The                                          The                                        The                                                The                                             The                                           The                                           The                                            The

The whole objection, however, of the immorality of poetry rests upon a misconception of the manner in which poetry acts to produce the moral improvement of man. Ethical science arranges the elements which poetry has created, and propounds schemes and proposes examples of civil and domestic life: nor is it for want of admirable doctrines that men hate, and despise, and censure, and deceive, and subjugate one another. But poetry acts in another and diviner manner. It awakens an

Summoned in such consoling tones and invited with such kindness, like earthly Mercuries, we shall fly on winged feet to embrace that most blessed mother and there enjoy the peace we have longed for: that most holy peace, that indivisible union, that seamless friendship through which all souls will not only be at one in that one mind which is above every mind, but, in a manner which passes expression, will really be one, in the most profound depths of being. This is the friend

A poem is the very image of life expressed in its eternal truth. There is this difference between a story and a poem, that a story is a catalogue of detached facts, which have no other connection than time, place, circumstance, cause and effect; the other is the creation of actions according to the unchangeable forms of human nature, as existing in the mind of the Creator, which is itself the image of all other minds. The one is partial, and applies only to a definite period

Part Four: Time and Eternity X I DIED for beauty, but was scarce Adjusted in the tomb, When one who died for truth was lain In an adjoining room. He questioned softly why I failed? “For beauty,” I replied. “And I for truth,—the two are one; We brethren are,” he said. And so, as kinsmen met a night, We talked between the rooms, Until the moss had reached our lips, And covered up our names. Emily Dickinson, without doubt, earned her title as one of the Masters of Literature.

Who then will not look with awe upon this our chameleon, or who, at least, will look with greater admiration on any other being? This creature, man, whom Asclepius the Athenian, by reason of this very mutability, this nature capable of transforming itself, quite rightly said was symbolized in the mysteries by the figure of Proteus. This is the source of those metamorphoses, or transformations, so celebrated among the Hebrews and among the Pythagoreans; for even the esoteric t

Language, color, form, and religious and civil habits of action, are all the instruments and materials of poetry; they may be called poetry by that figure of speech which considers the effect as a synonym of the cause. But poetry in a more restricted sense expresses those arrangements of language, and especially metrical language, which are created by that imperial faculty, whose throne is curtained within the invisible nature of man. And this springs from the nature itself o

Most esteemed Fathers, I have read in the ancient writings of the Arabians that Abdala the Saracen on being asked what, on this stage, so to say, of the world, seemed to him most evocative of wonder, replied that there was nothing to be seen more marvelous than man. And that celebrated exclamation of Hermes Trismegistus, “What a great miracle is man, Asclepius” confirms this opinion. And still, as I reflected upon the basis assigned for these estimations, I was not fully pe

They say that when we fall in love it is forever, and perhaps that is true. Even though we change who we are through time, through our life experiences, through emotions, through the dreams and hopes we follow, we remember and we forget; and even though those whom we love change as well . . . Love persists in our souls eternally, as a timeless flame. ~ "A Poet to his Beloved" by William Butler Yeats I bring you with reverent hands the books of m numberless dreams, White wo

Listen . . . Do you hear that? Perhaps it’s hard to hear with all those cars running by, or with all the rumbling and grumbling the factories make when you pass by. But the music of sound is always playing for those who listen. William Wordsworth (1770-1850) may be one of the best icons to represent the Romantic Movement. With the Lyrical Ballads composed with his friend Samuel Coleridge and many marvelous poems he wrote throughout his life, Wordsworth proves to be a Master

Following the Parnassian French poets of the late 19th century, comes one named Paul Verlaine, whose writings lead to inspire and shape the twentieth-century free verse. Hereby I shall present to you “The Art of Poetry” The Art of Poetry by Paul Verlaine You must have music first of all, and for that a rhythm uneven is best. vague in the air and soluble, with nothing heavy and nothing at rest. You must not scorn to do some wrong in choosing the words to fill your lines: