The urgent metrical sentence of poetry seems to me to soar far more suddenly and strike with a sharper shock [The figure is of a falcon] (I. xxvi).
These good people (Vergil and Lucretius) had no need of keen and subtle antitheses. Their diction is all full, and big with a natural and constant force. They are all epigram, not only the tail, but the head, the stomach, and the feet.... It is an eloquence not merely soft and faultless; it is prompt and firm, not so much pleasing as filling and quickening the strongest minds. When I see those brave forms of expression, so vivid, so deep, I do not call it good speaking; I call it good thinking (III. v).[91]
So he cannot stomach that Renaissance imitation which ran to borrowing, nor that display of Latin style for itself which published even private letters.
Those indiscreet writers of our century who go sowing in their worthless works whole passages from the ancients to honor themselves (I. xxvi).
But it surpasses all baseness of heart in persons of their rank that they have sought to derive a principal part of their fame from chatter and gossip, even to using the private letters written to their friends (I. xl).
So he is impatient with the unreality of romance.
Going to war only after having announced it, and often after having assigned the hour and place of battle (I. v).
Those Lancelots, Amadis, Huons, and such clutter of books to amuse children (I. xxvi).
Reviewing contemporary criticism of poetry, he says: “We have more poets than judges and interpreters of poetry; it is easier to make it than to know it” (I. xxxvii). “You may make a fool of yourself anywhere else,” he warns, “but not in poetry” (II. xvii). So there is no room for mediocre poetry.