Selections From American Poetry | Page 6

proximity to Longfellow. Genuine he was, but his spirit was less buoyant than Longfellow's and he touches our hearts less. Most of his early poems were devoted to a current political issue. They aimed to win converts to the cause of anti-slavery. Such poems always suffer in time in comparison with the song of a man who sings because "the heart is so full that a drop overfills it." Whittier's later poems belong more to this class and some of them speak to-day to our emotions as well as to our intellects. "The Hero" moves us with a desire to serve mankind, and the stirring tone of "Barbara Frietchie" arouses our patriotism by its picture of the same type of bravery. In similar vein is "Barclay of Ury," which must have touched deeply the heart of the Quaker poet. "The Pipes of Lucknow" is dramatic in its intense grasp of a climactic hour and loses none of its force in the expression. We can actually hear the skirl of the bagpipes. Whittier knew the artiste of the world and talked to us about Raphael and Burns with clear-sighted, affectionate interest. His poems show varied characteristics; the love of the sterner aspects of nature, modified by the appreciation of the humble flower; the conscience of the Puritan, tinged with sympathy for the sorrowful; the steadfastness of the Quaker, stirred by the fire of the patriot.
The poetry of Ralph Waldo Emerson is marked by serious contemplation rather than by warmth of emotional expression. In Longfellow the appeal is constantly to a heart which is not disassociated from a brain; in Emerson the appeal is often to the intellect alone. We recognize the force of the lesson in "The Titmouse," even if it leaves us less devoted citizens than does "The Hero" and less capable women than does "Evangeline." He reaches his highest excellence when he makes us feel as well as understand a lesson, as in "The Concord Hymn" and "Forbearance." If we could all write on the tablets of our hearts that single stanza, forbearance would be a real factor in life. And it is to this poet whom we call unemotional that we owe this inspiring quatrain:
"So nigh is grandeur to our dust,
So near is God to man,
When duty whispers low, Thou must,
The youth replies, I can!"
James Russell Lowell was animated by a well-defined purpose which he described in the following lines:
"It may be glorious to write
Thoughts that make glad the two or three
High souls like those far stars that come in sight
Once in a century.

But better far it is to speak
One simple word which, now and then
Shall waken their free nature in the weak
And friendless sons of men.

To write some earnest verse or line
Which, seeking not the praise of art,

Shall make a clearer faith and manhood shine
In the untutored heart."
His very accomplishments made it difficult for him to reach this aim, since his poetry does not move "the untutored heart" so readily as does that of Longfellow or Whittier. It is, on the whole, too deeply burdened with learning and too individual in expression to fulfil his highest desire. Of his early poems the most generally known is probably "The Vision of Sir Launfal," in which a strong moral purpose is combined with lines of beautiful nature