The Lake County times. [volume] (Hammond, Ind.) 1906-1933, 1909-05-27

ing wound after wound that at times
doubt seemed triumphant, that faith
was in the end victorious and that
Tepnyson was a Christian can be prov
ed to the last issue from his poetry.
Lived In an Age of Awakening.
Before taking up this evidence of
the struggle. 1t might not be amiss to
take glance at the age in which he
lived and worked. In the first place, it
was distincrively and pronounced an
age of science. Wonderful was the
progress made in the scientific world
between the years of 1909 and 1892
Countless are the inventions which
were made in this era. Scientific re-
search was carried out in every ap-
proachable field. Along with the other
sciences, geology grew and took on
new garments
out of the loins of historical geol-
ogy sprang the theory known as evolu-
ton, and associated closely with it,
that other, called materialism. These,
together with the Nebular Hypothesis,
seemed to fling themselves into the face
of the Bible in its account of the crea-
tion and its declarations as to the
destiny of man. We may add to this
the fact that at about the time Tenny-
son entered the university, the religious
spirit in England was at low-water
mark The Wesleyan spirit seemed to
be dead. The religion of England was
like the valley seen by Ezekiel, full of
bones and the bones dry, at that. At
such a time we should not be surprised
to behold man, though he were hon
est, noble and scholarly, swept from
o Of fa{
to pieces on an unknown rock. But
not so with Tennyson. A writer, and
especially a writer of poetry, is prone
to go beyond the common herd and
soar above and sway with the matter
of fact faith and traditions of his peo-
pie. A casual reading of Tennysons
poetry convinces one that he was thor
oughly conversant with the all absorb
ing themes of his age, Therefore. the
signal triumph of his faith cannot be
attributed to bigotry. born of ignorance
or narrowness.
NOn-Dramatic Poems Best Proof.
! In tracing this struggle of Tenny-
sons in his poetry. we shall for the
I most part neglect the dramatic poems,
not that there is anything there to dis
prove or combat the findings in the
non dramatic poems. for they are rich
in the very same material, but it is
unfair to point to what a dramatist
makes one of his characters say or do
as an evidence of what his own feel
ings are or on the quest on under con-
sideration. For instance. we should not
care TO make up Shakespeare's creed
of honor from the utterances of Iago
! or Shylock. What Browning makes
I Count Guido says in the Ring and the
book could not for one moment be
considered as the setting forth of his
own sentiments. 1t is no fairer to
take the simple. trustful, faithful lives
Of Phillip Enoch and Annie as indicative
of Tennysons private life though we
love the poet who could write Enoch
Arden. and have greater faith in hu-
manity after reading it. This life
struggle began early in his career In
the Confessions of a Sensitive Mind
! we have most certain evidences of in
ternaI strife"
Cites Poems and Extracts.
Professor Deaver then cited poems
and extracts, each in turn. to prove
the desperate grapple between doubt
and faith, the honesty and candor OF
his doubtings, his solution of theory
of the TRANSPORTATION of the soul, his
thoughts on materialism, and his fna'
victory over doubt as to the immortal
ity of the soul by citing extracts from
that great elegy. I'm Memoriam."