The commercial. (Union City, Tenn.) 190?-193?, 1913-08-15

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to have been very ample. The spirit
Of the lightning and thunder, the storm
and the earthquake. or any great natural
upheaval, does not play very conspic-
uous part in his poetry. Neither was
universal nature to him, in any mood,
a really liyiog, breathing presence. The
language Of grasses, flowers, trees,
brooks, rivers, mountains, stars or
heavens, did not possess for him the
significance Of POLITICALLY Ineligible
language. Still. that he was capable
Of sympathetically associating with
natural objects is proved by his poem
to the River Charles. Vet natural
things certainly lacked for him the
purely human touch. No chiseled
Sphinx, no peaked-towered Monadnoc
or Talkative Oak related to him in audi
BILE and articulate language their philo-
sophical lore or garrulous love story.
The deeper poetic sympathy for nature
or dumb animals was not his. No
flowers, / should think, awoke such
thoughts in him fas do often lie too
deep for tears. And there were no
tears in him for wounded hare or an
uprooted mount II daisy. Burns, writ
ing Of rugged, cold winter night, says
very touchingly
II thought me on the ourie cattle
Or silly sheep, who bide this battle
Owinter war
Such thoughts and sentiments have
their source in the deepest springs Of
the human heart, for no other brutes
claim so little of our sympathy as the
dumb cattle. Men will sometimes pet
even vicious horse, but the poor OK,
though painting and straining against
the yoke with all his might, receives
nothing but curses and brutal blows.
While Longfellow certainly lacked
Burns deep sympathy for nature and
the lower animals, he loved humanity,
and il is not strange that humanity
should love him, or, considering the
nature OF his poems, that they should
be very popular.
The constitution OF Mr.. Longfellow's
mind was certainly not highly intellec-
tual. His writings do not betray Emer-
sons keen intellectually Or deep and
penetrating vision Of the heartof things,
nor even Whittier's shrewdness, depth
and vigor Of thought, or Bryant's deep
grasp Of natures inner meaning. All
the more intense and brilliant points
and angles Of genius in him are yelled
and toned down SO that nowhere does
it emit sparkling rays Or fervid heat.
Yet am inclined to believe that some
Of this yelling and softening was self
imposed for the sake of art. For it is
certainly fault il poetry to be too
keen, epigrammatic Or angularly bril-
liant; rather should the whole be more
mildly and uniformly luminous. A great
poem is always uniformly deep and
sublime in thought, sonorous in mel
ody and stately and flowing, like great
river, in movement, rather than irreg-
ularIy keen, spasmodically bright and
undignifedIy rapid Even q great poem,
however, must move. like everything
else, by pulsations, by rising and fall
ing. The subtle and keen philosopher
rather has tho better Of the poet in
Emerson's verse, yet often the result Is
lofty and grand. Still u Mr. Long
fellows poetry, we do not find any I'M
usual depth Or Ioiuness Of thought or
sentimentor any powerfully grand sweep
Of movement, either yelled or openly
revealed, from which we must suppose
that be was lacking il the profound in
sight and sublime vision Of the great
masters. Yet believe that it is highly
probable that be preferred to write in q
plain, simple style that bis poems might
be ineligible 70 ALL II is certainly