Custer weekly chronicle. [volume] (Custer City, S.D.) 1890-1931, 1901-08-24
rRIaas AM Hrs M
Longfeliow and Holmes Latest Victims o
Chicago Iconoclast.


Chicago Tribune: Oscar r.. Triggs,
he University of Chicago professor,
who compares Rockefeller with Shakes
peare and characterizes church hymns
as doggerel, has now astonished his
class In English literature by the dec
laration that the poetry of Longfellow is
trivial and unworthy Of consideration.
Before the students had time to re-
cover from the shock, Professor Triggs
brought his iconoclastic hammer to
bear on Oliver Wendell Holmes. whom
he dismissed as irreverent and devoid
or convictions. The criticism on
Holmes was delivered yesterday; that
on Longfellow In the previous lecture
On Wednesday.
Today he professor will pay his re-
spects to Whittier, and the young peo-
pie of his classes are beginning to won
der IL they will have any poets left
when the process OF demolition is COM
pleted.s Having lost the hymn book.
"Evarfs- line and the 'One Hoss
Shay" they are now forced to fall back
on Walt Whitman, James Whitcomb
Riley, and the author OF beautiful
Snow"
"Longfeuow had no thought to COM
municate to the world said Professor
Triggs. He was merely a maker OF
verse. Yet he wrote just such poetry
as he was expected to write In his time.
The reading public was just then at the
stage OF maturity to appreciate such
tur as The Psalm OF Life Hymn to
the Night n other favorites which
are known to every school boy, but
which educated people must admit are
mere Jingle, unworthy the consideration
OF any man.
III was only by such verses, however,
that Longfellow could reach his audi
ence. Ills poems We're the outgrowth
OF the old New England Primer and
the Bay State Song Book, which latter
is mere doggerel. Because OF this en-
vironment OF P~uritanism Longfellow
could not be a great poet. Puritanism
Is inimical to art. Puritanism would
close art galleries on Sunday and let
the people go elsewhere. but has been
compelled to compromise by allowing
the galleries to be open half a day.
Ethics cannot produce poetry be-
cause ethics is barren; II bears no
fruits; 1t Is a system which destroys
itself. All Puritan writer's have been
disabled by their environment. The
ethical view is apt to be a view that
distorts, hence Longfellow had a dis
torted, fanciful, narrow view OF slavery.
"Longfellow's writings are excxel-
lent for children, and boys and girls
may be excused for admiring The
Psalm of Life Excelsior and similar
drlVel. But the adult mind must seek
new and higher fields OF thought.
"Longfellow was not truly an Ameri-
ear writer. He was too cultured, too
refined, to be truly American. He could
not feel the great heart OF the west or
south as Whitman does"
Professor Triggs yesterday turned
his attention to Holmes, whom he de-
scribed pleasantly as a modern Vol
taire.
DIR. Holmes" he said, was the re-
suit OF the Unitarian reaction in New
England, and his life was embittered
by Calvinism. He had no profound
convictions to impart and he was ir-
reVerent In all he wrote.
He treated the Greek gods with
~hippancy and IL occasion had required
would have been equally %lrreverent to
the gods OF the Protestant P~arthenon."