第9章 Lanier's Poetry: Its Themes(4)

"But Thee, but Thee, O sovereign Seer of time, But Thee, O poets' Poet, Wisdom's Tongue, But Thee, O man's best Man, O love's best Love, O perfect life in perfect labor writ, O all men's Comrade, Servant, King, or Priest, --What IF or YET, what mole, what flaw, what lapse, What least defect or shadow of defect, What rumor, tattled by an enemy, Of inference loose, what lack of grace Even in torture's grasp, or sleep's, or death's --Oh, what amiss may I forgive in Thee, Jesus, good Paragon, Thou Crystal Christ?"2How tenderly Lanier was touched by the life of our Lord may be seen in his `Ballad of Trees and the Master', a dramatic presentation of the scene in Gethsemane and on Calvary.How implicit was his trust in the Christ may be gathered from this paragraph in a letter to the elder Hayne:

"I have a boy whose eyes are blue as your `Aethra's'.Every day when my work is done I take him in my strong arms, and lift him up, and pore in his face.The intense repose, penetrated somehow with a thrilling mystery of `potential activity', which dwells in his large, open eye, teaches me new things.I say to myself, Where are the strong arms in which I, too, might lay me and repose, and yet be full of the fire of life? And always through the twilight come answers from the other world, `Master! Master! there is one -- Christ --in His arms we rest!'"3 Perhaps, however, Lanier's notion of God, whom he declared4 all his roads reached, is most clearly expressed in a scrap quoted by Ward, apparently the outline for a poem:

"I fled in tears from the men's ungodly quarrel about God.

I fled in tears to the woods, and laid me down on the earth.

Then somewhat like the beating of many hearts came up to me out of the ground;and I looked and my cheek lay close to a violet.Then my heart took courage, and I said: `I know that thou art the word of my God, dear Violet.

And oh, the ladder is not long that to my heaven leads.

Measure what space a violet stands above the ground.'Tis no further climbing that my soul and angels have to do than that.'"5 In this high spirituality Lanier is in line with the greatest poets of our race, from"Caedmon, in the morn A-calling angels with the cow-herd's call That late brought up the cattle,"6to him"Who never turned his back, but marched breast forward, Never doubted clouds would break, Never dreamed, though right were worsted, wrong would triumph, Held we fall to rise, are baffled to fight better, Sleep to wake."71 1 John 4:16.

2 `The Crystal', ll.100-111.

3 Hayne's `A Poet's Letters to a Friend'.

4 In `A Florida Sunday', l.85.

5 Ward's `Memorial', p.xxxix.

6 Lanier's `The Crystal', ll.90-93.

7 Browning's `Asolando': Epilogue, ll.11-15.

Perhaps I may append here a paragraph upon Lanier's criticisms of other writers, for they seem to me acute in the extreme.

Despite the elaborate essays in defence of Whitman's poetry by Dowden,1 Symonds,2 and Whitman himself, I believe Lanier is right in declaring that "Whitman is poetry's butcher.Huge raw collops slashed from the rump of poetry and never mind gristle --is what Whitman feeds our souls with.As near as I can make it out, Whitman's argument seems to be, that, because a prairie is wide, therefore debauchery is admirable, and because the Mississippi is long, therefore every American is God."3 Notice, again, how well the defect of `Paradise Lost' is pointed out:

"And I forgive Thee, Milton, those thy comic-dreadful wars Where, armed with gross and inconclusive steel, Immortals smite immortals mortalwise And fill all heaven with folly."4Few better things have been said of Langland than this, --"That with but a touch Of art hadst sung Piers Plowman to the top Of English songs, whereof 'tis dearest, now And most adorable;"5or of Emerson than this, "Most wise, that yet, in finding Wisdom, lost Thy Self, sometimes;"6or of Tennyson than this, "Largest voice Since Milton, yet some register of wit Wanting."7`The Crystal' abounds in such happy characterizations.

1 See Dowden's `Studies in Literature', pp.468-523.

2 See Symonds's `Walt Whitman: A Study'.London, 1893.

3 Ward's `Memorial', p.xxxviii.

4 `The Crystal', ll.66-70.

5 Ibid., ll.87-90.

6 Ibid., ll.93-94.

7 Ibid., ll.95-97.