Poems [7]
had juster notions of what was required in a song than many who have achieved celebrity as song-writers in England. 'The just office and notion of the modern song' has been defined to be, the embodiment and expression in beauty of some thought or sentiment--gay, pensive, moral, or sentimental--which is as natural and appropriate in certain circumstances as the odor to the flower. Its graceful purpose is to exhibit an incident in the substance of an emotion, to communicate wisdom in the form of sentiment. A song should be the embodiment of some general feeling, and have reference to some season or occurrence.
"It is not a difficult thing to make words rhyme; some of the most unimaginative intellects we ever knew could do so with surprising facility. It is rare to find a sentimental miss or a lackadaisical master who cannot accomplish this INTELLECTUAL feat, with the help of Walker's Rhyming Dictionary. As for love, why, every one writes about it now-a-days. There is such an abhorrence of the simple Saxon--such an outrageous running after outlandish phraseology--that we wonder folks are satisfied with this plain term.
"We wonder they do not seek for an equivalent in high Dutch or in low Dutch, in Hungarian, or in Hindostanee. We wish they would, with all our heart and soul. We have no objection, provided the heart be touched, that a head should produce a little of the stuff called 'nonsense verses'--that this article should be committed to scented note-paper, and carefully sealed up with skewered hearts of amazing corpulence. God forbid that we should be thought guilty of a sneer at real affection!--far from it; such ever commands our reverence. But we do not find it in the noisy tribe of goslings green who would fain be thought of the nightingale species. Did the reader ever contemplate a child engaged in the interesting operation of sucking a lollipop?--we assure him that that act was dictated by quite as much of true sentiment as puts in action the fingers and wits of the generality of our young amatory poetasters.
"We know of none who have written more charmingly of love than George P. Morris. Would to Apollo that our rhymsters would condescend to read carefully his poetical effusions! But they contain no straining after effect--no extravagant metaphors--no driveling conceits; and so there is little fear of their being taken as models by those gentlemen. Let the reader mark the surprising excellence of the love songs; their perfect naturalness; the quiet beauty of the similes; the fine blending of graceful thought and tender feeling which characterize them. Morris is, indeed, the poet of home joys. None have described more eloquently the beauty and dignity of true affection--of passion based upon esteem; and his fame is certain to endure while the Anglo-Saxon woman has a hearthstone over which to repeat her most cherished household words.
"Seldom have the benign effects of the passion been more felicitously painted than in the 'Seasons of Love'; and what simple tenderness is contained in the ballad of 'We were boys together.' Every word in that beautiful melody comes home to the heart of him whose early days have been happy. God help those in whom this poem awakens no fond remembrances!--those whose memories it does not get wandering up the stream of life, toward its source; beholding at every step the sun smiling more brightly, the heavens assuming a deeper hue, the grass a fresher green, and the flowers a sweeter perfume. How wondrous are not its effects upon ourselves! The wrinkles have disappeared from our brow, and the years from our shoulder, and the marks of the branding-iron of experience from our heart; and again we are a careless child, gathering primroses, and chasing butterflies, and drinking spring-water from out the hollow of our hands. Around us are the hedges 'with golden gorse bright blossoming, as none blossom now-a-day.' We have heard of death, but we know not what it is; and the word CHANGE has no meaning for us; and summer and winter, and seed-time and harvest, has
"It is not a difficult thing to make words rhyme; some of the most unimaginative intellects we ever knew could do so with surprising facility. It is rare to find a sentimental miss or a lackadaisical master who cannot accomplish this INTELLECTUAL feat, with the help of Walker's Rhyming Dictionary. As for love, why, every one writes about it now-a-days. There is such an abhorrence of the simple Saxon--such an outrageous running after outlandish phraseology--that we wonder folks are satisfied with this plain term.
"We wonder they do not seek for an equivalent in high Dutch or in low Dutch, in Hungarian, or in Hindostanee. We wish they would, with all our heart and soul. We have no objection, provided the heart be touched, that a head should produce a little of the stuff called 'nonsense verses'--that this article should be committed to scented note-paper, and carefully sealed up with skewered hearts of amazing corpulence. God forbid that we should be thought guilty of a sneer at real affection!--far from it; such ever commands our reverence. But we do not find it in the noisy tribe of goslings green who would fain be thought of the nightingale species. Did the reader ever contemplate a child engaged in the interesting operation of sucking a lollipop?--we assure him that that act was dictated by quite as much of true sentiment as puts in action the fingers and wits of the generality of our young amatory poetasters.
"We know of none who have written more charmingly of love than George P. Morris. Would to Apollo that our rhymsters would condescend to read carefully his poetical effusions! But they contain no straining after effect--no extravagant metaphors--no driveling conceits; and so there is little fear of their being taken as models by those gentlemen. Let the reader mark the surprising excellence of the love songs; their perfect naturalness; the quiet beauty of the similes; the fine blending of graceful thought and tender feeling which characterize them. Morris is, indeed, the poet of home joys. None have described more eloquently the beauty and dignity of true affection--of passion based upon esteem; and his fame is certain to endure while the Anglo-Saxon woman has a hearthstone over which to repeat her most cherished household words.
"Seldom have the benign effects of the passion been more felicitously painted than in the 'Seasons of Love'; and what simple tenderness is contained in the ballad of 'We were boys together.' Every word in that beautiful melody comes home to the heart of him whose early days have been happy. God help those in whom this poem awakens no fond remembrances!--those whose memories it does not get wandering up the stream of life, toward its source; beholding at every step the sun smiling more brightly, the heavens assuming a deeper hue, the grass a fresher green, and the flowers a sweeter perfume. How wondrous are not its effects upon ourselves! The wrinkles have disappeared from our brow, and the years from our shoulder, and the marks of the branding-iron of experience from our heart; and again we are a careless child, gathering primroses, and chasing butterflies, and drinking spring-water from out the hollow of our hands. Around us are the hedges 'with golden gorse bright blossoming, as none blossom now-a-day.' We have heard of death, but we know not what it is; and the word CHANGE has no meaning for us; and summer and winter, and seed-time and harvest, has