The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1897-11-14
NOBLE POETRY.

A small pamphlet has been issued by the
New Unity Publishing Company, of Chi
cago. bearing the title "Ten Noble Poems"
number of well-known men and women
of literary ability were asked by Mr.. Jenkin
Lloyd Jones to prepare a list of the ten
noblest poems in English literature, meas
ured by the test of poetic form, ethical in
sight and spiritual Imagination. About sixty
replies were sent, and those receiving the
greatest number of votes were as follows:
'Intimations of Immortality" Saul"
"Elegy in Country Churchyard," rabbi
Ben Ezra" lode to a Skylark." Harvard
Commemoration Ode" rhine of the Ancient
Mariner ''Thanatopsis,' 1.-The Eternal
Goodness" Lines on Tintern Abbey"
That three of these are by American
writers is cause for congratulation, yet we
cannot help wondering how this vote would
be received by our English cousins when re-
Numbering that the London Athenaeum said
the poverty Of American verse and the in
adequacy of American judgment were evil
denced in regarding Lowell as a great poet.
That verdict, however will not deter Amer
lean scholars from placing LowelPS ode
beside the lauded one of Tennyson. The
majority of people in tests of this kind give
what Matthew Arnold calls the personal
estimate" A poem counts to them as best
which most appeals to their personal affini-
ties and likings. 1t is difficult not to at
tach undue Importance to that which affects
US personally. 1t is difficult to keep in mind
poetic form, ethical insight and spiritual
imagination if poem makes a direct and
personal appeal. But 1t is the universally
of the theme which makes a poem truly
great. 1t is interesting to observe that
Wordsworth's famous ode heads the list of
Ten Noble POEMS" and the question i'm
mediately arises why? Is it not because
Immortality is the theme? The indestruct-
Utility of the soul is the vital note, either
implied or directly stated in all great poetry
Not one of the above ten but contains it in
some degree. In ''Tintern Abbey is felt
"A presence that disturbs me with the joy
OF elevated thoughts; sense sublime
OF something far more deeply interfused."
In rabbi Ben Ezra" Earth changes, but
thy soul and God stand sure" And SAUL"
"By the pain throb triumphantly winning
intensified bliss,
And the next world reward ana repose Dy
the struggles In TINS.
Shelley says to the Skylark:
waking asleep
Thou of death must deem
Things more true and deep
Than we mortals dream,
Or how could thy notes flow in such
crystal stream?
Left the warm precincts of the cheerful
day,
But cast one lingering, longing look behind
yet his merits and his frailties repose in
trembling hope within 1.-The bosom of his
Father and his God.
In Lowelrs ''Commemoration Ode" the
soldiers whom the dumb turf wraps come
TRANSPORTED back:
Beautiful evermore, and with the rays
eXDec-
tation.'
Thanatopsis would leave dreary impress
sion were the soul not cheered at the close
by the .unfaltering trust" And Whittier,
in the rnaddening maze of things, clings to
the Eternal Goodness, to the belief that we
cannot drift beyond His love and care" The
Ancient Mariner prays to be shriven the
minute he sets foot on shore. His last
word is praise to Him who made and
loveth all" 1t is this note of Immortality
which touches all mankind most deeply
the idea of the continuance of life after
death, not Nirvana, not the absorption of
the Individual, but the continuance of the
self, the l. the personal immortality. The
man who teaches as Wordsworth did that
despite clouds with their sober coloring,
1.-The innocent brightness of a newborn day
is lovely YETI" the man who shows us how
to find. despite sad experience and dark dis
closures, strength in what remains behind.
and hope in what lies before, deserves the
high place posterity awards him. Our debt
of gratitude is large to him who sings of
something above and beyond the pain of
unSatisfied earthly desire, who lifts the veil
between the seen and the unseen, who shows
US how much higher is instinct than rea-
son. who makes US TO know that the .ob-
stinate questionings of sense and outward
things are but the blank misgivings of a
creature moving about in worlds not real
lied" and that it does not matter how far
inland we be If our souls still have sight
OF that Immortal sea which brought US
hither" MAY w. DOMAIN.
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