Thus one finds Byron characteristically asserting, "I hold
virtue, in general, or the virtues generally, to be only in the
disposition, each a _feeling,_ not a principle." [Footnote: _Letter to
Charles Dallas,_ January 21, 1808.]
On the other hand, one occasionally meets a point of view as opposite as
that of Poe, who believed that the poet, no less than the philosopher,
is governed by reason solely,--that the poetic imagination is a purely
intellectual function. [Footnote: See the _Southern Literary
Messenger,_ II, 328, April, 1836.]
The philosopher could have no quarrel with him. Between the two extremes
are the more thoughtful of the Victorian poets,--Browning, Tennyson,
Arnold, Clough, whose taste leads them so largely to intellectual
pursuits that it is difficult to say whether their principles of moral
conduct arise from the poetical or the philosophical part of their
natures.
The most profound utterances of poets on this subject, however, show
them to be, not rationalists, but thoroughgoing Platonists. The feeling
in which they trust is a Platonic intuition which includes the reason,
but exists above it.
Pages:
324
325
326
327
328
329
330
331
332
333
334
335
336
337
338
339
340
341
342
343
344
345
346
347
348