How does it come about that, in affirming the perniciousness of the poet's passionate temperament, the man of the street, the philosopher, and the puritan are for the nonce in agreement? The man of the street is not averse to feeling, as a rule, even when it is carried to egregious lengths of sentimentality. A stroll through a village when all the victrolas are in operation would settle this point unequivocally for any doubter. It seems that the philistine's quarrel with the poet arises from the fact that, unlike the makers of phonograph records, the poet dares to follow feeling in defiance of public sentiment. Like the conservative that he is, the philistine gloats over the poet's lapses from virtue because, in setting aside mass-feeling as a gauge of right and wrong, and in setting up, instead, his own individual feelings as a rule of conduct, the poet displays an arrogance that deserves a fall. The philosopher, like the philistine, may tolerate feeling within limits. His sole objection to the poet lies in the fact that, far from making emotion the handmaiden of the reason, as the philosopher would do, the poet exalts emotion to a seat above the reason, thus making feeling the supreme arbiter of conduct. The puritan, of course, gives vent to the most bitter hostility of all, for, unlike the philistine and the philosopher, he regards natural feeling as wholly corrupt. Therefore he condemns the poet's indulgence of his passionate nature with equal severity whether he is within or without the popular confines of proper conduct, or whether or not his conduct may be proved reasonable.
Much of the inconsistency in the poet's exhibitions of his moral character may be traced to the fact that he is addressing now one, now another, of his accusers. The sobriety of his arguments with the philosopher has sometimes been interpreted by the man of the street as cowardly side-stepping. On the other hand, the poet's bravado in defying the man of the street might be interpreted by the philosopher as an acknowledgment of imperviousness to reason.
It seems as though the first impulse of the poet were to set his back against the wall and deal with all his antagonists at once, by challenging their right to pry into his private conduct. It is true that certain poets of the last century have believed it beneath their dignity to pay any attention to the insults and persecution of the public. But though a number have maintained an air of stolid indifference so long as the attacks have remained personal, few or none have been content to disregard defamation of a departed singer.
The public cannot maintain, in many instances, that this vicarious indignation arises from a sense of sharing the frailties of the dead poet who is the direct object of attack. Not thus may one account for the generous heat of Whittier, of Richard Watson Gilder, of Robert Browning, of Tennyson, in rebuking the public which itches to make a posthumous investigation of a singer's character. [Footnote: See Whittier, My Namesake; Richard W. Gilder, A Poet's Protest, and Desecration; Robert Browning, House; Tennyson, In Memoriam.] Tennyson affords a most interesting example of sensitiveness with nothing, apparently, to conceal. There are many anecdotes of his morbid shrinking from public curiosity, wholly in key with his cry of abhorrence,
Now the poet cannot die
Nor leave his music as of old,
But round him ere he scarce be cold
Begins the scandal and the cry:
Proclaim the faults he would not show,
Break lock and seal; betray the trust;
Keep nothing sacred; 'tis but just
The many-headed beast should know.
In protesting against the right of the public to judge their conduct, true poets refuse to bring themselves to a level with their accusers by making the easiest retort, that they are made of exactly the same clay as is the hoi polloi that assails them. This sort of recrimination is characteristic of a certain blustering type of claimant for the title of poet, such as Joaquin Miller, a rather disorderly American of the last generation, who dismissed attacks upon the singer with the words,
Yea, he hath sinned. Who hath revealed
That he was more than man or less?
[Footnote: Burns and Byron.]
The attitude is also characteristic of another anomalous type which flourished in America fifty years ago, whose verse represents an attempted fusion of emasculated poetry and philistine piety. A writer of this type moralizes impartially over the erring bard and his accusers,
Sin met thy brother everywhere,
And is thy brother blamed?
From passion, danger, doubt and care
He no exemption claimed.
[Footnote: Ebenezer Eliot, Burns.]
But genuine poets refuse to compromise themselves by admitting that they are no better than other men.