The sun., 1909-02-21
POETS, Not PHILOSOPHERS,
The Glory OF English Literature dc
cIares an English Lecturer.

ciares an English Lecturer.
LONDON. Feb. lO.--Dr. A. C. Bradley,
formerly professor OF poetry at Oxford,
gave an interesting lecture at Manchester
University last night, dealing with the
Wordsworth age OF poetry and its rela-
ton to philosophy.
Starting with reference TO the pres
ent year as one Of ccntenaries, DR.. Bradley
said that its immediate successors would
be 20 also. Darwin. Tennyson, Gladstone
and Lincoln were quickly followed by
Dickens. Thackersy, Browning, Bismarck
Schumann and Wagner. Something IKE
this conglomeration of new stars had
been seen before. In l769 we're born
Napoleon and Wellington. in the next
year Wordsworth, Hegel and Beethoven
then Scott. then Coleridge; and in i77S
and 1915 the philosophers Schelling and
Herbsrt. Then came a pause and there
came together. with a curious happi-
ness OF unhappiness, Byron and Schopen-
hauer, and u few years later Shelley
and then Keats.
The collocation OF these great names
brought DR.. Bradley TO the leading idea
of his lecture, the identity OF thought
in German philosophy and English poetry
In the beginning Of the nineteenth cen
ury. The first quarter OF that century
saw a magnificent outburst OF imagina-
tive literature in England and Of phi-
losophy in Germany. The English phi
losophy of this same period has much
less in common with English poetry
than had the German philosophy, and a
comparison of the English poetry with
the English philosophy would be com
parison OF something first rate with some
thing. at the best, second rate.
While English literature was exceed
ingly strong on the imaginative side. II
was exceptionally weak in other direc-
tons. Ii was the time OF the poets Words
worth, Coleridge. Byron, Shelley and
Keats, OF the novelists Scott, Jane Austen,
of the critics Coleridge, Hazlitt and
Lamb.
The mark ed inadequacy OF English
philosophy to English poetry was, said
DR.. Bradley, a peculiarly OF Words
worth's age. Ii is not found in the same
degree at any other period since the re-
vival of letters and not at all in the times
! OF Locke, Berkeley and Hume; and yet
! it showed a distinction of the English
/ or Ang lo-Saxon mind
Shakespeare was Of course only the
! topmost peak Of an immense mountain
chain. English poetry from Chaucer
onward is one OF the nations glories. Ii
! is in poetry and other imaginative liter.
ature that the English mind expresses
! it's deepest insight and feelings.
n. tod in no i,,na
OF Wordsworth that English poetry
showed little sympathy With English
philosophy and good deal with that Of
Germany. In all the great products OF
/ the time. poetic or phllosophic. there is
TO be felt an extraordinary intensity
! II was Z flood time.
Each of the poets and philosophers
seems to have caught sight OF something
! which excited and engrossed him, filed
/ him with burning thoughts and emo
tions and forced him TO uNerance and
creation. In estimating the value OF
! the movements We find their greatness
and defects were both connected with
this int ensity and inspiration.
In the poetry OF the time II betokered
! an unusually strong sense Of the great
ness OF the possibilities Of man or OF the
mind In Wordsworth and Hegel sense
OF the greatness of mans mind or spirit
which seemed to appear in all the more
noteworthy poetry and philosophy
showed itself strongly. At the same time
one could not say that Hegel would have
accepted everything Wordsworth said.
In speaking Of some ideas common to
those writer's he did not imply that those
ideas we're free from defect or proof
against criticism. but he did believe that
those periods in which and those men
in whom the mind was strongly felt to
be great saw deeper than others. The
time Of Wordsworth and Hegel was such
period; ours is not.
When the greatness OF the mind is felt
the period is great IL produces wonders.
The time OF Wordsworth and Hegel did
80, and ours does not. IL would seem
that after ls40 for many years scsrcely
any man Of genius was born in England
or any other country
The lecture teemed with impressions
and ideas. Perhaps one Of the most
interesting points raised was the question
why in an age when English poetry was
on one Of its noblest eminences English
philosophy. unlike that Of Germany
should have been 80 inadequate.
II a congress OF all the peoples OF the
past and present, said DR.. Bradley, were
collected for judgment the judges would
have TO deny to the English a position OF
eminence in sculpture. in music or even in
painting; but they would have TO give
sthe English the first prize in the art OF
government. and in poetry they would
have to admit that the English alone have
equalled the Greeks. Further. the English
would have TO accept the verdict that in
the realm Of philosophic or religious ideas
the English mind was not at its highest
England has no Plato or Aristotle or
HegcI, no st. Francis or Luther or
Pascal. None OF the greatest names in
philosophy is an English name. When, to
use Dr. Bradleys expression. the spiritual
temperament is at its highest the English
mind bursts into poetry, but not into
philosophy. The best English philosophy
comes from those ages when the spiritual
TEN permanent is subnormal and poetry
has grown nearer prose.
The greatest English philosophers ex-
press ideas incompatible with those OF
tho greatest poets. They belong 20 a
lower plane. The English mind sees more
deeply in its poetry than In its meta
physics English imagination accepts
what English understanding rejects.