Whittier.
DIR. Holmes KNOWS this and be did not
make the critical mistake of the orators at
the Bryant centennial and praise the dead
poet without Just discrimination.
The truth Is that Bryant. outside Of his
'Thsnatopsis. /" has today n small circle Of
readers compared with Holmes, Whittier
and Lowell. and for the reason that he is
not pre-eninsntly tie poet Of either out
ward OF inward nature. lie never touches
the heart or deeply searches the soul COM
pared with the great American poets We
have named. for be had very cold nature
an intensely Puritan spirit; he was vigor-
Gus po.emie. q very sole political writer
and an ardent patriot; 3 great and useful
citizen, eut he certainly Vas rot great
poet The number Of his readers Is de-
ersasiug; he wilg be read always for his
'*ThaHatopsis," ths poem in which bis
talent bore iss first and By Tar its finest
AMI MODEST fruit
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The railway Just completed across the
Tehua0tepee isiamgs all shorten the sea
route hetxe cen the last and ths Wess ~