Day after day, day after day, Upon a painted ocean. Water, water, everywhere, And all the boards did shrink; Nor any drop to drink. The very deep did rot :-O Christ! That ever this should be! Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs About, about, in reel and rout The water, like a witch's oils, 6 218. From CHRISTABEL.' It was a lovely sight to see Her face, oh call it fair not pale, And both blue eyes more bright than clear, Each about to have a tear. With open eyes (ah woe is me!) Asleep, and dreaming fearfully, Alas! they had been friends in youth; With Roland and Sir Leoline. Each spake words of high disdain To free the hollow heart from paining- 1. I wis: Coleridge seems to have fallen into the usual blunder of making this word a pronoun and verb. For its true explanation see note 4, extract 25. Like cliffs which had been rent asunder; The marks of that which once hath been. 2. Between is bi-twegen, by the twain; the be standing for by, as in because, besides, behind, &c. 219. From THE LECTURES ON SHAKESPEARE. Assuredly that criticism of Shakespeare will alone be genial which is reverential. The Englishman, who, without reverence, a proud and affectionate reverence, can utter the name of William Shakespeare, stands disqualified for the office of critic. He wants one at least of the very senses, the language of which he is to employ, and will discourse at best, but as a blind man, while the whole harmonious creation of light and shade with all its subtle interchange of deepening and dissolving colours, rises in silence to the silent fiat of the uprising Apollo. However inferior in ability I may be to some who have followed me, I own I am proud that I was the first in time who publicly demonstrated to the full extent of the position, that the supposed irregularity and extravagances of Shakespeare were the mere dreams of a pedantry1 that arraigned the eagle because it had not the dimensions of the swan. In all the successive courses of lectures delivered by me, since my first attempt at the Royal Institution, it has been, and it still remains, my object, to prove that in all points, from the most important to the most minute, the judgment of Shakespeare is commensurate with his genius - nay, that his genius reveals itself in his judgment, as in its most exalted form. And the more gladly do I recur to this subject from the clear conviction, that to judge aright, and with distinct consciousness of the grounds of our judgment, concerning the works of Shakespeare, implies the power and the means of judging rightly of all other works of intellect, those of abstract science alone excepted. 1. Pedantry, such conduct as is found in a pedant, Fr. pédant, who took his name from L. L. padare, which is de rived from Gk. raideve. A pedant, according to Halliwell, is a teacher of languages. It is a painful truth that not only individuals, but even whole nations, are ofttimes so enslaved to the habits of their education and immediate circumstances, as not to judge disinterestedly even on those subjects, the very pleasure arising from which consists in its disinterestedness, namely, on subjects of taste and polite literature. Instead of deciding concerning their own modes and customs by any rule of reason, nothing appears rational, becoming, or beautiful to them, but what coincides with the peculiarities of their education. In this narrow circle, individuals may attain to exquisite discrimination, as the French critics have done in their own literature; but a true critic can no more be such without placing himself on some central point, from which he may command the whole, that is, some general rule, which, founded in reason, or the faculties common to all men, must therefore apply to each, than an astronomer can explain the movements of the solar system without taking his stand in the sun. And let me remark, that this will not tend to produce despotism, but, on the contrary, true tolerance, in the critic. He will, indeed, require, as the spirit and substance of a work, something true in human nature itself, and independent of all circumstances; but in the mode of applying it, he will estimate genius and judgment according to the felicity with which the imperishable soul of intellect shall have adapted itself to the age,2 the place, and the existing manners. The error he will expose, lies in reversing this, and holding up the mere circumstances as perpetual to the utter neglect of the power which can alone animate them. For art cannot exist without, or apart from, nature; and what has man of his own to give to his fellow3 man but his own thoughts and feelings, and his observations, so far as they are modified by his own thoughts and feelings? 2. Age is an instructive instance of the love of contraction in the Romance tongues. It comes through O. Fr. edage from ætaticum, just as homage from hominaticum (Diez). 3. Fellow: M. E. felaze, felaw, L. L. felagus, is, properly speaking, a partner in property, from fee, substance, and lag, a bond of agreement. The O. N. is felagi, from felag, association. SPECS. ENG. LIT. Y Robert Southey. 1774-1843. (History, p. 240.) 220. THE BATTLE OF BLENHEIM. It was a summer evening, Old Kaspar's work was done, And by him sported on the green She saw her brother Peterkin Roll something large and round, Which he beside the rivulet, In playing there, had found; He came to ask what he had found, That was so large, and smooth, and round. Old Kaspar took it from the boy, Who stood expectant by ; And then the old man shook his head, And with a natural sigh, ""Tis some poor fellow's skull," said he, "Who feil in the great victory. "I find them in the garden, For there's many here about; And often, when I go to plough, The ploughshare turns them out! For many thousand men," said he, "Were slain in that great victory." "Now tell us what 'twas all about," "Now tell us all about the war, And what they killed each other for." |