F. T. to W. M.:—
"Many thanks for the Edinburgh, which has indeed pleased me. I did not expect such an enthusiastic review of my work, and particularly of my last book, from a periodical so conservative and slow-moving. I am very gratified by what you say about Meredith. You know, I think, that I hold him the most unquestionable genius among living novelists. I have read five of his novels: Harry Richmond, Evan Harrington, Richard Feverel, Diana of the Crossways, One of our Conquerors. Nothing beyond this."
In another letter he again mentions the Edinburgh reviewer:—
"The writer shows not only taste, but what is nowadays as rare, that acquaintance with the range of English poetry, which ought to be a natural essential in the equipment of any poetical critic. Even where he is mistaken, he is intelligently mistaken. One remark goes curiously home—that on the higher poetic rank of metaphor as compared to simile. It has always been a principle of my own; so much so, that I never use a simile if I can use a metaphor. The observation on the burden of the poem to Sylvia shows a metrical sense unfortunately very unusual in our day."
CHAPTER VIII: OF WORDS; OF ORIGINS; OF METRE
The Morning Post reviewer dwelt on his "incomprehensible sentiments and unknown words," and even his friends had before publication warned him that his meanings were lost in the "foam and roar of his phraseology."
Lionel Johnson was hardly more candid than some others when he said of Francis Thompson that he had done more to harm the English language than the worst American newspapers: corruptio optimi pessima. And Mr. Gosse saw him as the defiler of the purity of the English language.