I can not write of this thing in heat. It is a far too serious matter.
The classics "escape." They are "immune" "ordinarily." I can but close with the cadences of that blessed Little Brother of Christ, San Francesco d'Assisi:
CANTICO DEL SOLE
The thought of what America would be like
If the classics had a wide circulation
Troubles my sleep,
The thought of what America,
The thought of what America,
The thought of what America would be like
If the classics had a wide circulation
Troubles my sleep,
Nunc dimittis, Now lettest thou thy servant,
Now lettest thou thy servant
Depart in peace.
The thought of what America,
The thought of what America,
The thought of what America would be like
If the classics had a wide circulation....
Oh well!
It troubles my sleep.
Oravimus
[1] Prufrock and Other Observations, by T.S. Eliot. The Egoist, London. Essay first published in Poetry, 1917.
[2] A.D. 1917.
[3] The Future, May, 1918.
[4] "A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man." Egoist, Ltd. London. Huebsch, New York.
[5] Little Review.
[6] Egoist, Ltd., 23, Adelphi Terrace House, Robert Street, W.C. 2. 6s. net. Knopf, New York, $1.50. Reviewed in The Future.
[7] "Eminent Victorians," by Lytton Strachey.