Seven essays which regard poetry from the standpoint of the moralist,—the moralist who thinks that “In the wretched degradation into which belles lettres have fallen we seem to be losing all sense of the importance once attached to them, when critics were scholars and poets something more than aesthetes.” The essays are The poetry and poets of America, The collected work of Lord Byron, The collected poems of Mr. William Watson, The poetry of Gerald Massey, Miltonic myths and their authors, Longinus and Greek criticism, and the True functions of poetry.
“In this book Mr. Churton Collins writes as a pessimist.”
– Acad. 69: 1305. D. 16, ’05. 1850w.
“As a critic, Prof. Collins has a cultivated taste, but his instinct is unsure.”
+ – Ath. 1905, 2: 857. D. 23. 1720w.
“Impeccable in scholarship. Mr. Collins has not in this volume avoided one or two minor slips of style, probably due to careless proofreading.”
+ – Nation. 82: 472. Je. 7, ’06. 1590w.
“A genuine by-product of scholarship, true essays, containing not any sound doctrine, but the human touch which alone is able to convey the results of scholarship to those who stand outside the bars of that snug pasture.” H. W. Boynton.
+ + N. Y. Times. 11: 98. F. 17, ’06. 5700w.