The Bourbon news. [volume] (Paris, Ky.) 1895-19??, 1902-02-07
Our Poetica1
Legacy
BY
PROF. EDWARD DOWDEN, MA, LID.
Dean Of St. Patrick's College, Dublin.
Dean of St. Patrick's College. Dublin.

visible and angbe-ese unshaped poetry bequeahed to
chosen nherOrs of the which hundred years
ago. WHAT THEY RECEIVED AS A MIST WAS TRANS
FORMED INTO A STREAM, AND THE STREAM BROAD
ENED TO SWIFT AND ABOUNDING RIVER
The term Romantic Revival" somewhat misleading at
best indicates only part There had been in the
eighteenth century naurasc movement of which Fielding in
prose- earlier date and Crabbe later date may
stand representatives Wordsworth also naturalist he
studied the appearance Of the external world and the lives of his
IN the spirit OF veracous esearch but the naturalist was at
the same time ideaist he recognized what spiritual part
and the most vital part, of the fact For him the invisible flowed
through the visible hence may sometimes
ne the least ace of poets and he who interpreted most
profoundly the revolutionary principle of equality for the gross
erna distinctions of high of great small disappear
when what humble dmnutve inlet for
spiritual light What he attained without effort he held in calm
and indefeasible possession His poetry in the
propheyng but the prophet does end his garments his mood
of serenity, enclosing JOY the quicken
ing power of passion without its trouble its victude.
The romantic revival might have lost itself in extravaganza
angushed the debility hectic disease had entered
alliance with the historical spirit and gained vgor and sanity from
that alliance In Chde Harold the awakened interest in the life
of the inspiring influence "Rodeck the of the
Goths chapter of Spanish history lifted from prose narrative
of grave dignity Scott Others who effected
the union of the romantic and the historical imagination
suSctaton of the past wholly theory from
the pald mist of sentiment from cuoties aesthetics
pseudomedieval regosy; HIS SYMPATHY WAS WITH AC-
lion, AND The PASSIONS WHICH ENGENDER ACTION;
he lived strenuOuSy in the present therefore
reality and a dream.
The eighteenth century had only gaze
its great historical school, of which Gbbon master and
its OanC Scandinavian and ballad forgotten
ages and primitive Civilizations and gazed
with wdeyed hopes into the future But bright the
French Revolution had been followed by the Terror
and equality realized in the military depotism
and fraternity in that of the deadly strife of nations
The boundesS DESIRES the aspirations excited by the
uonary lived the spirit Of Byron; around
him world of ruins ruined faiths ruined hopes England
the gathering forces of reaction Byron sang generously free
DOM but for him freedom little than casting
of restraint by nations and by the individual thought hardly
all of the freedom in obedience higher law energy
commanding egoiSm dpoyed amid fallen ideals
tied creed and the cyncm redeemed
the bitterness of its gayety cynsm for which the was partly
responsible and partly the When Byron sense that
great power lost the world upon contemporaries ali
the imPesSvey because the single
mind single WILL and did live inspiring influence
imperSonal wisdom and of love.